Let’s not have the car get in the way of a good advert
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Tag Archives: cars
Consumers, cars and common sense
The role of gas prices in American automobile purchases
When consumers visit their friendly automobile dealer, they encounter a wide variety of options: sedans, SUVs, minis, convertibles, pickups, hybrids, luxury vehicles, and others, as well as the alternatives of new or used vehicles. They also face a choice among gas guzzlers that will incur high running costs, cars with high gas mileage that will cost less over the long term, and everything in between. That choice becomes particularly critical at a time like the present, when gasoline prices show great volatility.
via Consumers, Cars, and Common Sense – The role of gas prices in American automobile purchases.
Skoda marketing turnaround
This is an interesting piece of video from the BBC. Back in the 80s who would have thought that Skoda would rock in at no3 (tied with Jaguar) in a survey of cars, just behind Lexus and Honda.
In fairness this is as much a manufacturing turnaround as a marketing one, but it is the marketing that interests me at the moment.
The re-branding of Skoda provides a useful case study of the challenges faced by brands wishing to reposition themselves. Remember the Skoda jokes?
- What do you call a Skoda with a sun-roof? Answer: A skip.
- Why does a Skoda have a heated rear windscreen? Answer: To keep your hands warm when you push it
- What do you call a Skoda with twin exhaust pipes? Answer: A wheelbarrow
Critics of the Skoda would be surprised to hear the Skoda is now one of the fastest-growing car brands in the UK motor industry. The Czech car company boosted its sales in the UK in 2001 by 24% as opposed to the average market growth of 10.7%. This built on growth of 34% in 2000. How has this been achieved?
Read a marketing case study of Skoda’s re-brand: http://tutor2u.net/business/marketing/casestudy_skoda.asp
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Prepaid gets people out of cars and onto buses
Prepaid and smart cards are contributing to the migration of passengers from the comfort of their cars and onto public transport buses. Well that appears to be the assertion.
The Go-Ahead Group has reported a 7.2 per cent rise in passengers using its deregulated bus services in the first quarter of 2011, hinting that motorists are saying “so long” to the car and “hello” to public transport.
Some of the reasons outlined for the increase in bus use include the introduction of smart card ticketing and successful marketing campaigns aimed at getting passengers to use alternative forms of transport.
via Are you ready to ditch the car? | ContractHireAndLeasing.com.
I think prepaid is bound to be a contributor. I now use a simplyBus card from Reading Buses and this does make local bus travel easier…as my Oyster card does in London.
But let’s keep our feet on the ground here; basic pricing, timetables, routes and availability of public transport play a huge role in the decisions of passengers. I also think the sky high fuel prices, today £1.42 for a litre of diesel is a major influencer.
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Why your next car will have an IP address
One trend that has become very clear at this year’s CES is that the Internet is slowly making its way into our cars. Of course, you can already browse the Net and play music from Pandora through your smartphone, but the next generation of cars – and especially electric cars – are making the Internet an integral part of the car’s feature set.
What will this mean for marketers? Will we target people via their cars? We will know where the car has been and for how long. Overlay Google Maps, SatNav and a few savvy ideas and the shape of consumer marketing is set to evolve in some interesting ways.