NEW YORK AUTO SHOW
Reigniting an icon
The New York International Auto Show is one of the nation's first and best international automobile shows, the oldest and largest attended auto show in North America, bringing automotive innovation, ride and drive experiences, concept vehicles, and the latest cars and trucks to the Javits Center every year.
Filling the floor, all over again
The 2022 show marked the return of live experiences after a two-year COVID-19 hiatus, so momentum, habits, and audiences all had to be rebuilt from a standing start. Ruckus was asked to strategize and deploy a robust digital marketing effort to drive ticket sales and event awareness as fans returned to the Javits Center floor.
The engagement ran as a year-long program, from a July 2021 kickoff through the show's return in April 2022, spanning social, paid media, web, and email, engineered to turn attention into tickets.
Four gears, one engine
Social media drove awareness and everyday excitement using Instagram Reels and Collabs, partnering with automakers exhibiting at the show, running seven digital activations, and reposting fan content daily. Bold, motion-forward creative carried the show's red and chrome identity across every placement, all pointing at one call to action: buy tickets.
Paid campaigns on Google and Facebook captured high-intent searches and remarketed to warm audiences, tuned for the more than 75 percent of ticket-site traffic arriving on mobile. A dedicated website workstream shipped rolling releases ahead of the show, streamlining the ticket flow and reworking exhibitor pages for a faster path to the floor.
The show came roaring back
Press days alone drove 827.7K impressions, and the social campaign closed with 5.3 million total impressions and a 109.9 percent lift in engagements versus the 2019 show. Paid media added 1.5 million impressions and 26,000 Buy Tickets clicks, while the rebuilt website lifted time on site by 20 percent.
Across the campaign, 40,000 tickets sold through ad placements, engagement rose 350 percent versus the last in-person show, and the ticket conversion rate on paid campaigns hit 8 percent, the show's aisles filling back up with it.
