“It’s okay for us to be the little guy,” Wager said.

But like Davis vs. Goliath, Mazda has a new attitude – and a new strategy – to boost its presence not only on TV, but also in search and digital, as well as high-profile places like Times Square and a promotional tie-in with an upcoming movie.

Wager compared Mazda to MLB’s Oakland A’s, which ranked last out of 30 teams for payroll costs, but still finished 4th overall. He declined to reveal specifics of Mazda’s ad budget.

Mazda spends about $280 million a year on ads and media, well below the major car brands.

Mazda is kicking off its biggest ad campaign in 13 years in May. Themed “Game Changers,” ads will highlight pioneers of the past who figured out a way to excel in their areas of expertise. You know, like Mazda.

The first work features Olympian Dick Fosbury, who revolutionized high jumping with his new “back-first” technique that won him a Gold Medal in 1968.

“We are going to look at game changers- people who used courage to defy conventional wisdom,” said Harvey Marco, chief creative officer of Garage Team Mazda, the brand’s ad agency since 2010. He said other big names featured in the ads will be Mary Quaint, the mini skirt inventor, and Laird Hamilton, the big-wave surfer who dreamed up tow-in surfing, which involves a jet ski pulling the skier into monstrous curls.

There will be plenty of people who never heard of  these folks. But that’s okay since the Big Idea should overcome that.

Although the campaign breaks for the launch of the 2014 Mazda6 sedan, the new umbrella theme will spread to all models, all branding, in all messaging, including events, regional dealer advertising and sales offers.

That approach differs from how Mazda did things in the past and the uniform ad platform “will make our (ad) fund go further,” says Wager. Mazda is boosting its digital and search spending by 40% this year from 2012. Wager says the brand will reduce its reliance on TV. Although broadcast will account for the biggest chunk of the overall ad spend, at 65%, Mazda will be on television all year. Although digital will comprise 25% of all spending, the undisclosed total is 40% more than 2012 (and includes search). Print and out-of-home ads account for the remaining 10% of the budget.

Look for Mazda to takeover Yahoo’s home page with jumper Fosbury, carrying the headline “This is how he changed the game. This is how we changed the game.” (with the new Mazda6).

And from now on, Mazda ads will show only red vehicles “so they  pop off the page,” Marco said.

Mazda’s new consumer research, done over the past 5 months, and new analytics approach, will boost retail sales and reach, Wager said.

Mazda partnered with the upcoming space thriller “Star Trek Into Darkness” as part of the 6′s launch. Check out this  :30 commercial Mazda did to help promote the film

It makes sense for Mazda to team up with this sci fi flick to tout its SKYACTIV Technology that improves driving, safety and fuel economy.  Mazda has an app related to the movie that assigns 5 missions, including a trip to a Mazda dealership to take and upload a photo. Dealers will also get movie tickets to share with  service customers.

Mazda takes the “Game Changer” theme to print and out-of-home ads, like this interactive board carrying the headline “When you  Change Everything, You Change Everything.”

I may be nitpicking, but this ad (shown) and several like it remind me an awful lot of the work BBDO Detroit did back in 1992 for the launch of the new Dodge Intrepid. “We’re Changing Everything,” was the ad theme for that campaign. Okay, that was back in 1992, so maybe I am nitpicking.

Anything that can get little Mazda more exposure is a good thing.

MAKING TRACKS: Life IS stranger than  fiction. Steve Majoros joins Cadillac as global marketing director. Majoros was a managing director at IPG’s Campbell-Ewald ad agency. C-E had been Chevrolet’s ad agency for more than 90 years and is said to be in the pitch for Cadillac’s business. What does that mean for Fallon, Caddy’s current ad shop? Bad news, probably.

MAKING TRACKS II : Word is Hyundai creative ad agency ,affiliate Innocean Worldwide Americas in Huntington Beach is close to hiring a new COO after a year-long search. Stay tuned, folks.

Follow me, Jean Halliday, on LinkedIn, Forbes.com and Facebook

and on Twitter @jhal2001

And General Motors finally confirmed it, announcing late in the day today (March 14) it was consolidating Chevrolet’s global account at IPG’s McCann Worldwide. Strangely, GM distributed the statement, which was attributed to McCann.

Whatever.

The bottom line is this: Omnicom’s Goodby, Silverstein & Partners is out.

Goodby won the Chevy account in 2010 without a review shortly after the arrival of Joel Ewanick as CMO. Ewanick had worked with Goodby during his years heading Porsche marketing and also for a while at Hyundai.

Shortly before Ewanick was forced out last year, GM pushed Goodby into that silly 50-50 venture with McCann to handle Chevy, called Commonwealth. I predicted it was a bad idea to try to get 2 holding companies to work together.

http://autoadopolis.wordpress.com/2012/03/28/is-chevys-global-creative-solution-a-good-idea/

GM should have known better since it had tried it before on the media side… and it flopped.

Most AutoAdOpolis readers know I have not been a big fan of most of Goodby’s work. I don’t put all the blame on the agency because it has done some great work for other clients.

The smoke signals for Goodby’s demise really started billowing late last year when GM’s Alan Batey, interim CMO, (pictured below) moved oversight of the crucial Chevy Silverado launch to Publicis’ Leo Burnett.

