Proud sponsors of Weekends on Dave
By Catherine Faiers, Auto Trader Chief Operating Officer
As part of our continued commitment to support the industry in its recovery from the COVID-19 lockdown, Auto Trader will begin sponsoring ‘Weekends on Dave’, a premium schedule on one of the UK’s most popular digital TV channels. The campaign will help drive even more potential buyers to retailers’ adverts on our marketplace, which is currently seeing record levels of shoppers.
Running for 12 months, reaching 25.2 million UK adults
The TV sponsorship of ‘Weekends on Dave’ will run from the second weekend of August for 12 months, demonstrating a long-term TV sponsorship for Auto Trader. It follows the ‘Car buying’s back’ digital campaign, which launched to coincide with forecourts reopening in England and designed to promote the industry was back to business. During the campaign, it achieved over 26 million completed views (across 20s, 30s videos and 6s bumper formats) on YouTube, 43 million impressions across YouTube and display and 61K click throughs to articles addressing consumer confusion in the car buying journey.
The new sponsorship will deliver a stand-out series of 10 second adverts that hero the different lifestyles and experiences cars offer UK drivers at the weekend. An average of eight will be shown per hour across peak and daytime hours, reaching 25 million adults over 12 months, an audience that has historically performed well for Auto Trader TV advertising in terms of both brand consideration and response.
To be seen across some of the most popular shows
Dave’s premium programming targets a male, upmarket audience, popular also with UK in-market car buyers. Marquee weekend programming includes shows such as Mock the Week, Have I Got News for You, Top Gear, Live at the Apollo and Red Dwarf. The channel had the third highest monthly reach on all platforms in 2019, reaching 17.6 million adults, behind only E4 and ITV2.
We’ll continue to support the industry in its recovery
Whilst demand on our marketplace shows no sign of abating, we are acutely aware the industry needs to maintain a strong level of consumer appetite if it is to recover from the full impact of three months of lockdown. From the very beginning, we have been committed to doing all we can to support our retail partners and the wider industry. Sponsorship of Dave is the next phase of that commitment and will provide us with incredible reach and an exciting opportunity to engage with a broad audience of new and used car buyers.