Social media seems to be the darling (well at least currently) in automotive sales and marketing.
Ford claims a most successful introduction of its Fiesta product due to a contest , and is now attempting to follow up on this successful launch of the 2014 Ford Fiesta as well.
Yet what of measurement and “ROI” that is “Return on Investment.” More than one experienced auto seller or dealership owner have insisted that its salespeople who sell cars – not those things that “kids do on the computer”, and that salesmen don’t get a lot for all the work of selling a car – and all in all they should get the boost not social media campaigns.
Still an industry has been created on this.
Contests can be run in any of a number of ways. How many people of you heard tell you that they chose their new truck / SUV or car based on Facebook / Twitter etc etc etc. Have you even heard color choice of said vehicle based on Facebook or other social media websites online.
Yet numbers and importance of these social media sites may be overstated indeed. Just as kids have many free hotmail /gmail /yahoo emails that the eventually deactivate over time – each person may have many many Facebook accounts – a good number of which are of little importance or credibility yet have donated “likes” and “Favorites.”
Good questions indeed. Ultimately its all about value.
More on the topic of the successful Ford Fiesta social media platform campaigns and the methods and philosophies behind them at this link:
http://www.bu.edu/today/2013/how-ford-became-a-leader-in-social-media/
