• by Karl Greenberg , December 17, 2009

Toyota's Scion division next week will launch a video extension of its in-house Scion A/V label, called Scion A/V Video, comprising a series of music videos from independent labels across an array of genres.

The music videos, from artists in genres like metal, hip-hop, electro and new-disco, were produced by Scion and will be distributed via iTunes, and Scion's social media channels including Scion's just-launched lifestyle Web site ScionAV.com. The videos will also be on Vimeo and other video sites and promotional DVDs.

The company has been in the music, arts and video promotional business in some form or another since the brand launched in 2002. The arts focus lets the company target 18- to-24-year-olds without spending a lot on TV and to establish the brand as an automobile for people for whom personal expression is paramount.

The new ScionAV.com Web site, which Scion soft-launched this fall, is an omnibus site for music, art and film content sponsored or produced by Scion. It comprises a Web-streamed music and video channel called "Scion Radio 17"; schedules and info about Scion's House Party and Radio 17 monthly concerts, as well as music festivals, contests and promotions. The site will also host music from Scion's in-house Scion A/V label, and episodes of the global travel-lifestyle series, "Slick's Picks."

Scion has also just released its second mobile application, called Scion AV Radio, in the Apple App Store. The free program offers mobile access to the ScionAV.com site and all the content therein.

Jeri Yoshizu, lifestyle, events and promotions manager at Torrance, Calif.-based Scion, tells Marketing Daily that the programs build brand affinity both for the artists and for Scion. "That is very critical for our brand, and the markets that we are interacting with -- music enthusiasts."

She says the new ScionAV.com site is a bit like Amazon.com, where different creative disciplines, interviews, and artist information are linked by association. "When you go on Amazon and you buy a record or CD, you get recommendations and are drawn deep into an interest group," says Yoshizu. "We make it so that if you are a fan of a certain genre or band you will be exposed to all connecting threads within the world of Scion."

Yoshizu says the brand needed such a Web-based kiosk that tied everything together because the arts tend to exist in silos: people who follow or participate in one Scion-sponsored artistic show or endeavor might have no idea that Scion is involved in others. She says that among the dozens of art and music shows the automaker sponsors, or produces every month, attendees often have no idea that the company is doing the same promotional activity around other genres and art forms, sometimes in the same town at the same time.

"I was really caught off guard by that," she says. "So I decided that there has to be more exposure in one place. The bottom line is, if Scion is putting itself out there as a supporter of arts communities, I want people to feel that it's not just about one artist but about all these other areas. So if you are, say, a fan of metal [music], you aren't in your own bubble: 'Yeah this car company is marketing to us, but they are doing the same thing for the garage scene, dance scene, the independent film scene.' It is more integrated. That's the hope."

Yoshizu says Scion is involved as a sponsor in some 70 music, art and film events per month, and produces and curates four to eight events per month.