Full-circle marketing
Authored By Brian
Being part of the motorsports scene, I’ve wondered long and hard how major car manufacturers financially justify participating in Motorsports as a competitive level. Some builders such as Ford do not. Outside of the possible R&D benefit where technology and experience gained from racing filters into the production line-up, there are relatively few ways to earn any return on the (usually hefty) investment.
That’s where Citroen does it right. Citroen’s World Rally team won the championship last year and one of their pilots is Carlos Sainz (above mentioned Spanish hero). The Citroen ads for the grocery-getting wagon to the little 4-seater, all feature Sainz in full nomex sporting Citroen logos. He isn’t sliding the car around corners and in fact, he’s not even driving in any of the ads. Rather he’s the sentimental connection between the Spanish people and the French car manufacturer. I’d love to see the numbers behind these ads… I think they’re on to something here.
Although much of Spanish television is pretty horrible, they have a reality TV show here called La Granja featuring famous people living big-brother style on a ranch. The show seems to be on 8 hours a day. Now, I can’t watch Big Brother for more than 30 seconds but somehow, someone at the network was a genius and added Arancha Bonete (warning: not so work-safe). It’s such an obvious ploy that I feel like a fool for watching… but I mean… ok… just take a short peek. It’s like a tractor beam pulling the remote control to it… no, don’t change the channel… stay here… I’ll be wearing tight outfits and showing my culo in the outtakes… I promise…
Dios mio.
