5 Things to Know About Automotive Marketing Trends

(MLive) - What is the “new normal” for marketing in the automotive industry? According to Meredith Guerriero, Google global head of automotive, it’s digital. And many companies – automotive or not – can’t exactly control their brands anymore because of the power of our “digital,” or online, society.

“Everything and everyone has an online presence whether you like it or not,” she said during a keynote speech at the Automotive World Megatrends 2014 USA conference in Dearborn, Mich.

Guerriero is on the marketing and advertising side of the business, rather than the technology side of Google that continues to make news in the automotive industry. She used a handful of videos to demonstrate how automakers are changing their advertising and marketing.

Here’s a look at five points from Guerriero’s keynote speech from the United Kingdom-based news organization’s conference:

5. Endless opportunities- Consumers now have more choices than ever.

According to Guerriero, we now create as much data ever 10 minutes as we did from the beginning of human civilization through 2003. That means customers have more choices than ever before – from online used car purchasing to pricing different dealerships for a new car.

Guerriero said dealers and automakers continue to spend more on their digital presence rather than traditional marketing. “TV is online and online is TV,” she said. “This is another big shift for the (automakers) … you can’t view them separately anymore.”

4. Loyalty caput? With all those choices, customer loyalty to brands is shifting.

“Just because you got them once doesn’t mean you’re going to get them twice,” Guerriero said. “You’ll start to see a major shift, and we’ve seen that over the past couple of years.”

Loyalty diminishing, she said, is a result of new car buyers, closer gap regarding the quality of vehicles today and the online resources.

3. Dialog rather than monologue: One thing that has bee particularly hard for automakers to comprehend has been accepting younger generations of car buyers want to have a dialog rather than a monologue.

“They don’t want to be told,” she said. “They want to experience it on their own and they want to have a say in it.” Officials have continued to say that dialog includes speaking with their social media “friends” and online forums to auto pricing websites and dealers.

“Consumers are uniquely empowered,” said Guerriero, adding 81 percent of consumers use online research/tools for car purchasing.

2. Automakers are coming around: Slowly, but surely, automakers are advancing their advertising, dealerships and overall business to attract and retain customers.

Guerriero, using a Mercedes-Benz advertisement as her favorite example, said automakers are entering the “content game” to draw attention to their brand and its Intelligent Drive. In the ad, no car is shown. The only things shown in the ad are hands essentially moving chickens to Diana Ross’ “Upside Down.” The video has received more than 10.3 million hits on YouTube.

“The OEMs are coming around,” she said. “Welcome to the new normal.” Guerriero said she’s confident the automakers will continue to advance their ways of doing business.

1. Digital is the new normal: Digital – It’s that simple.

“Digital is enabling what would otherwise be impossible,” Guerriero said. “It’s changing the way that we communicate, we entertain, the way that we work and the way we engage with brands.”

Guerriero said she’s not sure is everyone is ready, but they’re going to have to be ready “because it’s coming either way.”