Scion, Mercedes and the Battle for Gen-Y Drivers

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

There is a nice little post over on YPulse that takes a look at two very different new media approaches to marketing cars to young people.

Scion has been actively targeting youngins for a while now, making appearances in a number of AdultSwim cartoons including “Assy McGee” and “Frisky Dingo.” I guess they weren’t getting what they wanted from that relationship so they are now making their own branded entertainment which can be viewed oven at on their very own branded portal, here.

Their latest series, “The Fists of Oblivion”, features a bunch of Kung Fu puppets. And not a single Scion. Or much in the way of entertainment value – unless you really dig puppets fighting.  It isn’t clear how this will help sell cars.  Even more interersting is that “The Fists of Oblivion” gets exactly one unrelated return on a Google search, so god knows how anyone would even find it if they wanted to.

Meanwhile, Mercedes is taking a more high-minded approach:

“…by inviting an exclusive group of Gen Y consumers to www.generationbenz.com, a password-protected website. MediaPost (reg. required) reports that the site is an attempt to mine the select Gen Y sample for insight towards their “attitudes, lifestyle and brand preferences” through questionnaires, polls and live chats. Ultimately, the company “hopes to get a new group of consumers into the brand and shape the brand for the future.” (via)

Whether either of these campaigns will get young people to buy their cars is tough to gauge but at least Mercedes has a chance of coming away with a bit of useful data

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Honeyshed Is Back – Act Fast, It Won’t Last

Image by danorbit. via Flickr

Honeyshed is a web-based QVC aimed at 20-somethings that had a soft beta lauch sometime last year and is now back with slick packaging and social media integration…and it is still proof that they don’t understand how to sell to young people at all.

Aside from the obvious problem that every product is sponsored, making it hard to trust the opinions of the lovely young hosts, who the hell is going to sit and watch this thing instead of just heading over to Google and doing a proper product search?

QVC is great for the homebound housewife with little else to do all day but why would anyone think the same basic approach would work on the fast-paced hipsters they are sadly courting?

They say they are “Home Shopping for the Digital Generation,” but that’s actually called the internet and today’s youngs don’t need Publicis showing them the way.