Thanks to a recommendation from Brenda Buratti, who blogs about how to minimize stress and create better relationships in her interesting Live Your Better Life Blog, I read an interesting Wall Street Journal article about how Ford has picked 100 young, Web-savvy drivers to get behind the wheel of its new Ford Fiesta subcompact for six months and post their impressions on sites such as YouTube, Flickr and Twitter.
This campaign makes a lot of sense given that it will likely reach the young drivers who will like the stylish and sporty Fiesta (now there are two adjectives I've never used to describe a Ford vehicle) that is still unavailable in the U.S. but continues to rack up impressive sales in Europe.
The article points how leading executives at Ford were reluctant to give away cars for six months when they have no control over what the young testers will say about the car or where they will say it:
From the article:
When Ford first tossed around the idea of loaning 100 cars without the ability to control what the drivers might say, Ford's sales chief emerged as the leading internal skeptic.
"I was like, 'Nah, go to Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica [Calif.], go to Royal Oak [Mich.] on a hot night with the kids out for ice cream,'" said Jim Farley, Ford's global vice president for sales and marketing. "Pull up with 10 vehicles, give away free T-shirts, have people do test drives, broadcast the whole thing on the Web."
Mr. Farley said his reluctance softened when a group of sons and daughters recruited from Ford's largest dealers endorsed the six-month online effort.
"The interest in the Web [campaign] had far exceeded my expectations," he says. "My hunch was pretty traditional."
Today's consumers, particularly savvy young ones, are looking for authentic information about the products that they might buy - particularly big ticket items.Ford's campaign for the Fiesta provides this authenticity. Although some test drivers might make negative observations, their comments will only reinforce the authenticity of the campaign which should be overwhelmingly positive given that the Fiesta provides benefits that are likely to appeal to the young testers.
If American car manufacturers adopt more creative word of mouth marketing campaign likes this one rather than dumping billions into boring car commercials that people skip with their DVRs, they might just survive without government-funded bailouts.
