Last year, fresh out of bankruptcy, General Motors ran the first ad with Ed Whitacre. At the time, GM rationalised the Whitacre ad by saying:
“The spot will set up a wider TV campaign featuring commercials about each of GM’s four surviving brands: Chevrolet, Buick, GMC and Cadillac.” Automotive News, 9/10/09
The implication being that the brand advertising would clarify the brands’ identities. Almost three heads of marketing later, we still have yet to see an ad or an idea that positions these brands clearly in the marketplace. Three of the four GM brands have not put a stake in the ground telling us what they stand for (GMC is the exception and that work was done years ago).
Last week it leaked out that Chevy was going to have the tag-line “Excellence for all.” That idea has been roundly criticized as a strategy looking for an execution. We used to describe an idea like this by saying its “strategy is showing.” The point of course is that it lacks passion, emotion, bravado, something magical that makes you feel something about the brand, rather it’s as if research wrote the line. Chevrolet is truly one of America’s most storied and iconic brands, surely it deserves better.
Predictably the industry was quick to blame Publicis (Chevrolet’s new agency), I think that’s misplaced.
Ironically, exhibit number 1 in defense of Publicis is the new Cadillac campaign from Bartle Bogle & Hegarty. Just announced yesterday, here are a couple of the commercials: (more…)
What a difference a year makes. It’s 2010 and the auto industry is beginning to recover.
After an incredibly tough 2009, consumers seem to be coming back. For the first time in recent memory, Americans’ perception of domestic automobiles seems to be on the mend (Business Week 4/23). Ford’s bet that Americans will buy smaller, fully featured automobiles looks like it may pay off. GM’s product plan created by soon-to-retire Bob Lutz is leading a resurgence for the General. Hyundai and Kia, supported my excellent product quality, have taken advantage of recessionary sensibilities and grown share of market. Audi , Subaru and Mini have come out of the recession on a tear.
On the other side of the ledger, Toyota continues to struggle with recalls and concerns about quality. This has led to unprecedented incentives by Toyota and the predictable response by competitors to match them. So a good number of consumers who had been sitting on sidelines during the recession have come back to dealerships looking to for a good deal. After 2009, it’s a relief to see traffic in the stores but at the same time if the incentives continue that will not be good for the industry long term. In 2009, some progress had been made at reducing the use of incentives, but the moment Toyota jumped in to defend its franchise, that opened the floodgates again.
So the good news is that customers are returning to the stores, but are they coming back for the right reasons?
I know we live in a world dominated by spin and soundbites but there is something cynical about GM making a big deal about repaying the “loans” and “early” no less. GM has the marketing & PR folks going 24/7, they’ve even made a commercial:
I think it’s great that they have repaid the loan and are showing progress, but this PR/advertising effort seems a little misplaced. Does GM think that we’ve forgotten that the taxpayers provided another $43B for which the government got stock and now owns 60% of the company?
It’ll be one thing when there’s a public offering, the government sells it’s stake and gets its investment back plus interest. That will be something to crow about. In the meantime making a big deal out of the fact that they paid us back roughly 15% of what we put in feels a bit like they’re trying to “sell” us something.
Rather than “sell” us that they’re succeeding, just get on with it, and when they’re no longer Government Motors, bring in the marketing guys.
In the meantime, marketing should be working on clearly positioning their remaining brands. That will help sales and create value for the shareholders.
When I first saw this Acura commercial it got me thinking about what constitutes “old news” versus something relevant and important:
This Acura commercial is about crumple zones and their ability to absorb energy in a crash while directing it around the passengers ensconced in a safety cage. It’s a nicely executed commercial that provides people with information that gives them confidence that Acuras are safe.
But it isn’t new and it certainly isn’t exclusive to Acura. Many of us would say that crumple zones are “old news.”
In 1952, Mercedes-Benz received a patent for a crumple zone in an automobile. Up until that point rigidity was regarded as the key to protecting passengers in an automobile accident. The 1959 Mercedes-Benz W111 series included crumple zones and was actively crash tested by the company.
I can still vividly remember the first time I actually saw a crash test. It was at the Mercedes Benz Safety Center in the Sindelfingen plant outside Stuttgart. I was amazed at the devastation created by a thirty mile an hour off-set crash. Right then and there I learned the value of a crumple zone.
Today, every automobile manufacturer uses crumple zones to make their cars safer.
Yet here is Acura, using their version of a crumple zone to differentiate themselves from their competitors.
If every car has crumple zones, then what’s differentiating about Acura’s? (more…)
Curvin O’Rielly has been kind enough to allow us to publish this article on McNaughton Automotive Perspectives. For those of you who don’t know Curvin, he is one of the most respected copywriters in the advertising business. Among his automotive accomplishments was the creation of the Saturn brand with his colleagues at Hal Riney and Partners. As you will see, Curvin’s perspective on automobile advertising is both timely and timeless.
Everything “Old” Is “New” Again
By Curvin O’Rielly
In 1982, when I was a young creative director at BBDO in New York, I was asked to write an article about the automobile business for Magazine Age.
The article was well received. I even won an American Business Press award for it. The question is, has it stood the test of time?