Burnett  also has GMC and Buick and one could certainly argue that work for those two brands hasn’t exactly been setting the world on fire.

So one has to wonder why Batey chose to only fiddle with the agencies for only 2 of 4 GM US vehicle brands, essentially giving Burnett a free pass.

But even more curious is Batey’s timing.

After all, Tim Mahoney will start April 1 as GM’s newly-hired global CMO for Chevrolet. Mahoney, on vacation this month after leaving VW of America, will also be global GM marketing operations leader, indicating he’ll also oversee other car brands. He’ll report to Batey.

GM has been mum on whether Batey, also VP of sales and service in the US, will remain interim global CMO. So Mahoney could well be Batey’s successor. So, if Batey wanted to make some big moves and undo most of what Ewanick did, he knew he had to hurry.

But why not wait until Mahoney arrives?

Batey’s marketing power plays would have had to have been okayed from the top, since Batey reports to GM Chairman-CEO Dan Akerson.

This entire mess doesn’t portray GM in a very positive light.

What the hell are you guys thinking?

———————————————-

Follow me, Jean Halliday, on LinkedIn, Forbes.com and Facebook

On Twitter @jhal2001

It’s good to see that General Motors’ biggest brand included the sexy Corvette in the commercial. But why are there no crossovers or pickups? Those segments are certainly a big part of the brand’s bread and butter these days. The scenes in the spot are pretty nifty. The robo dog is cool and who doesn’t like deer? The  first part of the Sonic section looks very much like a spot for retailer Target, another Grammy broadcast sponsor.

But the whole thing somehow doesn’t gel as one; doesn’t come together. Who is finding new roads? Where are the new roads?

What probably bothers me most is the boastful line “with the best lineup of vehicles ever….”

Memo to Chevy: Who said you have the best lineup ever? It’s better to use third-party ratings than pound on your chest with that blanket statement. Why? Because there’s plenty of skeptics out there and people are more likely to trust third party sources. Hopefully Chevy will have some testimonial ads touting its “best lineup” ever.

And say goodbye to Tim Allen as the voice of Chevy advertising. He was thrown out with the “Chevy Runs Deep” ad tag that lived for a little over two years, created by Goodby, Silverstein & Partners in San Francisco. That’s OK, you can still hear the actor narrating ads for Campbell’s Soup. You’re now hearing John Cusack doing Chevrolet ad voice overs.

The second spot out there with the “Find New Roads” ad tag is for the 2013 Chevy Traverse.

Check out how the ad shows seating for 8, whether they are real or imaginary

Sorry, Chevy and Commonwealth, but this ad is awful close to Kia’s 2010 Super Bowl commercial for the Sorento, showing the critters from kids’  popular cable TV show Yo Gabba Gabba come to life

It certainly looks like Chevrolet and Commonwealth stole the idea from Kia and their ad agency DavidandGoliath. These sort of coincidences happen from time to time in this business. There was one season in the ’90s when 2 or 3 different car brands featured grocery store parking lots and shopping carts in their commercials.

The longer you’ve been in this business, the more examples of these coincidences you see. Here’s another one, this time it’s Kia, which in recent weeks broke a national spot for the 2014 Sorento. Check out how Kia touted the crossover’s power-folding mirrors and programmable power lift gate in a tight parking space

Of course lots of people would never jam their $23,000-to$33,000 new vehicle into such a tight spot. This Big Idea isn’t so fresh. Check out this commercial from WPP’s JWT (now TeamDetroit) for the 2000-model Ford Focus

And so it goes. If you’ve got any to add, please leave a comment and thanks for taking the time to read AutoAdOpolis.

MAKING TRACKS: General Motors has shifted Craig Bierley from ad director for Buick GMC to the same post at Cadillac. Craig, a Michigan native, has been with GM for 22-plus years, starting there as a financial analyst. He succeeds Molly Peck, who was moved last fall from the Caddy post to USA ad director of Chevrolet. The merry-go-round continues over there.

Follow me, Jean Halliday, on LinkedIn, Facebook and Forbes.com

and on Twitter @jhal2001

Volkswagen of America just released this 1:30 gem teaser it calls “Get Happy,” starring Jamaican regaee legend Jimmy Cliff

Love the crying “cat lady” and the whole spot just makes you smile. VW is very smart to push its own web site, vw.com, where it is offering downloads of this exclusive track and directing viewers to #GetHappy. Kudos to Deutsch Los Angeles.

Of course the teaser isn’t necessarily what VW will air in the game on Sunday, Feb. 3. VW fooled us all last year with a whacky teaser of dogs barking the “Star Wars” theme, then in the game ran a Beetle spot of a dog getting in shape so it could chase the car. I do know VW will air a brand spot in the Big Game.

Here it is

I think I prefer the teaser.

“You can be a little bit crazier with the teasers,” CMO and chief product officer Tim Mahoney, told me. And since he’s arrived at VW in spring 2011 he said he and his team has learned that “you can stretch the conversation” about your brand when you release your Super Bowl teaser earlier rather than later. In 2011, VW got several million views for “The Force” Super Bowl spot on YouTube less than a week before the Big Game.

