• by Karl Greenberg , November 11, 2011

Ford will unveil the newest version of its Escape compact crossover SUV at the Los Angeles Auto Show next week. The Escape -- perhaps more than any other car or truck in Ford's lineup, except the F-150 -- has been the most consistently successful vehicle year after year since its launch in 2000, back when SUVs with truck underpinnings sold like hot dogs at a baseball game.

The automaker's activities leading up to next week's reveal evince something else that Ford has been consistent about since it (pre-) launched the Fiesta compact car in 2009: marketing experiments around digital and social media. As it did with social media programs like Fiesta Movement, the Facebook unveiling of the Explorer last summer, and the Focus Rally, Ford is teasing the new Escape and its features with a mobile effort offering sneak peeks, daily cash prizes and a grand prize of $3,000 "Living Social Escape" vacation. 

The program puts an Escape-themed game on the digital shelf of the iPhone/iPad application GoldRun. The promotion, which started on Nov. 4, introduces a series of activities leading up to next week's show, each of which elaborates on features unique to the 2012 Escape. To those who play, it offers rewards and glimpses of Escape features via a series of five videos that tout things like the hands-free lift gate and sustainable elements.

Ford's Escape marketing manager Jason Sprawka says the videos are also housed on Ford's Facebook page for Escape. He explains that the program has a strong consumer-content component, since players participate in the various exercises by doing things like uploading photo images. "One of the neat things from a marketing perspective is that alternate reality overlays an image you provide. We are using that to deliver product messaging."

Sprawka explains that one element touts the fact that the Escape comprises a lot of recycled materials by focusing on the carpeting, made of recycled bottles. "We marry product messages with alternative-reality pictures. So GoldRun will put messaging on-screen, and [in the game] the consumer might take a picture, say, in front of pop bottles and share it to the app, which is connected to the user's Facebook page."

He says the program is emblematic of what the automaker will do around the Escape launch next spring. "Connecting with consumers in the social realm gives credibility and credence to the message because we are letting customers tell our story. The Escape marketing program will be like Fiesta Movement, and Focus Rally, but we are looking to take it to next level. You can see with GoldRun that we have learned to amplify the message with social, but we are going to integrate as much with the mobile community."