What the EV boom can teach marketers about branding

By Keren Homan, Head of Client Partnerships, Yahoo DSP Australia

As Australia's EV market becomes increasingly crowded, the biggest shift isn't happening on the road - it's happening in media plans. Keren Homan, Head of Client Partnerships at Yahoo DSP Australia, examines why the category offers a timely lesson for brands entering fast-moving markets.

Not too long ago, seeing a Tesla on the road was enough to nudge whoever you were with and start a conversation about the novelty car, and how electric cars (EVs) surely wouldn't catch on.

Today, the convo is more likely to be asking what make the car in front of you is, with new EV brands like Geely, BYD, and Jaecoo among an estimated 28 new brands entering Australia's already-crowded automotive landscape in the last five years. We've already seen eight new brands launch in 2026.

Spoiler alert - EVs did catch on - especially with the rise of the hybrid, meaning consumers could enjoy the best of both worlds and alleviate the range anxiety holding many back in the early days.

A crowded field, fast

The Electric Vehicle Council recently announced EVs accounted for 36% of total new passenger car sales in June 2026, with battery EVs accounting for one in every four car sales. BYD even sold 18,881 vehicles in June - just 243 cars fewer than Australia's long-time top seller, Toyota (and more than Toyota sold in May).

That pace of change has been nothing short of remarkable. Australia has long been a tough market for new entrants to break into, thanks to longstanding brand loyalties and a handful of established manufacturers dominating market share.

Yet within just a few months, this new wave of EV brands has fundamentally altered the competitive landscape. Consumers who once associated EVs almost exclusively with Tesla are now weighing an increasingly crowded field of competitors, each vying for attention as the category tips into the mainstream amid surging fuel prices and uncertainty.

The numbers behind the shift

We've seen the same pattern in our own data - one EV brand running on Yahoo DSP saw exposed audiences convert at a 57% higher rate on leads and a 36% higher rate on purchases than those who weren't reached.

Another brand we've worked with saw a 15% lift in overall conversion among exposed users, with multi-offer campaigns proving up to 9x more efficient than single-offer ones.

From performance to brand

The disruption hasn't stopped at the dealership - it's beginning to reshape where media investment is flowing in the automotive category.

When these brands first entered Australia, much of their activity was understandably focused on performance marketing. Like most new entrants to any category, the immediate priority was generating sales, building momentum and reaching consumers already in the market to buy.

But all that changes once a category becomes crowded. The challenge for EV brands is no longer persuading consumers to ditch their petrol cars - they need to cut through and convince them to choose their brand, specifically, amongst all other noisy brands now in the market.

Why brand and performance work together

It's already having an impact on how brands are approaching their media investment, pushing beyond pure lower-funnel activity with substantial investment in channels like premium video, connected TV, broadcast-video-on-demand and programmatic digital out-of-home - the channels more associated with brand building in the marketing arsenal.

Brand building and performance marketing are often spoken about as though they're competing strategies. In reality, the most successful companies understand that they're complementary, with each making the other work harder.

Analytic Partners even found that when one of its customers increased its investment in brand activity by 72% year-on-year, it resulted in a 76% increase in profit. There was also a 48% increase in the return generated by its performance marketing, even though performance spend itself increased by just 35% - proving that brand often has a disproportionate effect on performance.

Getting local right

It's also not just the media strategy that's changing - the creative is too. All of these new brands are coming in from overseas, so many are going out of their way to prove they're a good fit for the Aussie motorist. This means grounding advertising in distinctly Australian settings, from the outback and beaches to camping trips and weekend adventures.

They're also partnering with familiar Australian personalities to help build local relevance - like Daryl Braithwaite performing Horses at the launch of BYD's Shark 6 in Broken Hill. It could only be more Aussie if he was also wrestling a crocodile while eating a meat pie.

The lesson beyond automotive

None of this is accidental. As these brands shift from introducing themselves to establishing themselves, they need to invest in familiarity as well as awareness. Winning market share can't simply be about convincing Australians to buy an EV - it has to ensure their brand feels like it belongs alongside the established names consumers have trusted for decades and is part of the everyday fabric of our lives.

The implications of this trend extend well beyond automotive. The EV category reminds us that disruption can arrive much faster than established businesses expect. Markets that once felt stable can become fiercely competitive in months, especially when multiple well-funded challengers enter at the same time.

When categories evolve this quickly, waiting until competition forces you to build a brand may mean you've already left it too late. By then, consumers are no longer simply deciding whether to buy into the category - they're choosing between a growing field of credible alternatives.

That's why brands shouldn't be viewed as something you graduate to; they should be developed alongside performance much earlier in the journey, with the balance between the two evolving as the category matures.

Every category will face new competitors at some point. What's changing is the speed at which that competition arrives - and the speed at which your marketing strategy needs to evolve with it.