The VW brand has advertised in the Super Bowl since 2010, when it returned after a 9-year hiatus.

Mercedes-Benz is getting a lot of attention for its pre-Super Bowl video for the all-new CLA starring Kate Upton. Uploaded on YouTube on Jan. 21,  the 1:30  attracted an impressive 3 million views by the middle of the day Jan. 24. The commercial, from Merkley + Partners in New York City, is a spoof of a scene from the 1967 prison drama “Cool Hand Luke,” in which a sexy young thing teases the chain-gang guys with a suggestive car wash. Here’s Mercedes’ take

This seems unusual for Mercedes-Benz, but hey, sex sells, right. R&B star Usher will also be in the final ad airing in the fourth quarter.

Mercedes also went big for an earlier teaser too, buying the rights to the Rolling Stones’ “Sympathy for the Devil,” in this video posted just a few days ago on Jan. 19

Meantime, two car brands- Audi and Lincoln- are letting consumers get involved in decisions for their Big Game commercials.

Starting Jan. 25 at midnight for 24 hours, Audi will have people pick one of 3 endings for a :60 Super Bowl commercial. The story line for the 2013 Audi S6 spot is a teen boy at his prom. Somehow that doesn’t sounds very prom-ising.

This still photo from the spot is about all that’s out there now from Audi

Doesn’t give us  much to go on, eh? Should make for a wild and crazy week for Audi’s ad agency, Venables Bell & Partners in San Francisco as they edit the most popular ending into the commercial.

Here’s Audi’s final cut 

Ford Motor Co.’s lux Lincoln brand asked Tweeters in December to help it write the Big Game spot for the new MKZ sedan. Lincoln teamed with Jimmy Fallon in videos, in social media, on Twitter at www.Twitter.com/LincolnMotorCo and and via the site steerthescript.com.

On Saturday, Jan. 19 Lincoln released a 1:15 video of sneak peeks of the spot

Hmmm- tortoises, a motorcycle gang, llamas and a UFO? That’s certainly an interesting combo, eh? But only a disappointing 1,506 views on YouTube by this afternoon, Jan. 24.

Lest we forget, Lincoln said back in early December it had signed a deal with with NFL rushing leader and three-time Super Bowl champ Emmitt Smith as a “brand ambassador” for the MKZ launch. So I fully expect to see him in the final cut on Game Day. HudsonRouge in Manhattan is Lincoln’s ad agency.

Lincoln is NOT really a Super Bowl freshman. Lincoln was an advertiser in the Big Game in the mid-90s. And it had an ad buy for the 2005 Super Bowl for the Mark LT pickup truck. But Lincoln pulled out in the eleventh hour after advocacy groups complained it made light of the Catholic Church’s sex scandals. The spot showed a clergyman tempted by the keys to the 2006 pickup left on the collection plate. Instead, Ford used the ad slot during the game for an existing Mustang convertible spot.

The Toyota brand said weeks ago TV actress Kaley Cuoco would star in its Super Bowl spot. Here she is this :36 teaser, dubbed “I Wish,” arrived Jan. 23 on YouTube with the “Big Bang Theory” star and the RAV4

I don’t think this is going to get much attention for Toyota unless the actual :60 commercial airing in the first quarter from Saatchi & Saatchi in Los Angeles really dials things up. The look of this is too similar to the one the ad agency did for the recent launch of the new Toyota Avalon

You just get the idea they wanted to use this cool camera technique. Toyota also turned to social media to woo people for a chance to be in the commercial on game day. And Toyota is a sponsor of the post-game show.

Toyota finally released the in-game commercial

Hyundai still hasn’t officially released its ads or teasers, although I and other members of the media have seen the rough cuts . (You can check out my earlier blog about Hyundai’s Super Bowl ad plans here

http://autoadopolis.wordpress.com/2013/01/23/hyundais-super-bowl-ads-better-than-2012/

This is my favorite among Hyundai’s two in-game spots, called “Stuck” for the Sonata Turbo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SohqIBOb03k

Here’s the other in-game spot, just released today, called “Team”

Chrysler Group is again keeping a lid on specifics about its ad plans for Super Bowl. But you can pretty much count on something over the top.

Kia, readying its fourth year as a Super Bowl advertiser, seems late to the teaser party. But word is out it bought a :30 slot in the third quarter for the Forte and a minute-long slot in the fourth for the Sorento. DavidandGoliath, Los Angeles, handles. Here’s the teaser, which was released AFTER I originally posted

Car brands that aren’t returning this year are Chevrolet, Honda and Acura.

It’s a shame they’ll miss the big hoopla.

MAKING TRACKS: Ian Marlowe quietly shifted gears on auto accounts last year from group account director on Audi at Venables Bell & Partners in San Francisco to global brand director at TBW on Infiniti in all  markets. Did former Audi of America Prez Johan de Nysschen, now president of Infiniti globally, cherry pick Marlowe?

