For years, Japanese car makers have sold pickup trucks in the North America market, but they’ve usually been small economy trucks—perfect for folks hauling modest-sized loads, but dismissed as playthings by people weaned on serious-sized F-150–type trucks. Toyota (and Nissan) have tried to breach this market with more heavy-duty trucks such as the Tundra and the Titan.
The first-generation Tundra was regarded by full-sized truck enthusiasts as being not-quite-close-enough to a full-scale model. The new Tundra, to be unveiled this year, is bigger than the previous model, and should get the attention of large truck aficionados. But if most big-truck buyers buy domestic models, how do you get their attention?
Grass-roots marketing, that’s how. Sure, Toyota will be spending its marketing money by doing tie-ins with 84 Lumber and Bass Pro Shops, for instance. But it’ll also be at what one reporter called “events that reek of Americana: country music concerts, chili cook-offs, and high school football games.”
Although Toyota has been building cars and trucks in the U.S. for over twenty years, the automaker still is reckoned as a “foreign car” to many people. Toyota is using its 2007 marketing plan to weave its locally-built cars into the fabric of American culture. For instance, a recent advertisement shows a Solara cruising down a country road, while an announcer touts the benefits its manufacturing plants have brought to various U.S. communities.
Other tie-ins sure to get people’s attention this year include a fleet of courtesy vehicles donated to the Future Farmers of America convention in Indianapolis, and Toyota’s entry into NASCAR--of all things--that will certainly get its name in front of people’s eyes each and every weekend.
Professor Mike Bernacchi of the University of Detroit Mercy says that customers have to form an emotional bond with the company—which will ensure that Toyota isn’t seen as some heartless corporate monolith.
“Being number one in sales is not enough,” the marketing professor said. “Being number one in the hearts and souls is really where it's at because then it grows. Then, you have a brand that's not just skin-deep.”
And if it takes sponsoring a bass-fishing event in Montgomery, Ala., as one Toyota V.P. of marketing recently said, that’s what it’ll do.