Marketing your car brand via Social Media? Keep this in mind… (or just call us)

Looking at the automotive market we can divide the industry in two main segments:

Luxury vs. Non-luxury car brands.

The fans in these segments are rather different in their behavior. The luxury car fan is most likely also fan of other (non-automotive) luxury brands and identifies him/herself with the brands liked. Not that most of them can actually buy the brands and cars.

(Top 10 Automotive Brands on Facebook – by number of fans)

Particularly in luxury cars, the average engaged fan – someone who has liked, shared or commented on content – is likely to also engage with other luxury brands.

Non-luxury automotive fans fare better, with the average non-luxury car brand such as Nissan, Ford, or Mazda seeing returning interaction.

Your fans, followers, likers, etc. can be inconsistent, unfaithful, just there for a moment… and when you look around: GONE. Especially when you acquire them via WIN this! WIN that! WIN everything! campaigns.

By building and executing a consistent Social Media approach. Strategy. Content planning. Create engagement. They stay longer, and more loyal. So instead of focusing on “likes,” “comments,” “shares” and “retweets” when measuring social content, many auto brands must also think about retaining their engaged users month over month, and encouraging them to go deeper with their brand in order to build long-term value.

How to retain them? Keep the following in mind:

Get more out of video content

Looking at the fact that most car brands use video content in their Social Media strategy, looking at various pages for some time we can see that on average they post 10% of the time video content. Video has a lower impact on engagement, less comments/shares than other sorts of content. Why? Well most of the video content is just plain – however beautiful – car commercial. Done for TV, in remote areas with a complete production circus. Let’s call it macro video content.

However, recent studies show that fans who do interact with video content tend to be more likely to repeat-engage month over month, and are also heavier engagers. These are your best friends. So feed them with more…

The opportunity lies in engaging those fans with micro video content… Not complete video’s commercials that last for minutes… Go for the quick and fun/informing videos that zoom into car specific details so engagement goes on that point and not about the complete car. Shareable and short pieces of video. We believe this remains one of the biggest growth opportunities in audience engagement on Facebook.

Identify the reason why fans share your content

Overall, photos dominate top posts by shares for top brands, for both luxury and non-luxury autos. But this is where the similarity in what makes content shareable for fans ends.

The most frequently shared content for luxury autos places the vehicle at the center of the content. Aspirational beauty shots, highlights of design, form, advanced functionality, and proud histories are all themes that reign across top engaging brands such as Mercedes-Benz, Ferrari, Lamborghini, and Aston Martin.

Conversely, the most frequently shared content in non-luxury autos places the owner at the center of the content and leverages “owner pride,” often in a fun or playful manner.

So when you’re not representing Ferrari or Bugatti on Social Media? Put the driver first.

Stay consistent

Brands (not only automotive brands) that execute their Social Media content in a consistent way, while using a proper content planning with a focus on engagement, keep higher overall scores in terms of return rate and unique engaged audience than brands that had fewer posts. Luxury brands tend to do the latter, communicate less and just show aspirational shots/videos.

Posting 1-2 times a day consistently throughout the month, post by post, leads to higher rates of actions (comments/likes/shares) on the long term.

Doing so shows the intent that you want to engage across Social Media. Staying relevant (and adding value) stays key, the big difference is the level of consistency you choose in your approach.