Omni Automotive Advertising Blog

The 2008 Honda Accord comes out later this month and the redesign isn’t the only new thing about it. It also comes with the new tagline “Beyond the Road.”

The all new Accord is “Honda’s largest launch ever,” according to Tom Peyton, senior manager, national advertising at Honda.

Oh and by the way, the new Accord will start at $23,360.  No wonder it’s having the “largest launch ever.”

But Honda has a strategy, aim for Gen X’ers. So how do you appeal to such a group of cynical people, you advertise with NBC promising a trip to Hollywood and tickets to Universal.

You can view Honda Accord’s new ad and cross promotion with NBC here.

The first branding campaign from Hyundai’s newest ad agency was unveiled today. The taglines ask the viewer to “Think About It.” The reason for the change in strategy…

“Hyundai research has found that over 50 percent of consumers tune out ads because of various negative connotations.”

Hyundai is on the verge of changing the consumer’s perception about the brand. They are trying greatly to move away from being labeled as just a “cut-rate automaker.”

Personally I like the spot that raises this question: “Don’t you think a car should have more airbags, than cupholders?” It really does make one think about it.

You can read more about the campaign here.

Late last week, I wrote about the fall of newspaper advertising. Now this week, AdWeek (that’s a lot of “weeks” in just two sentences) reports that the majority of internet searches are triggered by television, word of mouth and print ads.

Basically, people aren’t just sitting at home searching for stuff. Something has to trigger a potential consumer’s search for your dealership on Google, Yahoo or even DogPile. There has to be a message that really retains their attention.

Also this shows that just because your phones aren’t ringing off the hook, doesn’t mean the ads aren’t working. Your internet leads are your phone leads of yesteryear.

It seems every great dealer stresses the relationship they have with their employees and their customers. Now, in this quarters’ AIADA magazine, Ron Esserman speaks of training his employees to better help potential customers.

Esserman pioneered the very innovative YES customer satisfaction program, You are Empowered to Satisfy. He explains…

“Every employee must find a way to say yes to all our customers. We have extensive training of all our employees… We want to help (our employees) get where they want to go, so that we can get where we want to go.”

It’s very interesting how the successful dealers all concentrate on the relationships they have with people. I’ll post the article when it comes live on the net.

According to Gerald Zaltman, professor emeritus at Harvard Business School and author of “How Customers Think: Essential Insights into the Mind of the Market” car dealer advertising that “yells” at the consumer only provides short term success. He cites that only people who are interested in buying a car at that exact moment will even listen to the message. Which causes a bump in sales for the time the ad is running.

However Zaltman notes car dealers ads contribute to their negative publicity and hurt them in the long run.

“In one study we did involving auto dealerships, customers described themselves as feeling like `prey.’”

He believes dealers would benefit, “from a more respectful yet engaging style of communicating and establishing awareness.”

However dealers can’t pin their hopes on long term success. Everyone in the business knows you must produce month end and month out.

But perhaps instead of just “screaming” prices and rebates at a customer, you also provide reasons to come to your dealership in the future.

Branding your dealership is not just limited to playing a jingle in your spots. You have to find that niche that makes you unique compared to your competition. Otherwise you’ll always be struggling to find the short term solution to your sales problems.

Last month, after selling less vehicles than imports for the first time ever, the Big 3 outsold imports for the month of August. However it was GM that was doing all the heavy lifting. GM sales rose 6% (8% less in cars sales, 16.5% increase in light truck sales). Both Ford and Daimler Chrysler posted loses (-14% and -6% respectively).

Toyota also posted loses while Honda, Nissan and Hyundai all posted positive gains.

Automotive News recently did a feature on the Van Tuyls, Cecil and Larry. What was very interesting is that no matter how large the group gets, their focus is always on people, from their employees, ownership opportunities for managers, to their customers, direct hands on approach.

Cecil Van Tuyl said, “The better the people you surround yourself with, the better you’re going to do, for yourself and the consumer.”

You can read the whole article here.

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