• by Karl Greenberg , July 24, 2007

Nissan is tuning up for the launch of its Rogue compact crossover this September with a summer interactive campaign with Yahoo Music.

The program ties in with Nissan Live Sets On Yahoo Music, a program launched late last year that uses Yahoo as a platform to webcast Nissan-sponsored concerts held on a Nissan-branded sound stage in Fox's studio lot in Los Angeles.

The Rogue pre-launch program, "Ultimate L.A. Rogue Trip," centers on a concert on the sound stage by Carlos Santana and others. The program, via ePrize, dangles an all-expenses-paid trip for two to see Santana perform live at Nissan Live Sets on Yahoo Music.

Melissa Adams, senior manager, Nissan Media, says the company is boosting its Internet marketing efforts--and that, in fact, the Rogue campaign will be Nissan's largest-ever online campaign.

She says Nissan's campaign with Yahoo Music has boosted brand image and trustworthiness, as well as purchase consideration.

"Interactive will have a large presence for the Rogue launch," she says, adding that Nissan Live Sets will be a central component to the young-skewing effort for the car, whose target demo for Rogue is 20s to early 30s. "Nissan Live Sets is definitely here to stay. We're in month eight, and will be continuing into year two."

She says, to date, Nissan has streamed 50 million videos of Nissan Live Sets videos through Yahoo Music to about 6 million people. "The vehicles we have used for the quarterly promotions--Altima and now Rogue--have seen the most benefit in terms of lead generation, but, overall, we've seen great metrics even during non-promotional months," she says.

The performances feature artists in hip hop, pop, R&B, country, Latin and other genres. They have included Tony Bennett, American Idol-alumna Kelly Clarkson, Joss Stone, Avril Lavigne, Beck and Enrique Iglesias.