automotive

Luxury Automakers Need To Socialize More

BMW Blog

Luxury automakers could use a course in how to integrate social-media campaigns, per a new study from New York-based consultancies MH Group Communications and Forum Strategies & Communications.

Looking at luxury auto-brand activity across sites like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Flickr, the study found that German automakers dominate the luxury auto business category, while Japanese and American brands are largely absent. But the study also determined that none of the automakers has social media down pat. Overall, it ranked BMW No. 1, followed by Porsche, Audi, Mercedes, Cadillac, Lexus, Acura, Infiniti and Lincoln.

The firm says Porsche had the highest social-community index, followed by BMW and Audi. In terms of conversation, BMW held a sizeable lead over competitors.

BMW leaned heavily on social media last year to launch its 1-Series car, intended to attract younger, entry-level consumers with a "Pure BMW" effort via Austin, Texas-based GSD&M and New York-based Dotglu. The effort included Facebook elements, wherein members could send virtual 1-Series cars and car keys to each other and the car itself on a kind of trip from one profile to another.

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Audi is using social media sites like Facebook to trumpet the virtues of its turbo-direct injection diesel with videos about its race program featuring interviews on site with people like chief marketer Scott Keogh.

Mark Hass, president of MH Group and former worldwide CEO of PR firm MS&L, tells Marketing Daily that the import luxury brands have the benefit of strong brand identity.

But, he says, social-media silence about the Japanese luxury brands means that resting on laurels isn't enough. "Lexus was a real surprise in terms of how little traction they have," he says. "That is a reflection of what they are doing. The German brands are doing more."

He argues that savvy social-media marketing -- and he holds up Zappos and Starbucks as exemplars -- are both aggressive within a given channel and also integrated across a number of them. "We have found that automakers are doing things that are focused in one or two channels, and each effort is isolated and treated as an independent program," he says. "None of the automakers -- not even BMW and Porsche -- have integrated, holistic approaches."

Hass says an aggressive approach means making sure fan sites don't subsume the company's own efforts. "If the unofficial fan pages tend to have more participants than official ones," he says, "you've lost control of brand. It's great to let customers control it, but not to control it completely."

The study revealed that social media conversations around luxury auto brands focused on admiration, sales and deals, questions about features, service and availability and news and vehicle announcements, which are unique challenges in each area for automakers.

The good news is that consumers evince a general goodwill toward luxury brands in social media. The firm says that 90% of the commentary and content created about these brands is positive, since luxury brand consumers perceive that they receive a high level of service and value by being associated with the brand.

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