Tag: Auto Advertising

Southern Auto Dealer Shares His Opinions

In case you were thinking that the recent Presidential election signals a new, color-blind United States of America, there’s some evidence that we may not be there yet.

A Savannah, GA auto dealer named O. C. Welch was in a foul mood one day recently, and happened to be near a microphone. You can hear the resulting hairball of a radio commercial here, on my colleague Mike Copeland’s blog.

Factually dubious (many of the Toyotas he’s complaining about are built by Americans in Alabama, Kentucky, Texas, West Virginia, and Indiana) and downright racist (“rice-ready”???), the ad acts as a sixty-second test for Savannah:

How many angry bigots are in the market for a new car this weekend?

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Confidential to Oregon Auto Dealers

Who’s writing your copy? If it’s someone at a radio or TV station, you probably assume that you’re working with a professional who’s up to date on auto advertising laws.

You may very well be wrong.

A few months ago, the Oregon Department of Justice, having just issued a new set of rules, held a half-day seminar on how to keep auto ads legal. The only Portland broadcast rep who attended the seminar also writes this blog.

Yesterday, I heard a commercial that committed five separate violations in 60 seconds. I didn’t think that was possible, but in fact, all of the violations took place in a 25-second span. The commercial violated the Federal Truth in Lending Act, along with several Oregon administrative rules.

If the commercial had actually aired, the dealer could have faced thousands of dollars in fines. It didn’t air because I heard it in advance, called the other radio station and told them how to fix it.

I guess I’m just a giving sort of fellow.

Want to know if your commercial’s legal? Give me a call before you put it on the air.

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A Smaller Pie Doesn’t Mean No Pie

Over at the Sales and Marketing Loudmouth Blog, Tim Rohrer has a very interesting take on the role of local marketing. He summarizes his premise this way:

Remember, to advertise effectively at the local level, find out how consumers are behaving and then fashion your message to take advantage of their direction and momentum.

I agree with him as far as that goes. But he loses me when he tackles the car industry. Although he doesn’t come out and say it, this paragraph would lead an auto dealer to conclude that he should stop all advertising until sales improve:

Auto dealers must measure the cost of the advertising against the return they are likely to get right now and not on some future share. The reason is simple: A very small percentage of the public is in the market for a car (maybe 3% under normal circumstances and 2% right now). Consumers only hear the advertising that pertains to them. So, any market share gains made by a local auto dealer are being made with the 2% of people who are “now” buyers of autos. These now buyers will not be in the market again for another three years so the advertising seller is asking the auto dealer to spend money with them to 1) gain market share of an unusually small pie and 2) wait three years to get a payoff on that growth in share.

What this argument neglects is that if, for example, Chrysler’s sales are down 25% (as they were in May), that means that 75% of the normal-year buyers are still buying Chryslers from someone. And there are fewer Chrysler dealers on the radio this year than last.

So the “right now” pie is 25% smaller, but a Chrysler dealer willing to be agressive has a shot at a larger piece of that pie right away. And that dealer’s ads are also talking to a lot of folks who are going to buy from someone later this year. If you’re a Chrysler dealer, the fact that overall sales are down 25% doesn’t mean that you have to be down 25%.

A good, well-thought-out campaign may mean that you’ll stay even while your competitors drop even more. And the difference may very well justify a significant advertising investment even now.

All the standard rules apply — frequency, a strong offer, and good creative — in fact, those things are more important than ever. And yes, dealers are going to have to cut back.

This scenario is playing out in many different industries. Some consumers have changed their behavior, but many are still going to buy from someone. The fact that the pie may be smaller right now doesn’t mean there’s no pie to compete for at all.

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Request your free copy of my white paper, The Seven Deadly Advertising Mistakes and How to Fix Them here.

Got a question? Call me at 503-323-6553.

Is Ford’s New Campaign on the Right Track?

When selling, remember: If you don’t admit the downside, they won’t believe the upside. — Roy Williams

Lively discussion in progress on AdRants (see the comments) regarding Ford’s new ad campaign, “Drive One”. I admit to a rooting interest here, since I have two Ford dealers as clients. The author of the post is hard on the company, since in his view the positions Ford is grabbing for are already taken in the consumers’ mind by other manufacturers. And he quarrels with the whole tone of the campaign:

When a tarnished brand like Ford asks me to be surprised when I “drive one” I may register that Ford is building quality cars, but I am also reminded why I should be surprised by that – because their products were so bad for so long.

I tend to believe that Ford is facing reality — although the damage to their reputation may be self-inflicted, it’s real nonetheless, and they need to begin the slow process of repairing it. The “surprise” expressed is a tacit acknowlegement of the fact, and it’s refreshing to see them do it.

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Steady Marketing Builds Trust

One of the most common — and frustrating — conversations that advertising/marketing professionals have with their clients is the one where the client just wants to advertise when they have a special event, or at “peak” times of the year.

  • The jeweler who only advertises at Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day and Christmas
  • The car dealer who’s off the air for six months and then does a blitz for a weekend
  • The piano dealer who does a big newspaper campaign when they have a sale, and then goes quiet until the next one.

Those of us who’ve been at this for a while know the value of consistency — of getting into the customer’s head over time. The big sale campaign is so much more effective when the potential customers are already familiar with the merchant. And some businesses (The Shane Company is an example that comes to mind — love him or hate him, you know Tom Shane and why you should come to his store) are so successful at this that they never have to do a big sale.

Sometimes we win the argument, and sometimes we lose. Our most successful clients “get it”, stay in front of their customers, and reap the benefits. We do the best we can with the rest.

In an effort to win more of those arguments, I’m going to be borrowing the words of Seth Godin, who has a very powerful post on his blog this morning. The money quote, for me, is this:

The best time to look for a job next year is right now. The best time to plan for a sale in three years is right now. The mistake so many marketers make is that they conjoin the urgency of making another sale with the timing to earn the right to make that sale. In other words, you must build trust before you need it. Building trust right when you want to make a sale is just too late.

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Click this link to subscribe to Portland’s Finest Advertising Blog.

Request your free copy of my white paper, The Seven Deadly Advertising Mistakes and How to Fix Them here.