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Need for Tesla Advertising / PR
- Thread starter Buckminster
- Start date
I have been thinking about this quite a bit since my friends ignorance surprised me.
Young people know about Tesla and don't need ads.
But I think there is a large group of us in our fifties who can afford a Tesla just fine - but our views of the cars have been formed by click bait articles. So if Tesla did a smart targeted campaign educating the middle aged customer group they could generate more sales.
My 2 øre. Tesla will be fine in the long run either way.
What the survey question actually asked was: "How familiar are you with recent reductions in the sales price of major EV manufacturers?"
For those with a 4 year college degree or higher, it was 52% if you include "aware of".
If I was suggesting spending billions then I think this would apply more. I see this as shooting fish in a barrel. If a specific advert doesn't sell cars then there is still a good chance that it will reach kids that will buy in 10 years or grandparents that will mention Tesla at Christmas. Brand can increase the margin for existing customers that may not upgrade for a year or two.
As I have said before, I am most excited about creating a series of professional educational adverts. These can be paid ads in the right places but just as importantly will go viral for $0 - because it is Tesla.
I understand your points. Probably no need to debate them. This, in the end, comes down to economics. Tesla, and Elon, understand that many influential shareholders want this to happen. Just as with defense contractors and aircraft makers, if the important shareholders and influencers want Advertising, and promote it enough, arguing education mostly, then they'll get it, if only to keep them happy. Hence we see Airbus and Boeing touting their aircraft to general audiences. Useless in terms of selling the product. Satisfying to crucial constituents.
There is a huge body of Marketing history and lessons about how to introduce new technologies and novel products. General awareness advertising has repeatedly been disbanded as a useful expenditure, simply because general advertising is suitable only for generic products. Cars almost never qualify.
Highly targeted promotion works and works well. That is exactly why search-based promotions are very expensive in Cost per Reach, less so in 'Cost of Qualified Reach' and cheap in terms of 'Cost per Sale".
Nearly all the proponents of Advertising are predicating their advocacy on improving overall BEV knowledge and understanding as well as Tesla-specifc attributes. What almost none are doing is actually studying what that mens and how best to approach the subject. As that subject almost always arises the body of understanding has risen.
Oddly enough, Elon understood much of that long ago with Zip2 (look it up if you do not know about it), that provided a gigantic technological impetus to resolving awareness and 'Calls to Action' with minimal cost and nearly invisible promotion.
Today 'targeted search responses' serve similar cases.
Other techniques are far more subtle and seem totally irrelevant to the subject. Those include rear seat video, things like fart noises and other quirky things that attract children and make children all fver the world know about and favorable to, Tesla.
For some bizarre reason most of us do not see those things as 'Marketing'. One crucial principle is to reach influencers, almost always more effective than reaching the final buyers. Why? It's cheaper, it gets the attention of the buyer, it's persistent and it's NOT rejected. Tesla spends huge effort on those things. Those are why, for example, I can attest my nephew's wedding in Rio de Janeiro last week and listen o children pestering parents about Tesla (The nephew, his parents and I all are Teslaphiles) they cannot buy them today but you can be sure they'll soon be on the list.
So, please think about the alternatives before arguing for money wasting general advertising.
Or advertise to tempt long term Mercedes and BMW drivers away from their fave brands....
Gigapress
Trying to be less wrong
Marketing is about a lot more than just boosting sales, which I know you know. For one thing, general advertising also targets employees and future job applicants. Are you aware that there is currently a massive boom in demand for commercial jet aircraft, and so both Boeing and Airbus have been engaged in aggressive hiring waves? B&A don't need more orders; they need more workers to fulfill the orders. One of the main selling points for working for either of these companies is the opportunity to work on some of the coolest and most impactful products in the world. Sounds pretty similar to Tesla's recruiting message, doesn't it? Almost all of Tesla's big marketing events, such as AI Day and Investor Day, and also a substantial portion of their social media activity, are directed towards recruiting, not just pushing metal.
This should have been a central focus of our debates, which we have ignored to the detriment of our understanding. Thanks for reminding us!
Both AIDay and Investor Day were billed explicitly in part as recruiting devices. Nearly every Tesla discussion, from FSD, Octovalve and Gigafactory to Gigapress is excessively detailed for nearly all investors, but ideal for recruiting.
