Yikes - Targeted Marketing at the Gas Pump
I am generally a skeptic towards advertising. I think most of it is ineffective for the majority people, and some of it is just painful. This is why advertising has to reach such large numbers: to get any reasonable conversion, they need to be seen by a great many people.
However, this is a great example of targeted marketing:
I’m at the gas pump, I’m paying an arm, a leg, and two more arms (don’t ask where I got them) for gas…you can see that I’m at $22 for 5 gallons of gas. I see this advertisement, and I have to agree: Yikes!
So what is the solution? According to this ad, Toyota. Toyota apparently makes the most fuel efficient cars. Cool, I didn’t know that. Isn’t that relevant?
Now if I didn’t already have a Toyota Camry, this would be very intriguing for me. What if I have an aging Honda that I was thinking about selling? I might seriously consider a Toyota for my next car…the savings would be tremendous.
Unlike most unfocused, bland, broad advertising, this hits me when it is most effective: when I literally am paying the “yikes” amount for gas. Nice work, Toyota.
August 8th, 2008 at 3:55 pm
Haha, that is awesome. Simple and it works.
Probably would be too expensive, but would be amazing if they went a step further and made it interactive somehow.. like while you’re standing there watching your money drain away, a little display lets you select your car brand and model, and see exactly how much $ you would have saved if you drove a Prius (or whatever). Maybe even multiply that out over a year’s worth of pumps, that’d be a pretty concrete and convincing argument.