What was it? The 9th Nielsen annual automotive TV advertising awards at the 2015 New York International Auto Show. That might seem like a prestigious award promoted by the most important media measurement company in the world, but it’s really just industry self-congratulation at its finest, basically a bunch of ad agency executives telling each other what a fine job they did putting suckers into seats the typical consumer wouldn’t otherwise consider.
Who won? If there was a theme to this year’s awards, it’s that the most effective marketing tool is still humour. In the best luxury campaign of the year, Buick proved it is finally shedding its sales-killing gray-haired reputation, its “Experience the new Buick” campaign showing grannies and teens alike completely bewildered as they fail to recognize Buicks for the stylish, modern vehicles they now are. Toyota won both the best Spanish language ads and the best sales event with similarly spoofish spots, albeit with Toyota’s typical conservatism.
The most effective automotive ad of the year, however, went to Volkswagen for its genuinely funny “Wings” contention that “every time a Volkswagen hits 100,000 miles, a German engineer get his [angel] wings.” True advertising magic occurs, when, in the denouement, the incredulous daughter gives dad a cynical, “Yeah dad, I’m sure that as 200,000 miles, rainbows shoot out of their butts!” before panning to the very last engineer, already with angel wings, starting to look genuinely uncomfortable.
Do they matter? Nielsen claims that, though TV is no longer the only media it measures, its ratings systems still matters, now more than ever, because the company focuses on “Total Audience Measurement” which it expresses as “reach times resonance equals reaction.” Despite this seemingly sophisticated, the real message is still the same old “there’s no such thing as bad publicity” that has been marketing’s mantra since the beginning of public relations.
According to Nielsen, while Matthew McConaughey’s Lincoln ads were widely ridiculed, Ellen DeGeneres’ and Jim Carey’s cutting spoofs resonated so much that they had viewers, who might otherwise never bothered to watch a Lincoln ad, actively seeking out MKC spots out just to see how truly awful they really were. The medium may change but it would seem the message remains pretty much the same.
Full coverage of the 2015 New York International Auto Show
