GM tries off beat marketing to boost sales

Automakers like General Motors, Maruti, Hyundai Motor and Tata Motors are trying to drive sales up by taking diverse offbeat marketing initiatives in a fiercely competitive turf. From teaming up with retailers to hosting rock concerts to using the digital media or even social networking sites, these companies are embracing myriad out-of-the-box strategies to promote their machines.While General Motors is teaming up with retail biggies or organising rock concerts to market its products, Maruti, Hyundai Motor and Tata Motors are using the digital media and social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter to shore up sales. These initiatives, which are largely targeted at people under 35 years, are yielding decent volumes.

General Motors, for instance, has teamed up with Levi’s to create a buzz around its newly launched, Chevy Beat. “A few Chevy Beats will be on display at Levi’s retail outlets so that customers can get a feel of the car. Rock concerts are also a decent marketing tool for promoting a car. We’ve used this tool once and may do so in future,” said P Balendran, V-P, GM India.Incidentally, GM has recently undertaken pub activities to promote music in select cities which eventually culminated in a rock concert featuring Bollywood actor Saif Ali Khan and the country’s premier rock band ‘Parikrama’ in Bangalore. “This was a huge draw,” he added.

A closer look at GM’s sales figures confirms that these initiatives have been well received by customers. “If you look at first quarter 2010 figures, we have sold 31,862 units registering a growth of 130% over the corresponding period of the previous year,” said the GM India V-P.Tata Motors and GM have used social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter and Orkut to gauge product popularity. “Tata Nano is very active on Facebook and Twitter. We’ve also used a virtual marketing tool for promoting the Tata Indigo Manza and Indica Vista range.

The online reputation management through social networking sites is the immediate barometer of effectiveness in the communications strategy. We get real-time reactions from the target group which gives us an understanding of an emerging trend. This also influences customer decisions which eventually gets translated into sales,” said a Tata Motors spokesman.Maruti Suzuki and Hyundai Motor are using digital media in a big way to market their products. Hyundai started its digital initiative in 2009. Arvind Saxena, director (marketing & sales) at Hyundai Motor India, said the company plans to launch an i20 fan club for i20 customers.

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Source:ET 8-4-10

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