Follow me, Jean Halliday, on Forbes.com, LinkedIn, Facebook

On Twitter @jhal2001

The spots, at the time of writing, were still in rough cut and not available to post. (will add as soon as possible). But they should arrive today on You Tube, Facebook and other social mediums. Hyundai’s VP-marketing Steve Shannon told me yesterday the automaker is blasting the new ads out about 5 days earlier than last year ahead of Game Day in hopes of getting a bigger lift in online traffic and buzz.

In the good old days before high-speed internet access reached the masses, Super Bowl viewers would have to wait until game day to first eye ball the commercials.

Shannon told me the spots have been pre-tested via focus groups with people screened for liking the Super Bowl and its ads.

I guess Hyundai and its ad agency Innocean USA in Huntington Beach, passed the test because the commercials are coming this week, along with an extra surprise Friday about a custom-written song in one of the spots from a psychedelic alternative rock band. Shannon said that on Jan. 25  Hyundai will announce the name of the band, which doesn’t do a lot of commercial work. The new song for Hyundai will be a bonus track on the band’s upcoming new album. And Hyundai will offer 100,000 free downloads of the song via iTunes on hyundai.com the same day the new album debuts.

That ought to stir some more buzz- at least with the folks who know and like this band.

The band members have several cameos in Hyundai’s only :60 spot. It’s for the new 7-passenger Sante Fe and airs in the slot before the kick-off. The name of the commercial, “Epic Play Date,” says it all. A montage, with just a splash of animation, shows a family moving from a pancake breakfast at home to a riotous day of fun. A saber-tooth tiger comes to life in a wild life museum,  ostriches chase the family at a petting zoo and there’s a game of outdoor bowling, with one of the sons inside a giant, blow-up bowling ball.

Actor Jeff Bridges does voice over for all the spots, which carry the two-year-old tag “New Thinking. New Possibilities.”

Hyundai has a pair of new :30s breaking IN the game.

The one in the first quarter, dubbed “Team,”is also for the launch of longer-wheel-based Sante Fe. A bullied young boy rounds up his dream team of friends to seek revenge in a football game. The song “Bang Your Head,” from Quiet Riot, plays through the spot as the boy’s Mom picks up his posse in the crossover suv. There’s no question at the end who will win the football game. The dream team of 6 kids in the Sante Fe are over-the-top. Among them: red-headed twins pumping serious iron and a bear wrestler. This spot has a nice football link, but not a real big finish.

In the second quarter, Hyundai has a another :30, called “Stuck” for the Sonata Turbo sedan. Because of the car’s zippy engine, the couple inside can easily pass a variety of vehicles they find offensive, including a hefty guy on a motor bike showing part of his derriere and animal-print panties, a tanker truck oozing some suspicious-looking green goop and big dogs slobbering out of an RV onto the Sonata’s windshield. The kicker at the end is delivered by actor Jeff  Bridges: “Trust us. It’s better to be in front.”

Hyundai’s fourth commercial is for the zippy Genesis R-Spec, a :30 that will also air in the pre-game broadcast. Named “Excited,” it shows the 8-speed car screaming around a race track as sportscaster Gus Johnson is heard in the background doing the play-by-play. On screen notices tell us how this 429-HP car bests a BMW, Mercedes-Benz and Porsche in horsepower and/or 0-60.

Those stats are likely to shock fans of those German brands, but you can’t blame Hyundai for wanting to get the word out to 100-plus-million viewers. Still, this is not the place for bragging. Not to worry. This car-on-track spot isn’t interesting enough to cause a ruckus.

Hyundai’s fifth commercial isn’t new, it broke last fall as part of the launch of the smaller, 5-passenger Sante Fe. This this :30 spot, called “Drive In,” during the pre-game broadcast, was under the umbrella theme “Don’t Tell” (Mom or Dad) because each parent is doing exciting things with the kids without the other spouse. In case you haven’t seen it

I like the “Don’t Tell” series and gave it a nod in my Year In Review post.

“Stuck” for the Sonata Turbo should get plenty of laughs, and along with “Epic Play Date” for the Sante Fe are the best in my book from Hyundai’s game-day offerings this year. I predict the two will rank higher than Hyundai’s ads in last year’s Super Bowl, when the “Cheetah” spot for the Veloster Turbo ranked 23 by AdMeter. That was not the lowest-ranked car ad in the 2012 game, mind you. That “honor,” at Number 54, went to Team One USA and the Lexus GS ad it created.

We’ll just gave have to wait to see how all these spots perform after all Super Bowl viewers see them.

MAKING TRACKS: Sad to say Andy Prakken left Team Detroit, where he had been exec VP-chief media officer for 8 years, overseeing media planning and buying, brand content development and analytics operations for Ford in the US and the rest of the world. Andy worked on the Ford account since at least 1991, when he was a media director at J. Walter Thompson, one of Team Detroit’s predecessors.

Follow me, Jean Halliday,  on Forbes.com, LinkedIn, Facebook

And on Twitter @jhal2001

GM is said to be readying an offer to a global executive currently working in Europe outside the auto industry

That would be about right since GM CEO Dan Akerson himself is from outside the industry and doesn’t necessarily believe auto experience is mandatory for key jobs at the automaker.

Akerson has been criticized for moving execs without auto industry experience into key posts. Last fall, GM’s CEO tapped Bob Ferguson to the newly-created position of VP to head Cadillac globally, overseeing retail, marketing, brand management and advertising for the lux brand in all markets around the world.

