The archive · Marketing & Growth · Marketing decision · 2024–2025
Dacia lets skeptical Moroccan buyers test-drive with real owners
Moroccans trusted owners over ads, so Dacia built an app matching prospective buyers with real Dacia owners for peer test drives — and sales rose.
Dacia
What it had to solve
Dacia sold affordable cars in Morocco, but buyers were skeptical: research showed Moroccans trusted personal recommendations over brand messaging, and the traditional test drive was hard to get because dealerships had long waiting times. The brand's affordability did not translate into trust, so VML Casablanca had to rebuild the relationship with an audience that wanted real experiences rather than marketing.
How it works
Dacia's affordable cars should have sold themselves in Morocco, but they did not: research showed Moroccans trusted personal recommendations far more than brand messaging, and the official test drive was often out of reach because dealerships kept customers waiting. Skepticism sat between the product and the purchase.
With VML Casablanca, Dacia decided the salesperson was the problem and made owners the solution. The Test My Dacia app connected prospective buyers with real Dacia owners nearby, letting them borrow the owner's experience: an honest test drive of a real car with real answers, with no showroom pressure and no waiting list.
The idea treated authenticity as a medium. Owners who volunteered became brand ambassadors with nothing to sell and everything to show, and each genuine recommendation was content the market would actually believe. Appointments spread through word of mouth and social channels rather than paid persuasion.
The results proved the trust gap was the bottleneck: 17.8 million organic impressions, a 150% rise in test drives and 80% positive brand response from participants, followed by a 30% increase in repeat app visits and a 16% sales lift. The work took a Gold Creative Strategy Lynx at Dubai Lynx 2025 and a Silver at the AME Awards.
Why it lands
- Peer owners answer the skepticism a salesperson cannot, because they have nothing to gain from the sale.
- Test drives that happen at the owner's convenience remove the waiting time that blocked the traditional route.
- Real experiences travel as word of mouth, which is the channel Moroccans said they trusted most.
- The app made the brand's own customers its media, converting satisfaction into acquisition.
What it did
The peer-to-peer format turned skepticism into evidence: the campaign generated 17.8 million organic impressions, a 150% increase in test drives and an 80% positive brand response from participants. Dubai Lynx reported a 30% rise in repeat app visits and a 16% increase in sales, and the work won a Gold Creative Strategy Lynx at Dubai Lynx 2025 plus a Silver at the AME Awards.
What you can take
When a market trusts people over brands, hand the selling to real owners — the product's most credible media channel is its existing customers.
Since then
Test My Dacia ran in Morocco through 2024 and into 2025, building a pool of volunteer owners who kept giving test drives to strangers. Beyond the direct results — 17.8 million organic impressions, 150% more test drives, 80% positive brand response and a 16% sales increase — it showed how a challenger automaker can use its installed base as a trust engine. It collected a Gold Creative Strategy Lynx at Dubai Lynx 2025 and a Silver at the AME Awards, becoming a reference for turning customer skepticism into a distribution strategy instead of arguing against it.
Sources
- Dacia: Test My Dacia
- Winners Spotlight — Test My Dacia (Gold, Creative Strategy Lynx)
- AME Awards Winners Gallery — Test My Dacia, Silver, Best Use of Medium: Activation & Engagement
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