Bob Lutz’s gigantic job: Unasked for advice for GM’s new advertising arbiter

The news of Bob Lutz’s new job responsibilities was, to use that overused and becoming increasingly trite word — awesome.  The shock waves, tremors and angst registered on the advertising Richter scale coast-to-coast within minutes after the announcement.  

One could almost see the swarms of e-mails and hordes of phone calls, like helicopters, from every GM advertising agency, media buying service, research firms, agency suppliers, search firm specialists, as well as consultants, creative’s and suit’s circling the GM building hoping, praying, wishing for an opportunity to get face or phone time to plead their case and experience to Bob Lutz.

This as most know, is not a new calling for the septuagenarian auto exec. He’s done this before for BMW. Dave Kiley, in his book Driven described how Lutz choose a new and relative unknown agency, Ammanti and Purvis over agency behemoths’ Ted Bates Agency and Benton & Bowles.  The result was perhaps the best corporate tag line ever in the car business, The Ultimate Driving Machine, and advertising that helped drive BMW’s business up and up.

But the problems of BMW then were not the same as GM’s are today.  I’ve gotten some favorable and a few nasty e-mails and calls about my recent reviews of GM’s corporate advertising and for that awful La Crosse ad.  Based on Lutz’s comments this week, he feels exactly the same but was more restrained in his comments.

It is more than audacious and presumptuous to offer counsel to a man like Lutz, but there are many advertising people, inside and outside the auto industry, who are hoping he succeeds in stopping the ill conceived, misdirected, idiotic image, GM’s and the remaining brand’s advertising has taken in recent years. It’s been horrible!

These ads, no matter the medium, have lacked consistency, credibility or creativity. They have not sold cars, and they certainly have been ignored or laughed at and justifiably so.

There has been a strict reliance on group-think, group-reviews, group-CYA-decisions based on using extensive consumer research to justify crap!  Both at GM and their agencies.  Hundreds of millions, maybe billions of dollars thrown down a deep dark abyss of gratuitous waste.

My take is simplistic.  Don’t allow, please don’t permit the GM corporate culture sycophants, corp-speak-artists, untalented and arrogant individuals to be involved any longer. They are the ones who effed it up in the first place.  And the way you start is the way you finish.

Bob, pardon my impertinence, but you need a few very bright, aggressive, not afraid to disagree, forward thinking, young and responsive and responsible lieutenants who can bring a variety of experiences to the table and are not afraid to work. Remember how The Duce did it with his Whiz Kids? So can you. The past can be prologue to tomorrow.

Two advertising clichés: “Half my advertising dollars don’t work, I just don’t remember which half “and of course “Your ads will only be as good as you let them be.”

I have contacted a rather lengthy list of ad people to offer a few words of counsel. Many declined for a variety of reasons, some I know were the helicopters circling the GM building but those who responded were thoughtful and provocative. A few examples:

From Bob Austin, whose advertising and PR work at Volvo in the 80s and 90s, made their name synonymous with safety, suggested” GM is not a brand. People can not go out and buy a GM. They will buy a Chevy, Buick, GMC, or a Caddy. Do not use your marketing capital to fix the GM name. The best way to reinvigorate the GM name is through the performance of the brands and the best way to communicate it is via an open and accessible P.R. operation. You do not need any GM ads.

In order to really build and communicate the remaining brands you need to define: what is the role of each brand, establish who is its target audience, what is its brand promise, what is its competitive set, and what will it take to be best in class? It is important that this be done as soon as possible and all of the important stakeholders need to participate in the process.  

I would recommend a week long retreat with people from corporate, each brand team, each key agency, the PR people, and several key dealer representatives. Mr. Lutz should kick off the meeting and explain that the objective is to plot a successful course for the future brand by brand, to be sure that the input of all key  stakeholders was considered, and to see that each of the brands would have a well defined and clearly differentiated place in the market.  Over the next three days, each of the 4 brand teams should, independently, develop answers to the questions posed above.  On the final day, all the teams will present.  Mr. Lutz along with the other participants will see that the new brand “bibles” are consistent, clearly defined, and have no overlap.  Now the process of developing communications can start.

All communications work should be developed according to a brief provided by the client.  It will contain the things we need to know in order to do great communications:  what do we want to communicate, why do we want to do this, to whom do we want to communicate, what do we want them to believe or what action do we want them to take after they have seen this message.  If you do not do this step, you will never be able to tell if you ad was good or bad, you will only be able to say that you liked it or you did not!  This is a critical step and it must be initiated by the client….not the agency.

Steve Bland Owner of Big Logo Advertising, LLC, an automotive marketing consultancy had the following comments. “Too obvious to dwell on, over the last 35 years, the free market has not been kind to GM. I pray that the “reinvention” of GM is not just another coat of paint on the same old issues.