Ferguson was a former AT&T executive and GM lobbyist, who now reports directly to Akerson.

The new Chevy and Cadillac global chiefs will replace a single global CMO at GM. Last year, Akerson moved Alan Batey to VP-US sales and service and interim global CMO after CMO Joel Ewanick was pushed out.

Ewanick’s hand-picked, right-hand man, Chris Perry, is the current global marketing chief for Chevrolet and was said to be a contender for the new global Chevy post that, like Ferguson at Cadillac, would also oversee sales and service.

GM’s moves to hire non-auto outsiders brings back the nightmare of the 1990s, when it brought in Ron Zarrella from Bausch & Lomb as its brand czar in North America, along with a slew of outsiders for brand managers of individual models. It wasn’t long before he was quickly promoted to president of North American operations. Under the marching orders of Board Chairman John Smale, another non-car guy, GM shifted to an ill-advised and clunky brand management system that wasted billions of dollars trying to create individual personalities for virtually all model , which were being designed by committee. It was a disaster of epic proportions. Zarrella resigned in late 2001, within months after GM hired Bob Lutz to succeed him. Zarrella amazingly admitted in a conference call with reporters before he left that he learned much about the car business in the several weeks he had spent with Lutz at GM. Mind you, this was the head of GM in North America confessing to on-the-job training !

GM doesn’t have time to train an industry newbie for the Chevy worldwide post. The brand is preparing to launch more than 20 vehicles around the world this year as it continues a push to grow globally. The new bowtie chief, whoever it is, needs to be able to immediately start swimming in the job, not jumping onto a learning curve and possibly sinking.

MAKING TRACKS: Abbey Berryman joins Carat USA as VP-director on the Chevrolet account from Vibrant Media, where she was senior sales manager. Berryman, a seasoned media maven, also worked on Chevy’s account as media director at Starcom, GM’s former media shop. Congrats!

MAKING TRACKS II: Colleen DeCourcy is moving to Widen+Kennedy in Portland as co-global executive creative director from Socialistic, the social media shop she started in 2010. The move brings DeCourcy back on the Chrysler account, among others. She worked on the automaker’s digital account when she was chief creative officer of Omnicom Group’s Organic.

You can find me, Jean Halliday, on LinkedIn, Forbes.com and Facebook.

On Twitter @jhal2001

Let’s start with the good news.

Chrysler Group scored big with its launch work for the return of the new, modern Dodge Dart. Ad agency Wieden + Kennedy in Portland, really hit it over the fence with this commercial that also debuted the tag line “New Rules”

Not only is this spot clever and witty, the art direction really catches your eye. Plus, this ad actually gives viewers a real sense of the brand.

Chrysler also gets high marks for the commercial for Fiat USA, dubbed “Immigrants” from The Richards Group. The :60 spot, which broke in the summer, hilariously depicts the next-gen 500 arriving to our shores- the hard way.

Like the Dodge spot, this is fun to watch and should put a smile on your face. It’s a perfect way to convey the car’s Italian heritage, which wasn’t the case in 2011 when Chrysler partnered with Jennifer Lopez for Fiat ads- a total disconnect that looked more like a music video for her new song than a spot for the car.

Both the Dart and 500 spots spotlight music from popular artists, a tactic preferred by Chrysler Group CMO Olivier Francois to grab viewers’ attention. The song in the Dodge ad is “No Church in the Wild” by J-Z and Kanye. The Fiat commercial pushed the new “Sexy People” single from Pitbull featuring Arianna. In neither case do the songs overpower the commercials.

Speaking of smiling, how about Volkswagen of America’s brand blitz that bowed with the :30 spot called “Smiles,” showing people of all ages laughing. There are no cars in this brilliant commercial from Deutsch in Los Angeles. It really captures the essence of the brand with the line “it’s not the miles, you how you live them.” The spot directs viewers to the whyvw.com sites, where they can post stories about their VWs or learn more about the cars from other owners and from VW.

Quite a brave move for a car marketer to not show a car in an ad, so kudos to VW’s CMO and chief product officer Tim Mahoney and his right-hand man Kevin Mayer, VP-marketing.

One of the most memorable spots that didn’t show a car was Jeep’s award-winning 1994 commercial, dubbed “Snow Covered” from the now-defunct Bozell in Southfield, Michigan.

Audi of America, which has been one of the industry’s best and most consistent advertisers in terms of creative, hits it out of the park again early in 2012 with a spot called “Ahab” for its all-wheel-drive Quattro system. The commercial spoofs Herman Melville’s epic sea captain character in search of an elusive whale with a northern tow truck operator and his frustration with never “hooking” an Audi with Quattro stuck in the snow. A very smart and entertaining execution from Venables Bell & Partners in San Francisco.

While we’re on Audi, the brand’s Super Bowl “Vampire” commercial for its LED headlights did the best among all the top 10 spots in the 2012 Big Game, ranking 7^th for Most Liked, according to Nielsen consumer research the best showing for any carmaker. The commercial was certainly over the top and tapped into the nation’s current craze for vampires.