Well, some of the details I included in the article are as dated as the wide ties we used to wear (the ones you’re saving, hoping they come back into style again), or the disco music we used to listen to (admit it; you boogeyed to disco), or the haul-ass iron we used to drive, the cars with more horsepower than their suspension systems and brakes could reasonably handle (unless they were well-engineered vehicles from Europe).
What’s still true about my article, unfortunately, is that the automobile industry is once again in deep trouble. This time, it’s poised at the abyss, owing in part to the economic tremors that came close to causing a complete meltdown. At the abyss, too, because it was smart (or so it prided itself) but then not smart enough. I mean, surely those at the wheel had to have seen all the danger signs on the road they were heading down, just as they had to have known they were racing toward a disaster of epic proportions.
That said, here are the observations I made 28 years ago, with some minor rewrites here and there.
An article in the April 2nd edition of the New York Times was headlined: “Despite Expansion, Mini Says It’s Still a Niche” and confirmed something that had occurred to me at the New York Auto Show.
In New York last week I saw the new Mini crossover, the Countryman, for the first time in person. All the Mini design cues are present in the Countryman and I think you’d be hard pressed to say that it wasn’t part of the Mini family. But I was struck by how “big” it seemed, it didn’t seem small and taut the way all the other models do. Part of the difference was that the Countryman’s ground clearance is higher, so its stance is really quite different than the other Minis.
This got me thinking, at what point does a marque go too far and begin to lose its essential character? Has Mini gone too far with the Countryman?
I suspect this is a little like losing your hair. Little by little your hair recedes, almost imperceptibly, you make little adjustments as you go, thinking no one will notice, until one day you end up with comb-over and people are snickering behind your back. Little by little automotive brands seem to lose their way. (more…)
The big news in automotive marketing this week was that Joel Ewanick is leaving Hyundai and going to head up marketing at Nissan. Hyundai won 2009 marketer of the year under Ewanick’s leadership and the company implemented the breakthrough Hyundai Assurance Program.
The Hyundai Assurance Program was a stroke of brilliance at a time when the economy and the auto industry were in a tailspin. It basically gave consumers a no risk way to purchase a vehicle. If you bought a Hyundai and subsequently lost your job, you could return the car, no questions asked. Truly brilliant and it propelled Hyundai through the recession and out the other end. Hyundai’s 2009 sales grew 8% and its share of market was up 1.1 points. This performance earned it elite status as one of only three automobile brands (Kia & Subaru were the others) to increase volume in 2009, while the industry overall declined 21%*.
The Hyundai Assurance Program was an unqualified success in a tough marketing climate. But now what? (more…)
JD Power just released its 2010 Vehicle Dependability Study and there are some surprises. Porsche is ranked 1st, Lincoln 2nd and Buick and Lexus are tied for 3rd. It wasn’t so many years ago that Lexus dominated the VDS study as the perennial number 1 and some may wonder what has happened? Particularly in light of the well publicized Toyota quality issues.
The fact is that nothing has happened to Lexus, they design, engineer and build an extraordinary vehicle. What’s happened is that the other manufacturers have improved to the point where every year it’s a genuine dogfight to get to the top spot.
There were some other surprises that weren’t so good…. (more…)
Who should be embarrassed? The auto industry and their communications agencies.
If you haven’t had a chance to see the documentary “Art & Copy,” you must. Last night I saw it for the second time and enjoyed every minute. If you have worked in the advertising business or are responsible for advertising on the client side it is well worth seeing.
It’s a chance to see some of the most talented people in the agency business talk about what makes great communications. Hal Riney, Mary Lawrence, Jim Durfee, Lee Clow, George Lois, Jeff Goodby, Rich Silverstein, Dan Wieden and others talk about what they think represents great work and what inspires it. They talk about great ideas: Braniff’s End of the plain plane, Apple’s 1984 and Think Different, Got Milk, Reagan’s re-election campaign, Nike’s Just Do It and VW’s Think Small among others.
At the end, these people and the work leave you inspired. You’re reminded that at its best, advertising can change opinion, entertain, move people emotionally and to action. Great work respects people and treats them decently. Great work can build brands, companies and value. Great work is really hard to create, get approved and execute, but when it all comes together, it can move mountains.
My last post regarding BMW’s new campaign resulted in a few conversations with colleagues that were interesting and got me thinking about the challenges associated with marketing a global automotive brand and the concept of a global campaign.
Virtually every automotive brand is global. Not every brand is marketed in every country but I can’t think of any that are sold only in their country of origin. That means that every manufacturer must be concerned with what their respective brands stand for in each country in which they are distributed. Obviously, it is in the manufacturers’ interest to have their brands positioned in the same way from country to country. Customers and prospects should recognize the brands no matter where in the world they come into contact with them.
Of course the real world is not quite this neat and tidy. Brands have developed in different ways in different countries, so for some manufacturers it’s a challenge just to get their colleagues around the world on the same page regarding the brand’s core values. In my experience we do pretty well when we concern ourselves with the strategic underpinnings of the brand, where things fall apart is when execution of the strategy is considered.
There seem to be two basic approaches to execution, each with its own set of plusses and minuses:
