PART 1: SITUATION ANALYSIS

Background

Lime is a company founded on the idea that everyone deserves access to smart andaffordable mobility. Lime’s distribution of shared bikes and scooters adds as a source oftransportation that helps maintain a healthier planet by reducing automobile dependence. Aninterview with Toby Sun, the co-founder of Lime, revealed that Lime was founded in January of2017, so it is relatively new (Beyer, 2017). According to Lime's website, it’s services are nowavailable in over 90 US cities and in 19 international cities. Besides establishing itself indifferent cities, Lime has also partnered up with 29 US campuses. As of this year, Lime alsolaunched a program that lets users donate to local charitable causes such as Austin MusicFoundation, Cascade Bicycle Club, and Building Bridges Across the River.

Product/Service Analysis

One of Lime’s strengths is that it offers dockless vehicles. Customers don’t need to takethe bikes or scooters back to where they initially got them. They can easily park it on thesidewalk when they are done using them. Another one of Lime’s strengths is its affordability.Lime pedal bikes cost $1 to unlock the and $0.05/minute to ride. “Students, faculty and staff witha valid ".EDU" email address, receive a 50% discount” (Lime). Lime-E Electric Assist Bikes andLime-S Electric Scooters cost $1 to unlock and $0.15 per minute to ride. The company alsooffers LimePrime, a service where customers can pay per month.

One of Lime’s biggest weaknesses is that their scooters break fairly easy. SeveralInstagram users have posted pictures with broken electric scooters. The article, “Lime is UnderFire Over Broken Scooters,” by Matt McFarland, addresses the common issue Lime faces. “Inlate October, Lime stated the baseboard on its Okai models could break if ridden off a curb athigh speeds,” (McFarland, 2018). Lime purchased scooters from suppliers whose scooters brokefairly easily and Okai was one of them. Another weakness is that their scooters’ battery can diewhile users are riding them. Some batteries have even heated up and caught on fire(Rajamanickam, 2018). The Lime brand has had a serious image issue in its earlyimplementation. Some users have left Lime scooters in the middle of the street and otherinconvenient places. This has caused a lot of negative sentiment to Lime, as well as thecommunity of electric scooter companies as a whole. Lime riders are leaving the scooterswherever they want and it’s creating chaos on sidewalks (Murphy, 2018). Lime has also hadissues with broken and uncharged scooters.

One of Lime’s advantages is it’s prices. It offers discounts for students and it also offersdiscounts for low income riders with a program called Lime Access. “To qualify for LimeAccess, an individual simply needs to demonstrate eligibility or participation in any state orfederally-run assistance program. Lime Access members receive a 95% discount on all Limepedal bike rides and a 50% discount on all Lime-E electric-assist bikes and Lime-S electricscooter rides,” (Lime). The brand currently uses social media platforms to communicate its

brand. It uses Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and Youtube to share its content while encouragingriders to ride responsibly. It uses the hashtag “#CitrusGotReal” as part of its marketing effortsand it reposts what users are sharing. Its campaign theme is “Get where you need to gointelligently.”

Competitive Analysis

One of Lime’s biggest competitors is Bird scooters. Birds also provide electric scootersfor the same price and system as Lime. Both have a pretty user friendly app that lets you start upyour ride from about anywhere. One key difference is the appearance of the scooters. Limescooters are bright green, white, and black making them stand out a bit more with the brightgreen color to match the company logo. Bird scooters, on the other hand, are plain black andwhite. Lime also has reached more cities than bird, although Bird is valued at over $2+ billion,almost double what Lime has. This seems to be because Bird entered this new market first. Thiswould be their biggest competitive advantage over Lime scooters. Another key difference isBird’s brand image is directed more towards a “car-free” alternative to transportation, focusingon less traffic, cleaner air, and safer streets. Lime’s brand image is directed more towards gettingsomewhere quick and smart, with it’s campaign theme being “Get where you need to gointelligently.” Bird’s focus on the environment and reducing the amount of cars on the streetcould be why it is a bit more successful than Lime.

One of the big differences between Lime and Bird is their current advertising andpromotion efforts. Lime has many more platforms they promote their brand on such as twitter,instagram, linkedin, angel, blogs, and even their own youtube channel with videos of people’sinspirational stories. These channels are building their brand image much stronger than othercompetitors. Another big competitor for Lime is Ofo bikes. Although it may be a different meansof transportation, the convenience of bikes is a huge competition for Lime scooters. Ofo bikeshas the advantage of not having to be recharged like Lime scooters do, although one of Ofo’sweaknesses may be the convenience of getting somewhere faster. A scooter will travel muchfaster than a bike without having to use energy to ride one. Depending on the consumer, somemay rather ride a bike or scooter. Bikes are also a good way to exercise which some may preferover the automation of riding an electric scooter.