Audi also ranked highly in my 2011 review. 

It was good to see American Honda Motor Co. raising the creative bar for both its brands in the Super Bowl. The Honda CR-V commercial starred Matthew Broderick spoofing his role in the flick “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.”

The commercial was one of the best from RPA in Santa Monica for Honda in a long time and blew away the earlier launch work for the CR-V. The spot ranked 10^th Most Liked among all Super Bowl ads by Nielsen research,.

The automaker’s first-ever Super Bowl commercial for Acura was also a hit. In the Big Game, a media outlet where advertisers need to go big or be invisible, Acura met the challenge with a funny spot for the NSX starring funny men and car nuts Jerry Seinfeld and Jay Leno. USA Today’s AdMeter, based on consumer voting for their favorite Super Bowl ad on Facebook in 2012, ranked Acura’s spot number 13 and Honda’s 16.

Unfortunately, Honda and Acura’s over-the-top Super Bowl commercials weren’t enough to keep their ad agencies, RPA and sibling rp&, both in Santa Monica, out of the hot seat. Both accounts recently went into review.

Toyota Motor USA’s Lexus brand also made some inroads into improving creative with the launch of the new 2013 ES and first ES Hybrid. One of the launch commercials, dubbed “Split World” grabbed your attention with special effects and a script that made sense. Bravo to Brian Smith, VP-marketing at Lexus and kudos to Team One

Sister brand Toyota still isn’t there yet. But Toyota’s “Real Owners. Real Stories” TV commercial for the Camry, with online video assets and accompanying web site is not only well done, but is getting tons of input. Toyota figured out how to tweak a year-old site for the Camry launch and took it up a few notches

When it comes to Ford Motor Co., its Ford brand has had some of the most consistent work in the category all year. The advertising from TeamDetroit in Dearborn is visually interesting, makes relevant points and is strategic without shoving people’s faces into it.

Take this launch commercial for the 2013 Fusion. Great way to bring to life the Big Idea of standing out from rivals, which disappear.

Let’s look at Hyundai Motor America. After a pretty decent run with some of the best ads in the industry, seems too many of Hyundai’s ads are getting a bit formulaic. The brand’s Super Bowl commercials, from Innocean Worldwide Americas in Huntington Beach, California, were nothing to write home about.

There are some signs of improvement with the September launch work for the 2013 Sante Fe, themed “Don’t Tell” mom or dad

Shows there are still signs of creative life at the ad agency and at Hyundai.

I’d like to recognize Cadillac as one of the most improved auto advertisers. After a less-than-stellar appearance in the 2012 Super Bowl, General Motors’ lux brand blew out of the gates with impressive summer launch work for the new ATS compact sedan. The work, from Fallon, Minneapolis, was themed “Cadillac ATS vs. The World,” showing how the car performs on some of the ing on and some of the planet’s wildest and most challenging roads. Cadillac smartly posted lots of behind-the-scenes videos on YouTube, as well as links on Facebook and elsewhere.

Keep it up! We’d like to see all of Cadillac’s sibling brands take it up a notch also. Although there were some break-out ads for Chevrolet last year, there simply haven’t been enough of them.

Note to GM and its ad chiefs: Please take some risks!

Looking forward to seeing more break-through work from all auto advertisers in this New Year.

MAKING TRACKS: Steve Rosenblum recently started as general manager of Publicis Kaplan Thaler in Manhattan, which handles the account for the Tri State Honda Dealers Association. Rosenblum had been consulting since leaving General Motors in late 2011 after 15 years in various ad and marketing positions.

Follow me, Jean Halliday, on LinkedIn and Facebook

and on Twitter @jhal2001

]]> http://autoadopolis.wordpress.com/2013/01/03/2012-car-ad-review/feed/ 0 autoadopolis http://autoadopolis.wordpress.com/2012/12/06/hondas-us-ad-agency-pitch-rigged/ http://autoadopolis.wordpress.com/2012/12/06/hondas-us-ad-agency-pitch-rigged/#comments Thu, 06 Dec 2012 22:22:54 +0000 autoadopolis http://autoadopolis.wordpress.com/?p=769 Continue reading →]]> American Honda Motor Co. has called a review for both its Honda and Acura brands in the USA, encompassing creative, media buying and planning.

The surprise isn’t that a review has been called. It’s that it has taken this long to happen.

Other than a few bright advertising stars in recent years, including the boffo Super Bowl commercials for both Honda and Acura in 2012, the work hasn’t exactly set the world on fire.

I don’t place all the blame on the incumbents: Honda’s longtime agency of record, RPA in Santa Monica, and rp&, its sister arm on Acura. The clients, after all, kept approving their work year in and year out. An example of the industry adage : a client getting the work it deserves. The incumbent agencies will defend their biggest accounts.

But it doesn’t look good for the home teams. There’s already some skeptics – not at the incumbents- grumbling that the review is a set-up. The skeptics posit that   giant Japanese ad agency Dentsu, which  handles Honda in its home market there, will manage to steer the account to its McGarryBowen agency network.

It’s never wise to discount the pull an agency has with the client at the mother ship. The marketing brass at the corporate offices of many a global car company are close to the execs at their shops in the mother land and they also, from time to time, like to flex their brass muscles to make sweeping worldwide moves.

