In 1908, despite many people’s skepticism about the future of cars, William C. Durant curated together a diverse group of automobile ventures and finest minds to form General Motors, transforming the future of automotive industry, and the world. Decades later, his fearless spirit continues to lead the way and inspires the establishment of the Durant Guild, first community-driven D2C platform for GM’s premium import business in China.

In today’s China, successful, ultra high-net-worth individuals are looking beyond their personal achievements and strive to do their part to contribute to the larger society. The Durant Guild’s mission is to bring together a community of these visionary individuals, who may come from all walks of life, but share the same believe of “what I do matters.” The challenge is how do we appeal to them in a genuine, authentic way, and connect with them in the long run.

We’ve all used voice assistant at some point. They tend to be transactional, and distant. We wonder, is it possible to humanize technology to help build a long term personal relationship with members? Can voice be more intimate, more human? One that you can not just hear, but can see, touch and feel?

As part of the exclusive Durant House event, we launched the “Hello Billy” multi-sensory immersive experience where we humanize voice interaction through sound, sight and touch to connect with the Durant Guild community. For the first time, guests learned about the inspiration of Voice of Billy, and interact one on one as if meeting a new friend, and contribute to the future collective fearless spirit of Billy.

Target audience:

Successful, ultra high-net-worth individuals in China, who are looking beyond their personal achievements and fearlessly striving to do their part to contribute to the larger society.

Approach:

- Creating immersive 1:1 bespoke experiences to connect, inspire and co-create a diverse lifestyle community together.

- Target tier 1 cities with high concentration of potential TA — starting with Shanghai with diverse, high disposable income professionals, and Shenzhen with young, start up and tech entrepreneurs.

- A 6m x 6m futuristic holographic space, Billy’s dynamic voice visualization is projected onto a circular, double-layered mesh wall, immersing visitors in Voice of Billy.

- Scan QR code to activate Billy’s friendly, confident voice through headphones.

- Mesh wall’s built-in motion sensors trigger tactile audiovisual interaction when visitor touches it to connect with Billy.

- As Billy invites visitors to tell us what fearless means to them, voice recognition combines with touch triggers secondary light projections from their hand, and see their “thoughts” connect with the heart of Voice of Billy.

- As visitors open their hands in front of the wordfall, Kinect sensor detects the gesture and enable fearless keywords flow into the palm, catching a fearless spirit.

- “Hello Billy" at the Durant House: Shanghai Sept 9-15, and Shenzhen Nov 24-30, 2022

2 invitation-only events (Shanghai and Shenzhen)

80% invited guest attended

76% engaged in voice interaction

100% engaged in touch interaction