Such events might well be an ideal type of event to promote wider understanding for the potential customers
I am chagrined to reflect that I’ve led several such events, very successful ones, for one new car brand, an airplane and, oddly perhaps, an ultra-high-net-worth financial product. Each of those used quite close analogies to AI Day specifically, each initially was invitation only, then heavily relying on referrals.
Frankly I shocked I haven’t been thinking clearly enough. Thanks again @Gigapress .
This quoted purported quantitative analysis prompts me to say a few specific points I have thus far tried to avoid because they become very complex and, for most people, incredibly boring.
First, I am NOT anti-advertising. When appropriate financial analysis, sufficient data and measurement criteria are used, Advertising can be highly productive. Making it so is, however, very arduous.
Second, in possible proof of the former I did my PhD in marketing and the subject of my dissertation was implemented in the process. It made my career.
Third, every part of Marketing, done properly, requires precise and accurate metrics of evaluation prior to committing to any campaign or approach. It is flatly impossible to accomplish that without having a soldi background in statistics. Detestable perhaps, but FUDsters are adept at precision, lousy with accuracy.
Fourth, media sellers in essentially every medium offer self-serving metrics.
To explain the fourth point. As @Buckminster pointed out, a recent purported analytic approach was offered by someone who obviously determined the desired outcome, then provided data to suggest how points were valid. As good sales people know, few people actually question claims with precise numbers. Forecasts here in TMC are good examples. The rule is that in forecasting and all of statistics one should use the last significant digit. One clue to bad analysis is offering precision in forecasts. I have an example, one fo my early horrible blunders . I was tasked to evaluate a Japanese market opportunity, and acquisition. I went to Japan spent weeks poring over all the data, concluded the deal was sound. I wrote it up and prepared a five year forecast of expected results if all went well, with a handful of alternatives, of course. Five years alter I was called by the illustrious CEO of the parent company who congratulated me on my excellent forecasting. I had forecast the five year net profit within 1.5%. Amazing, I was a hero! Actually I was a fool. I was off on major metrics by 100% and more, but they'd counteracted each other so that the bottom line was identical. I've used that as an example to graduate students to master the intricate details, because dumb luck rarely repeats itself.
Broadcast advertising metrics are highly complex because the two metrics used are generally these:
1. Cost per reach- total audience, itself usually impossible to measure, so the source usually is something akin to Neilson ratings, which cannot measure audience, but can measure sampled TV sets turned on with some questionnaires. Despite continuous innovation these are the commercial equivalent as measuring voting intentions which fail because nobody knows who will vote until they do. so,
2. Cost per qualified reach- using a variety of data this metric attempts to measure how many of those reached might really be prospects for the product. That is just as speculative.
3. Unaided recall- this gem surveys people from the first one to ask if they've heard about the topic advertised. That is unrelated to real intentions, to that is asked too 'intention to buy' and variants.
4. Sales increase following advertising campaign- This wonderful tool ignores all the things that might add to sales other than the ad.
All three of those metrics are used in every medium, so the more detailed the medium the more accurate tech measurement. For that reason Direct Marketing has become the fastest growing and most successful marketing approach.
Many people equate Advertising with marketing, but marketing has the famous five P's (look them up).
Most TV advertising happens because of the incestous and lucrative interplay between interested parties. Trips to exotic locales, hobnobbing with attractive/famous people is irresistible. By far the most entertaining way to illustrate is to watch "Lost in Translation", second best is watch George Clooney. Then any given Super Bowl ad. Those are the crowing accomplishments of Unaided Recall as a metric. Oddly they usually seem to show sales increases because the sponsors flood the market with promotions on their products in the middle of those ads, and/or increase the supply and sales promotions.
This discussion can go on almost endlessly. Fundamentally the truth is that the creative process is last in the line, not first, if one wants financial success. Each metric needs financial discipline and measurement criteria. All this is really boring next to the creative process which si why few fancies bother to actually understand what they are doing.
Our activities and this of other investors are begging Tesla to ignore their disciplines and make ads. With a doubt they need more concentration on their existing direct response, affiliate marketing, Word of Mouth and customer inducements to refer. They know that and are working hard. Are they good enough? Obviously not because they are not explaining themselves well enough to investors and they has not at all disciplined in presenting their results (yes, Elon is not helping in this).
I admit that my greatest successes have been from applying Direct Marketing and Word of Mouth.
I have recommended TV ads, especially on generic products targeted to parent of small children, small children, and geriatrics. Even those are rapidly transitioning to various digital media platforms for the majority of expenditures. The latter are more expensive in some metics but their results are often directly measurable.
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