Dentsu’s Tokyo office won a Cyber Lion in Cannes in June for the work it did for Honda in Japan. Think THAT doesn’t impress the mother ship?

This summer, Dentsu’s McGarryBowen office in London managed to win the pitch for Honda’s  pan-European launch of the CR-V, besting 5 other shops, including Wieden & Kennedy in the UK. The huge win was the agency’s first since parent Dentsu changed the name of its European offices from Dentsu to McGarryBowen earlier this year. Dentsu acquired the 6-year-old McGarryBown agency in 2008.

What other agencies have won at Cannes for Honda?

Well Wieden, natch, whose most memorable  Honda work in Europe has to be this UK spot called  “Cog,” which won a Gold Lion in Cannes in 2003

RPA’s last Cannes win for Honda? Anyone?

Other than this year’s Super Bowl commercials, one of my favorite Honda spots in recent years from RPA was for the Element in 2006, featuring that delightful crab named Gil, who later ended up with a big life all his own in social media

This work was perfect for the Element’s young target audience and cut through the clutter.

It’s never a good time for an agency review and is going to cause lots of stress for the folks at RPA and rp&, especially during the holidays. Best of luck!

MAKING TRACKS: Joel Ewanick lands at Fisker Automotive as the acting head of global marketing and sales, while the car company looks for a full-time replacement. Not surprised to see him land so quickly. He was pushed out of General Motors in the summer after a little over 2 years at the automaker as global CMO. Ewanick succeeds Richard Beattie, who retired from Fisker after a long career in the car business with stints at Jaguar, Mazda and Ford.

Find me, Jean Halliday, on LinkedIn, Facebook and Forbes.com

On Twitter: @jhal2001

Hyundai dipped its toe in the water back in 2010, when it inked a 4-year deal to be the title sponsor of the Sun Bowl with El Paso, Texas area dealers.  Last year, the automaker upped the ante by sponsoring 15 schools, doing  64 on-site, stadium displays, print ads, online and local media support, as well as in-game ads in 13  games across ABC networks, including ESPN and ESPN2.

Interpublic Group of Co.’s Initiative+ is Hyundai’s USA media agency of record and has done a great job of integrating all the pieces here.

This season Hyundai is supporting 25 programs and staging 151 events at college stadiums across the nation. The automaker is in its second season as presenting sponsor of 12 of ESPN’s “Thursday Night Kickoff” broadcasts. The 2013 model Santa Fe is the main vehicle tied to the effort, with a modified “Ultimate Tailgate” version of the compact crossover model making the rounds at games.

By the way, the Santa Fe is also the sponsor of ABC TV’s Jimmy Kimmel Live. Hyundai proclaims Santa Fe “the official car of Helping Parents 2 Rock,”a tip of the hat to the nightly musical performers on Kimmel’s outdoor stage. The new Santa Fe is getting plenty of plug on Kimmel

GM’s Pontiac  brand was the first sponsor of Kimmel’s stage, then called the  Pontiac Garage, but Bud Light beer took over that slot several years ago.

Hyundai is airing ads during ESPN’s pre-game football shows as well as in games, including a presence in 25 games on Thursdays and Saturdays across ESPN, ESPN2 and ABC.

Whew. But wait- there’s more!

The automaker is working with Chicago-based sports marketer expert Intersport for a 4-part series spotlighting the best of the current college football season. The latest installment of “Hyundai Presents College Football Uncut” will air this Saturday, November 16 on CBS at 2:30 pm ET.  Smartly, Hyundai , cut deals to also make the series available on Hulu.com, Amazon and Sony PlayStation.

“College football fans wear their colors more proudly than any other fan base,” said Steve Shannon, VP-marketing at Hyundai. “Reaching fans not only through TV but also at stadiums where that passion is rooted gives us a more genuine connection to the sport and those that love it as much as we do.”

As if all this isn’t enough, Hyundai is also in the midst of a sweepstakes, asking college football fans to post photos that emulate their team loyalty to hyundaishowyour loyalty.com. Check out the :30 spot from Hyundai’s ad agency and corporate affiliate, Innocean Worldwide Americas in Huntington Beach, California, promoting the contest

Is it just me or does the narrator Jeff Bridges saying Hyundai’s fans show their loyalty by “just buying another Hyundai” sound too boastful? I realize the video is touting Hyundai’s loyalty, but it comes across as too smug.

Hyundai has been down this smug road before – not once but twice since it started selling cars in the US in 1986. Disaster resulted in both instances. So it’s scary to see some echos of Hyundai’s hubris bowing its ugly head again.

Also, sounding smug in advertising is not a good place to be after Hyundai’s embarrassing admission that it overstated fuel economy ratings on its vehicles. After talks with the EPA, which certifies mpg for new cars, Hyundai is voluntarily dropping the mpg on some 900,000 (or 35 %) of  2011 through 2013 model year vehicles sold through October 31 and is reimbursing owners.

Meantime, rabid college football fans are posting like mad on Hyundai’s Facebook and Twitter pages for the sweeps. One lucky fan will win a new 2013 Santa Fe, which the spot doesn’t even mention. The other prize, also not mentioned in the spot, is a two-night trip for 4 people to a college football game.