PART 2: TARGET MARKET

Target Market

Lime should target individuals who are in urban and suburban areas. Community electricscooters and bikes are often used in casual and fun settings. Pacific Beach or North Park here inSan Diego are ideal places Lime has been promoting their services. The main benefit Lime

provides their customers is quick and easy transportation to places primarily in a 1-10 milerange. People between the ages of 20-30 who are seeking convenience and/or adventure areLime’s main target. Lime is a low cost service that has various programs to further lower theprice of their services and encourage individuals in the 20-30 year old range who are collegestudents. As far as targeting from a behavioristic stand point, Lime should be looking atindividuals who are doing the same routine everyday of the week and are looking for aconvenient way to get to work that’s in their area. A consumer that knows they can use Lime as aquick way to get to work will allow them to become a recurring source of revenue. Everyoneknows that time is a person’s more valuable resource, and Lime will provide the benefit ofsaving time to all who use the service. We highly recommend Lime keep in mind a consumerwho is looking for the benefit of faster than walking travel.

Key Consumer Insight

Jutta Degele and some of his other colleagues from Reutlingen University conductedresearch that helped them identify behavioral and demographic customer segments that are usinge-scooter sharing service. They found that 77.23% of users of the e-scooter sharing service aremale. Even though males use the e-scooter sharing service more frequently than females, there ishardly no difference between the ride length in meters between genders. Most consumers that areusing the e-scooter sharing service are from the age 23 to 30 years old. A popular time that thee-scooter sharing service is during the weekend (Degele, 2018). A possible reason why peopledesire and are motivated to use this service is because it is fast and convenient. With Limescooters being in many various locations it is easy for consumers to get a hold of one and cansimply be used by just using the Lime scooter app.

PART 3: CREATIVE STRATEGY

The Strategy:

1) Major Selling Idea (MSI):

Lime scooters are a faster, more convenient means of transportation when navigating thechallenges of everyday life.

2) Proposition Support Points (Reasons to Believe):

Support points for Lime scooters would be as follows:1. Reaches speeds up to 15 mph

2. Can travel over 20 miles on a full charge3. Convenient location services to find nearby scooters4. In-app battery monitoring

The Campaign:

1) Campaign Theme:Our campaign is the “When Life Gives You Limes,” campaign: When the challenges of

everyday life try to keep you from where you need to be, Lime scooters can help you get aroundand make the best of the situation. Through this campaign we will show people how the ease andconvenience of Lime scooters can help them overcome all the “lemons” that life gives them onan everyday basis. Therefore, as our consumers understand that “lemons” coming into their lifeis a bad thing, they’ll now understand that a Lime coming into their life is a positive forcehelping people to prevail over their challenges.

2) Tagline:

“When Life Gives You Limes…”

3) Tone:

The tone of our campaign is encouraging and realistic with slight hints of humor. Wehope to encourage people as they realize that through the use of Lime scooters, they do not haveto be subjected to everyday struggles such as car problems, oversleeping, or unreliable publictransportation. The tone will also be realistic in the sense that we will be portraying trueproblems that commonly occur. Our audience will be able to relate to these situations as it islikely that they’ve struggled with these exact problems themselves. The humor will be verysubtle throughout the campaign,but will add to the encouraging tone of it by lightning the mood.

4) Execution:

Since we want to highlight these every-day difficulties in our consumers lives we havechosen to use slices of life and demonstration in our campaign to show our audience how Limescooters are an easy solution to such problems. The slice of life nature of the ad will bedemonstrated by using everyday settings such as someone’s home, work, or a publictransportation terminal. In addition to this, the campaign will feature everyday people who looklike and engage in activities similar to that of our target market. All of the ads will be shot in firstperson point of view to help the consumer relate and understand these everyday situations. The

demonstration will commence once the individual walks up to the scooter, scans the code tounlock it, and rides away.

PART 4: CAMPAIGN DELIVERABLES

1) Mood Board for Visuals:

For the moodboard we would like to use “Arial Rounded MT” as our font because itmatches the type of font found in Lime’s official logo. For our color scheme we specifically planon using lime green and white. For our visual illustration we would like to include pictures of thecompany’s scooters, bikes, Lime’s official app, and street style to make it relevant with our targetmarket.

2) Storyboards:

A. When life gives you limes: Class Presentation

A student is suddenly woken up by the sound of his phone constantly ringing. He looksover at his phone and realizes he has slept in and about to miss a very important classpresentation. He starts to stress and panic. He quickly rushes out of the house and looks down athis phone. His map app tells him that he won’t be able to make it on time to present. He startsfeeling hopeless. He looks up to find another way to get there. And right in front of his house, hesees a Lime scooter. He rushes over to the scooter, opens the app, and scans the barcode. He thenrides off to his presentation. The ad ends with the tagline “When life gives you limes, you get toclass on time.”

