Ford Readies New Campaign

Ford's Latest Better Idea
Its New Ad Campaign
Aligns With Dealers;
Slogan: 'Drive One'
By MIKE SPECTOR
March 18, 2008; Page B1
Over the years, Ford Motor Co. made quality "Job One" and asked if you've driven one lately. More recently, it has run through less memorable advertising slogans, proclaiming "No Boundaries" and "Bold Moves."

Now, as a critical part of Chief Executive Alan Mulally's turnaround campaign, Ford is gearing up a marketing push that will take a new approach to attacking an age-old problem for Detroit -- the steady defection of once-loyal customers to foreign auto makers like Toyota Motor Corp. and Honda Motor Co. For years, Ford, General Motors Corp. and Chrysler LLC have mainly tried to win back customers through big-budget advertising campaigns driven from Detroit, often with little coordination with dealers, who spent millions of dollars in local ads.


The campaign, which will begin next month, features a new tagline -- "Ford. Drive One" -- developed in meetings with dealers in the last several months, according to a person briefed on the campaign. While the slogan will appear in television commercials, Ford is counting on aligning dealers nationwide to echo the same message in their advertising efforts aimed at local audiences, this person said.


The campaign, which was outlined to Ford's board of directors last week, is the brainchild of Jim Farley, the former Toyota marketing wiz whom Mr. Mulally hand-picked last year to torque up Ford's image in the market, and it could make or break Mr. Mulally's tenure at Ford.


The campaign will be closely watched in the auto industry because it is devised to fix what is known in automotive circles as "consideration" -- the industry term for how often car buyers shop for, or consider, particular brands or models. The Big Three remain strong in trucks. But large numbers of consumers, conditioned by the poor-quality cars Detroit made in the past, now simply refuse to even look at American vehicles, no matter the price, the warranty or the features.

Low consideration has been undermining the recent efforts to revive Ford, GM and Chrysler. If Detroit's Big Three can't solve the consideration problem, they are likely to see their market share -- and chances of recovery -- continue to dwindle.

Consideration is an especially pressing issue now for Ford and GM: After years of focusing on high-margin pickup trucks and sport-utility vehicles, both have markedly improved the quality of their cars. But about half of the people shopping for cars simply ignore them, according to J.D. Power and Associates. Ford's own internal research shows its approval rating at just 44%, according to Mr. Farley's board presentation, below the 49% garnered by GM's Chevrolet brand and Toyota's healthy 74%.

Ford hopes to boost those numbers with new vehicles such as the Ford Flex, a seven-seater small SUV that has received positive buzz. In a meeting last week, Mr. Farley told Ford's board of directors he hopes to establish "Drive One" as the auto industry's answer to Nike's "Just Do It" -- an enduring tagline that has inspired customers and represented the company for years, a person familiar with the meeting said. In the last few years, Ford has switched taglines several times without finding one that works.


This newest slogan harkens back to what was arguably Ford's last major successful tagline that began in 1980: "Have You Driven a Ford Lately?" Mr. Mulally has uttered that slogan at every opportunity since taking the helm at Ford in an effort to entice customers to dealerships.

By working closely with dealers, Mr. Farley aims to build a grass-roots "army of Ford brand advocates," he told the board, the person familiar with the meeting said. The traditional, top-down campaigns that the Big Three have run in the past have achieved "nothing," he said in his board presentation, this person said.

Ford's more than 4,000 dealers control nearly 75% of $1.5 billion in Ford-related advertising expected to run this year, the person familiar with Mr. Farley's strategy said. The approach mirrors Toyota, which for years has viewed its dealers more as partners than customers -- local retailers form most consumer impressions about how an auto maker operates.

Some ads in the new marketing campaign will feature footage from a planned series of "Friend to Friend" events in which Toyota and Honda owners were given Fords to test-drive for a week, and asked to pass the vehicle to a friend to try.


Research by Mr. Farley's team has found that Ford now has an image of being "powerful," "on sale" and "American," attributes that mean little to many car buyers, this person said. Over time, Mr. Farley hopes the new marketing campaign will establish a new identity: "Quality, Green, Safe & Smart."

It has made some strides with its vehicles. Consumer Reports magazine has said Ford's quality is now competitive with Toyota, for example, while the auto maker is also introducing better-mileage engines across its lineup and equipping most new vehicles with Sync, a voice-activated technology developed by Microsoft Corp. that allows drivers to talk on the phone and listen to music hands-free.