Toyota Marketing Goes on Defensive to Disprove "Expert"

It's one thing to issue a press release or respond publicly to criticism about your company; it's a whole other thing to start advertising your response to a crisis. Let's call this Crisis Marketing, my borrowing a phrase common from Public Relations - Crisis Management.

If you don't know about Toyota's massive, very public recall situation than you are not paying attention. Toyota is suffering a barrage of recalls affecting several vehicles. One of the more damaging recalls is the sudden acceleration issue many consumers are saying they are suffering.

This is all very reminiscent of a similar situation Audi went through back in the 1986. I had a neighbor with a beautiful Audi 5000 that was parked on a descending driveway that we all thought was sure to suddenly accelerate and plow into his garage door, at least that was what we 14 year-old kids wanted to see, but it never happened. In fact the whole Audi sudden acceleration situation was user error due to a pedal placement design, not faulty electronics.

Audi was often criticized for how it responded to their crisis by constantly saying how there was no sudden acceleration situation in their product and it took years to show there wasn't, but unfortunately the public perception damage was done and it took a decade or so for Audi to repair its image.

Marketing a Crisis Response

Toyota is trying to do that same repair and is even marketing how the sudden acceleration demonstration performed by David Gilbert for an ABC News story was a false demonstration not using the actual Toyota product design. Toyota responded with a press release stating it has, "raised serious concerns about the validity, methodology and credibility of a demonstration."

What's most interesting to me as a marketer is how Toyota is getting their story to their consumers. Toyota has bought an ad network buy to get some banners out to tell their side and publicly discredit Gilbert.

The ads feature Professor David Gilbert with copy calling Gilbert a "critic of Toyota electronics." Gilbert isn't identified by his professional title as an automotive technology professor at Southern Illinois University. To Toyota he is a critic of the company.

Then when a person clicks the ad they are taken to a landing page full of content showing why Gilbert's demo is false and Toyota's position on the sudden acceleration issue, plus their response to help concerned customers.

It's all an interesting implementation from Toyota. Instead of letting the "experts" define the issue, Toyota is fighting back with its marketing dollars to regain some ground and not let what they consider misinformation fester and contribute to a long damaging reputation similar to what Audi experience 20 years ago.

The ABC News report featuring David Gilbert:

Competitor Websites Respond to Toyota Recall Woes

Toyota is gearing up for a March rebound with 0% financing and aggressive lease pricing after taking a 9% hit in year-over-year sales last February due to their very public recalls. Meanwhile everyone is trying to capitalize on Toyota's quality troubles. Late night sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live poked fun at Toyota's issues by putting two people in an unattended accelerating Toyota Prius with the fake ad saying "Ford: We make hybrids too."

Comedic marketing spoofs aside, it is interesting to see how Toyota's competitors are responding to the recalls at their manufacturer websites.

The strongest marketing message comes from General Motors. For example, their Chevy homepage features a promotion tile reading "Special information for Toyota owners/lessses" that is in the most prominent position in the promotion banner ribbon on the page (I say most prominent because users tend to click mostly on links to the far the left as American consumers read left to right.)

Ford also features a nod to the Toyota quality issues but in a more tempered way by promoting a quality claim the brand has been using since last year after a major quality report put Ford on par with Toyota and Honda. The message is more about Ford and less about their competitor Toyota. The promo reads "Learn more about why Ford quality can't be beat by Honda or Toyota."

The only other manufacture website I found promoting a strong quality message on their homepage is Hyundai. Hyundai uses an image from their recent Sonata campaign, "Hyundai Quality: Hyundai Held to a Higher Standard." This approach uses no competitor call-outs, but it certainly can be read as a strategic message to appeal to people cross-shopping Hyundai with Toyota.

The home teams in Japan - Honda, Mazda, and Nissan - make no mention of quality or Toyota on their home pages. Seems local support is strong for the time being.

Toyota Modifies Its Way Back to Quality

There’s still a lot of misunderstanding around the Toyota recalls. Some recent news on the “fix” for the unintended acceleration issue, which is the most concerning of the recalls Toyota is suffering through with its product quality, is calling into question whether the “fix” really works. None of this is stopping Toyota from showing confidence that they are fixing cars.


As part of Toyota’s damage control, they have started running a new commercial they're advertising on Facebook featuring Ronny Malone, a Master Diagnostic Technician from one of their dealerships.

The video’s main message shows the company has completed over 1 million “modifications” -- apparently using the word “recall” is too negative. The commercial also shows Ronny talking about how he has a family too who drive Toyotas and that he and people similar to him are working hard to keep Toyotas safe.

Safety and a rapid response to make Toyota owners and considerers feel the problem is being solved is very important to show the company is taking the recalls serious to maintain their primary brand image of quality.

“It took 35 years of intense focus for Toyota to get to the top of the industry in this market and around the world, but in just one week Toyota’s masterfully calculated image and hallowed reputation is now in tatters, decimated by a swirling maelstrom of its own hubris and unbridled greed.,” writes automotive journalist Peter M De Lorenzo in his blog the Auto Extremist.

Fixing the quality problem is a big issue for Toyota as it defines every product it sells. The brand isn't so much defined by performance, luxury, technology, or even green, except for the Prius nameplate. Instead they are defined by quality and now that has slipped away and they need to regain it fast before the brand loses its primary differentiator.


Some current Toyota owners are showing their support for the brand by donning “Loyal Toyota” bumper stickers and posting photos of their Toyota with said sticker on a new Facbook fan page. Toyota has even added the LoyalToyota fan page to their favorite pages on the brand’s Facebook fan page. Perhaps Toyota can move away from the Toyota technician ad and adopt some of its owner enthusiasm in a future brand image campaign once they move beyond the recall situation? Toyota Loyal could become a pride campaign featuring real owners and used to rebuild the brand after a very arduous situation.

For now, talking about the fixes from one of the people on the field is a genuine way to show the brand is taking this serious and moving quickly to get it right. If they are successfully doing this remains to be seen.

Toyota's Digital Communications DuringRecall are Well-Executed

A few of my thoughts Toyota's handling of its recall online is yeserday's ClickZ: News and Expert Advice for the Digital Marketer. The article "Toyota Goes Digital to Communicate Recalls" touches on a few points I made in my discussion with journalist Jack Marshall. He did an excellent job highlighting the key points.

Here is the ad Toyota is using in their news network media buy. The messages are very clean and simple without a lot of branding or visual pizazz, which of course is very appropriate in these situations.

A new Toyota sponsored ad unit bringing in top rated articles on the social linking site Digg is also being used by the brand to direct consumers to Toyota recall information.

Also, the Toyota Recall landing page is clean and simple to understand, especially the prominence of what vehicles are recalled. The question of what vehicles are affected is always the first question of any owner. So, it is great seeing the clarity of that message come through on the Toyota recall landing page.

Overall I think Toyota is doing the right thing in the online space. Their messages are clear and the ads are showing up on just about every online news story I read about the recall.

I will add one last thing that is briefly mentioned in the ClickZ article. Toyota UK has some excellent video communications they have posted on YouTube to let consumers know how the company is responding to the seriousness of the situation. The videos come across in a genuine way that removes the hysteria that might of ensued.