Outrageous Ads Sell Cars for NJ Dealer
Here’s your marketing question of the day: How do automobile dealers differentiate themselves?
Excluding more rural geographic areas, there are usually multiple dealers selling the same auto brand within a 30-minute to 1-hour driving radius. This lets consumers shop for the lowest price.
So what can a dealer do beyond talking about the nebulous better service benefit?
Photo: Brad Benson - NY Daily News
Former NFL star and Super Bowl winner Brad Benson has an answer. It’s clever and powerful advertising.
Benson is the owner of NJ-based Brad Benson Auto Group, which sells the Hyundai and Mitsubishi brands. Being a former Garden State resident, I remember Benson’s unique advertising style, which leverages current events, politics and celebrity actions to create memorable, attention-getting radio ads. He sometimes runs traditional television commercials as well.
I was reminded of Benson because he recently made national news with a radio ad that offered Florida Pastor Terry Jones a new car if he stopped his Quran burning plan. Listen to the spot, which is part of Benson’s International Idiot Award series.
Figuring out how to use brands is hard. It’s probably one of the most challenging aspects of marketing.
There are a range of options. For example, you can extend your existing brand. Create a new brand. Use a sub-brand. Team with a co-branding partner. Acquire an orphan-brand. And on and on.
I last wrote about branding in my post BoltBus Provides A Branding Ticket To Ride, in which I praised Greyhound for creating the BoltBus brand to target new consumers and penetrate a different market segment.
Here are some new examples to stimulate the branding juices.
First up is Hyundai. I’m a fan of their Buyer’s Assurance Program and Hyundai Uncensored marketing campaign.
The Korean automaker has come a long way since it exported its first car to the United States in 1986. Now more than half the cars sold in the US are made here. Hyundai makes cars in Alabama and has more than 20,000 employees at US dealerships.
What really got my attention was a Wall Street Journal comparison between the Mercedes S550, which starts at $91,600 and a new $55,000 sedan called the Equus, set for sale this November. Mercedes and Hyundai in the same sentence is amazing brand progress!
Hyundai’s second most expensive car, the Genesis, which starts at $33,000 was launched in 2008. Just how far can they take the Hyundai brand? Do they need a separate high-end nameplate?
Other car makers have taken the brand segmentation route. Toyota created Lexus. Honda launched Acura. Volkswagen has Audi.
Despite the optimism – “Equus will attract a new type of buyer to the Hyundai brand” - consumers want easily recognized and clearly perceived cache and prestige when breaking the bank for a high-cost car. Hyundai is probably driving uphill on this one.
Let’s take a quick look at three other recent branding decisions.
Posted in Branding
Tagged Donald Trump merchandise, Hyundai branding, United Continental branding
Advertising Age magazine just named BoltBus one of “America’s Hottest Brands.”
Not knowing who this company was or why it was so hot, I had to investigate.
First, some background. In March 2008, BoltBus was launched in the Northeast United States, and currently operates roundtrip service to New York City or Washington, D.C. via four markets: New York City, Boston, Philadelphia (including Cherry Hill, NJ) and Washington, D.C. (including Greenbelt, MD). BoltBus, headquartered in Secaucus, N.J., is a division of Greyhound Lines, Inc., operated in affiliation with Peter Pan Bus Lines.
Apparently, Greyhound’s objective was to target urban professionals, college students and commuters traveling on the popular Northeast corridor, and to penetrate a segment of the market known as “Chinatown buses” (provide curbside service from one city’s Chinatown district to another).
Here’s what’s interesting about BoltBus from a marketing perspective:
Greyhound used California ad agency Butler Shine Stern & Partners to help create the new BoltBus brand. For the marketing launch, BoltBus worked with key, urban bloggers and utilized media relations outreach to create awareness and demand.
Headline For Marketers: Brand extension is over-used. Don’t be afraid to create a new brand if your new product or service has a different target and positioning. Yes, it’s more expensive to launch a new brand than to piggy-back on the current brand, but the idea is to be successful and win in the market, not to save money. Remember to make sure you fully evaluate branding options when you start your next new product development project.
Blogger Harvey Chimoff, a cross-functional marketing leader, relies on a special blend of pragmatic strategy, vision, organization, and action to achieve marketing and business results. Click here for more information or contact Harvey at hchimoff@gmail.com.
Posted in Branding, New Products, Strategic Marketing
CMO Strategy from Ad Age Sales & Marketing Management Adweek Marketing