B. When life gives you limes: Hot Date

A ring goes off on a phone. He looks down at it and sees it’s a reminder to start gettingready for a date. Feeling happy and excited (maybe even a little nervous), he starts getting ready.Everything is turning out perfectly for him… so far. He grabs his car keys, exits the house, andgets in his car. He inserted his key into the ignition and turned it, but nothing happened. He startsagain and again with no hope. The realization hit him: his battery was dead. He looks out his carwindow, trying to find some way to get to his date's place. And then, across the street, he sees aLime scooter and gets an idea. He gets out of his car and rushes over to the Lime scooter. Heopens the app, scans the barcode, and he is offered. Moments later, he arrives at his date’s housewith two Lime scooters in hand. He tells her that he wants to ride around the town with her. Then

they are seen riding into the sunset. The ad ends with “When life gives you limes, you get thegirl.”

C. When life gives you limes: Interview

He hears “Time to wake up, honey! It’s your big day!” He rolls over and realizes it’s hismother’s voice coming from his phone. Turning off the alarm, he gets up out of bed and startsgetting ready. He wants to look good for his interview and picks out his favorite tie. After gettingready, he heads done into the kitchen to grab his lunch. On the fridge, he notices on thewhiteboard that his mom left him a note saying, “Good luck with your interview, love mom.” Hegrabs his lunch out of the fridge and heads out the house. He walks over to the closest bus stopby his parent’s house. He notices that the bus is already there. Odd. He reads the flashing signabove the front window saying “Out of service.” He begins to panic. He has to make it to thisinterview. He looks around and sees a Lime scooter close by. He runs over to the scooter, opensthe app, scans the barcode, and is on his way to his interview. He gets to the site right on time.He goes in and gets interviewed. They offer him the job right on the spot. He walks out of thebuilding, feeling overjoyed and excited. The ad ends with “When life gives you limes, you get tomove out of your parent’s house.”

3) Mockup Video:

For our mockup videos we decided to do two variations of the same video to get ourpoint across more efficiently to our target market. Thus, we want to focus on repetition. One ofthe videos is 30 seconds long, while the other one is 45 seconds long. These videos are based onStoryboard A, where a student is almost late to a class presentation. When the video ends, weshow the logo in the center of the screen with our tagline.

30 second: https://youtu.be/qvuFMlPipg845 second: https://youtu.be/s9v1lS2hofA

PART 5: MEDIA PLAN

As we move into the end of the year, Lime’s target market is going to be taking time offto spend the holidays with their family. We suggest Lime implement this marketing campaign atthe start of the next year, 2019, as our target market will be coming back to work and school. Wesuggest Lime use geo-targeted ads through YouTube and other social media outlets. The specificareas we would target include urban and suburban areas that Lime’s service is offered. Onlinemedia outlets allow our agency to directly monitor the impressions we are experiencing with our

advertising campaign. Having ads presented to our potential consumers when they are gettingback into the swing of their daily routines in January is perfect for Lime. We’ll present aconvenient and quick option that they might not have considered before at precisely the righttime.

PART 6: REFERENCE PAGE

Beyer, Scott. “An Interview With Toby Sun, Co-Founder Of LimeBike.” Forbes, ForbesMagazine, 17 Nov. 2017,www.forbes.com/sites/scottbeyer/2017/11/17/an-interview-with-toby-sun-co-founder-of-limebike/#6751cf141075.

Degele, Jutta, et al. “SDSU Library: Patron Authentication.” User Authentication :: SDSULibrary, IEEE, 17 June 2018,ieeexplore-ieee-org.libproxy.sdsu.edu/document/8436288/authors#authors.

“Lime.” Dockless Electric Scooter Share - Lime-S | LimeBike, www.li.me/.May, Ethan. “Here's Everything You Need to Know About Bird and Lime Electric Scooters.”

Indianapolis Star, IndyStar, 21 June 2018,www.indystar.com/story/news/2018/06/21/bird-electric-scooters-rental-costs-hours-charing-locations/720893002/.

McFarland, Matt. “Lime Is Under Fire Over Broken Scooters.” CNN, Cable News Network, 16Nov. 2018, www.cnn.com/2018/11/16/tech/lime-scooter-supplier/index.html.

McQuilkin, Kieran. “Lime Has DC Charity's Back With a New Donation Option.” DCINNO,DCINNO, 24 Aug. 2018,www.americaninno.com/dc/inno-news-dc/lime-has-dc-charitys-back-with-a-new-donation-option/.

Murphy, Mike, and Alison Griswold. “Electric Scooters Are Flooding California, And They'll BeOn Your Sidewalks Soon.” Quartz, Quartz, 21 Apr. 2018,qz.com/1257997/electric-scooters-are-flooding-california-and-theyll-be-on-your-sidewaks-soon/.

Rajamanickam, Vishnu. “Battery and Design Woes Continue to Torment E-Scooter StartupLime.” FreightWaves, FreightWaves, 19 Nov. 2018,www.freightwaves.com/news/technology/lime-ebike-startup-battery-problems-breaking-down.

PART 7: APPENDICES

1. Lime’s Twitter Account displaying the hashtag “#CitrusGotReal.”

2. Lime’s marketing efforts.

3. Lime’s Repost on Instagram to contribute their marketing efforts through social media.

4. Mood Board for Visuals

5. Storyboard A

6. Storyboard B

7. Storyboard C

8. Screenshot of video in the last second displaying the logo and tagline