I, like the rest of America, desperately want them to succeed.  But it’s difficult not to be skeptical of Henderson, Lutz, et al and what they are trying to sell us.  It’s the same cast in different roles.  Outside of a new car introduction, I can’t recall seeing an uplifting head-line about the saga of General Motors in my 20 years in the automotive business.”

Anonymity requested, “Detroit is such an “insular” culture change will be difficult. Example: on Fridays everybody tries to get out early in the summer and go up north to Mackinac Island. Only trouble is you drive 6 hours, get there and the guy you canceled the lunch date with to get out of town is in the next hotel room. And if he or she is an auto “biggie” the “bowing and fawning” must commence. Tough to be a change agent.”

These guys truly live in the “bubble” They had the model though a long time ago with Saturn which was conceived to change GM. Only trouble is GM changed Saturn But their model:  determine the mission and the critical success factors for achieving it … then get the key dealers involved on each critical success committee, including advertising … they don’t live in “the bubble”… and they are smart business people who can help a lot. Strange thing happens after a couple of days.

The dealers realize the factory guys’ hearts are in the right place and the factory guys realize the dealers are not idiots with gorillas on their roofs but savvy business men who can contribute a lot to the cause. And in the end the dealers become disciples not rebels because they were part of the process.

Ron Rose, president Ron Rose Productions, LLC was enthusiastic when he wrote, I think it’s wonderful having a real car guy at the helm. We’ve had enough bankers and accountants. Bob Lutz is automobiles in this city.

And last, are these comments from Stephen C. Kopcha, Associate Professor, Missouri School of Journalism (former Executive Creative Director, DMB&B) who wrote, “GM needs to make sure it doesn’t blow money on “image” advertising. Each commercial needs to be ALL ABOUT a benefit the competition either doesn’t offer or doesn’t talk about. Of course, it should be done with wit, style and creativity, not chest-thumping. 

Q&A with Hyundai’s VP of marketing, Joel Ewanick 

Over the past several months we’ve witnessed an amazing surge in respect, sales and break-through marketing ideas from Hyundai.  Okay, so the Genesis sedan wasn’t a marketing idea, but it created very big brand halo for the Korean brand. This was followed in rapid fire succession with the innovative and trend setting “Assurance program” which was recently followed with the $1.49 price guarantee for gasoline.

Knowing  the final CARS or ‘cash for clunkers’ final regulations will be published next Friday, July 24, I thought it would be a good idea to see what Hyundai was going to do with this program so I called Joel Ewanick, the current superstar of automotive marketing to get detail on their program.

MB: Obviously Hyundai has made some very smart tactical marketing moves this year, how did it happen?

JE: In August of last year we saw the sales decline coming, and as Hyundai’s management team we didn’t want to waste what we knew could be special, unique and rare opportunity for Hyundai to grow marketshare.  We had already seen the economy starting to slow down … we could see it in August then September, October and November, but we had already decided we were going to be aggressive and go after the market, not waiting for it to happen.

MB: What was done?

JE: We put a very aggressive 2009 plan together that started with Assurance, to gain marketshare.  Economic history has shown company’s like ours can grow marketshare during these down economies going back to the depression era.

MB: Every auto brand was trying to grow their sales; the consumer was being bombarded with deal after deal after deal, why have your programs succeeded?

JE: We saw that and pushed really hard to keep programs coming-up, one right after another.  Our goal is not let any month go by without putting something in front of the 700 to 750 thousand consumers in the car buying market. Our programs are resonating with consumers and making it difficult for them not to look at Hyundai.

MB: The $1.49 gas program recently announced was another marketing salvo, what triggered this tactic?

JE: Consumer confidence is up slightly, but the economy is still of concern. We know 80% of consumers are thinking if gas prices don’t go up this summer, they certainly will in the fall.  This means they are changing their automotive buying behavior and are looking at different kinds of cars than they did in the past. We tested several different things and if we can offer people a guarantee they will only have to pay $1.49 per gallon it was a very compelling message. 

MB: What new angles are you adding to differentiate Hyundai’s CARS or cash for clunkers program from the others?

JE: We believe those who are out there first promoting their CARS program and getting in front of the pack will have an advantage. Our creative, click for commercial, started last weekend and it spells out for the consumer exactly what the Hyundai CARS program means to them. 

MB: And that program is ….?

JE: It’s called net pricing. The consumer is shown what the cost of a Sonata would be in the CARS program. From our research, when people see that exact dollar number we connect the dots for them.  It’s not just saying “You’re going to get up to $4,500 if your car qualifies”  Hyundai  shows them what that means in dollars saved as opposed to other companies who are saying “You can get a low monthly payment.”

MB: Can you cite an example?