The only prize that IS mentioned in the commercial is a chance to be in an upcoming Hyundai commercial.

THAT will be interesting.

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Also on Twitter @jhal2001

The automaker isn’t off base with this strategy, since the redone midsize sedan has gotten a slew of very positive ink for its good looks – not really a staple in the segment.

“The media  launch of the Fusion will showcase how Ford is shaking up the bland midsize sedan segment,” said Jim Farley, exec VP and group VP of global marketing, sales and service. “Why do car buyers have to sacrifice styling and forward-looking design for fuel economy? They don’t.”

This isn’t the first time a carmaker  has zeroed in on styling to push a midsize sedan. Most memorably, Nissan and its ad agency , TBWA, used “Cure for the Common Car” in fall 2001 to launch the 2002 Altima. Still, styling hasn’t traditionally been the focus to advertise cars in this category.

Ford and its ad agency, WPP Group’s Team Detroit in Dearborn, hired Chinese artist Liu Bolin as a consultant for the print ads. Bolin is known around the world for painting his body and clothes to camouflage himself in photographs and he helped TeamDetroit create print ads that make competitors’ cars invisible.

This behind-the-scenes video will give you a better look at Team Detroit’s Big Idea

The look of the ads is pretty cool and the Big Idea works with the strategy without being obnoxious or naming rivals.

The new Fusion is also on the back cover of Maxim’s annual “Best Stuff of the Year issue, due Nov. 18. Ford’s Mustang is on the magazine’s cover – a nice double play. Toby Barlow, chief creative officer of Team Detroit, said the magazine approached Ford, not visa versa.

Amy Marentic, group marketing manager at Ford,  said the Fusion launch ads try to use design and technology to stand out in the crowded midsize segment. “We also knew we had to appeal to the rational side, and the most rational thing about this car is the fuel economy,” she said.

So the ads do mention MPG. The theme line in the TV spots is : It’s an entirely new idea of what a car can be.”

The agency extended the “disappearing” act of the print ads to one of its three national TV commercials, like this :30 one :

The final editing of the final two spots got delayed by Super Storm Sandy; the outfit doing the work is based in lower Manhattan. One touts “while everyone else seems to be going in the wrong direction, Ford is not just going forward, it’s going in an entirely new direction.”

But the third spot is the most dramatic. This commercial, for the Fusion Hybrid, touts the car’s “outstanding performance” and estimated 100 mpg range.  It also shows viewers the only thing the car can’t do- drive off a cliff. Yes, Team Detroit “jumped” a new Fusion in a one-take shot in Vancouver and the ad should attract eyeballs. Once it breaks, there will be a behind-the-scenes video of how the spot was made. (The car used in the stunt isn’t drivable, Barlow said).

In typical Ford fashion, this big media part of the launch came only after a major pre-launch that started digitally with a big push in July. Marentic said Farley challenged her team to encourage 300,000 consumers to build and price the new Fusion before it went on sale.

Enter “Random Acts of Fusion,” a massive social media, online video effort starring Ryan Seacrest, Joel McHale and Kate Micucci. Ford launched the push on national TV in July, along with the site RandomActsofFusion.com. The push included scavenger hunts, local events and chances to win one of 3 Fusions.

In this video, McHale and Micucci explain how they’re going to create a documentary with the 100 new Fusions they got from Secrest.

OK. Not the funniest video ever and the others are similar in tone. Still, Ford said 2 million people have visited the Random site, which tallied more than 12 million video views. Plus, the push nearly doubled Farley’s goal for online Fusion build-and-pricing by consumers, reaching more than 520,000, Marentic said.

Ford isn’t done yet for the Fusion. Coming Thursday, Nov, 15 is “Go Further with Ford Night” at local dealers, named for the brand’s new ad tag. For each person who visits a participating Ford dealer that night, the dealer will donate $10 – up to a total of $500 – to a local charity. Some 2,200 Ford dealers have already signed up to participate, Marentic said. People who register at a dealership that day will be entered into a prize drawing to win a new Fusion.

Visitors 18 and older can also try to win a VIP trip to see the popular “American Idol” TV show by testing their talent judging skills on camera. Each dealership will have a webcam to see a special message from Seacrest before they do some judging on camera. (Ford has been a long-time backer of American Idol style, which returns in January on FOX.

Ford is certainly backing the new Fusion with a major push that should build street cred and sales for the car.

MAKING TRACKS: Ford Motor’s Jim Farley, already exec VP and group VP of global marketing, sales and service for the Ford brand, adds the Lincoln brand. Farley quickly moved Matt Van Dyke from US director of marketing communications for Ford and Lincoln to director of Lincoln globally for marketing, sales and service. He’ll report to Farley. The two men have known each other since 2000 and worked together when Farley headed Toyota’s lux Lexus brand and Van Dyke was the account chief at the brand’s ad agency, TeamOne.

Kevin Koeppen, who had been manager-advertising and media, succeeds Van Dyke.

You can find me, Jean Halliday, on LinkedIn, Facebook and Forbes.com

On Twitter at jhal2001