JE: It was our decision to take another track and show the consumer that a Sonata, which would normally cost them $20,000 could now get as low at $12 or $13 thousand dollars. When we share that with consumers, their eyes get as big as saucers! It’s amazing.

MB: Dealers are optimistic about the impact of the CARS program, but there is genuine concern about the prompt payment of the special allowances, after all retail is run on cash flow, what is Hyundai doing about this?

JE: Our dealers will be offered cash advances to be repaid when they are paid by the government.  It’s a fully integrated program with marketing, public relations, sales, finance and the president and CEO, John Krafcheck fully committing to making this happen, without having the money available for the dealers we could not have done this program.  Everybody working together collaboratively and very quickly too that makes things like this happen. 

Thinking inside the box. Cube vs. Soul advertising

Little cars with box shapes, think the first Scion XB, have become hot commodities in today’s sluggish-to-dismal retail market. We’ve all seen and read the side-by-side comparisons of gear-head speak in enthusiast publications. This will use their format, but with a difference. 

This is a comparison of their respective television advertising and web site landing pages based on attending product introductions, getting marketing information and watching their key respective commercials and clicking to their landing pages.

When reviewing commercials for Automotive News I created and used a tally sheet of 20 different items in 4 categories for a maximum of 100 points – which I know is arbitrary, but it does level the field and is the basis of semi-objective scores for both commercials.

Imagine you are a critic (hell, everyone who watches a commercial is a critic) and click to the two commercials:

• To view the Kia Critters 30-second commercial click here,
• and for the Nissan Cube 30-second spot click here. 

Then below are my scores for each based.  

	Maximum Points	Kia Soul Critters	Nissan Cube Ice Cream
CONCEPT & CREATIVE
Idea	9	9	8
Execution	9	9	7
Copy	9	8	7
Intangible	1	1	0
Sub Total	28	27	22
PRODUCTION VALUES
Cinematography	6	6	6
Direction	6	6	6
Visuals/SFX/CGI	5	5	3
Actors/Voiceover	4	3	3
Music	4	4	4
Sub Total	25	24	22
BRAND IMAGE
Demographic targeting	8	6	8
Appeal	8	7	7
Memorable	8	8	6
Sub total	24	21	21
EFFECTIVENESS
Urge to action	8	3	8
Persuasive	8	4	7
Likeability	7	6	6
Compelling	7	3	6
Sub Total	23	17	23
TOTAL	100	88	88

The creative is as different as night and day, yet the scores are tied. Here’s how I arrived at these scores based on the knowledge both vehicles targeting the same under-30 market and the attachment of my subjective values.

I thought the hamsters in the Kia spot were unique and interesting but the message of sameness was, to me at least, obscure and got a bit boring. Obviously I’m not the target market and don’t know what bores kids today. Do you? Since there were no actors used it was hard to tell who the demographic target was other than through the music. Production used amazing computer generated graphics that were outstanding. 

This contrasted by the Nissan Cube spot in which the demographic targeting was easy to identify, very specific and well focused visually, with actors and the music.  Key to this commercial were the messages supers (words on the screen) identifying the benefits or features of the vehicle.

Neither commercial did a good job in directing the viewers, either through graphics or words, to their web sites, an important factor in reaching this very fluid market.  Although Kia’s Soul web landing page is sensational and targeted, click here.

By comparison, the Cube landing page is bland and boring, nothing like the commercial, click here.

So who is right?  Well, based on sales results to date, it seems Kia is the winner in the little box race.  But the race has just begun. 

Two interesting videos from Nissan can be seen by clicking here, and then here. Both are interesting exercises.

Newest bad GM commercial

The bluster, braggadocio and blunders continue. Corporate was awful. Buick La Crosse terrible. And now we have — rim shot please – the new Goodwrench commercial, just click here to view another profligate waste of tax payers money.

Many may remember that nice older guy with the mustache from years ago who was a mechanic called Mr. Goodwrench? A trustworthy, careful, caring man if I recall the brief. He was replaced with a younger more hip  “technician” also known as Mr. Goodwrench who only installed genuine GM parts but didn’t look quite so concerned.  Well, the geezer mechanic and the younger technician have thankfully been retired.

But in their place is the Goodwrench, non gender specific or personal title noted. Just Goodwrench in another truly ill conceived commercial selling brake jobs at $74.96 for all of GM brands, both the old bankrupt GM and the new just-reborn-from-bankruptcy GM.  It seems like a commercial bone to dealers to generate some service business.

But where is the promise to fix-it-right the first time service at realistic prices, with trained people and the work is done when they said it will be done?  Where? It’s not here!  Why? Because it’s obvious to me the person or persons who approved this ad and those who created it were living in a world where consumer touch points do not exist.  Shame on all of them.