Brand Audit

Overview • Context for Audit • Brand Purpose • Quality of Brand Communications

– Advertising – Website – Mobile – YouTube/Video – Social Media

• Brand Health • Post Presentation Discussion

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THE CONTEXT Mercedes | Millennials

Mercedes | Millennials

How does a classic brand that stands for luxury communicate to a new generation?

Can we reach Millennials without diluting our brand?

Can we develop messaging that is consistent and applicable to all generations?

BRAND PURPOSE We have a philosophy…but um…yeah…erm…I guess…

‘Nothing but the Best’

Mercedes has a catchy tagline, but has yet to develop a brand purpose

Mercedes-Benz Hasn’t Adapted Excerpt from Daimler.com: True to Gottlieb Daimler’s philosophy, “The best or nothing”, Mercedes-Benz’s pioneering work has been shaping the future of mobility for more than 125 years. More than any other trademark in the automotive world, the Mercedes-Benz star symbolizes the perfect combination of fascination and responsibility. With its great innovative strength, Mercedes-Benz is constantly defining new milestones in terms of vehicle drive systems, safety, comfort and design.

Mbusa.com’s about page has history with no purpose or values to be found anywhere.

QUALITY OF COMMUNICATIONS Brand

Advertising

Website

Visit mbusa.com for the Mercedes-Benz U.S. website

Website

Website • Their home page is advertising their winter event

but the primary car that is being sold is the 2014 CLA250 Coupe @ $29,000. This leads me to believe they really are trying to pull in a younger audience, or people don't have money to spend on luxury cars.

• "The price leadership of the CLA takes nothing away from every other aspect of leadership that comes with the Three-Pointed Star." is at the top of the page. This also alludes to the history of the brand.

• The website has their other offers on the left hand side with similar information about the cars and sedans being offered for the winter event.

• Social links to Facebook,Twitter, YouTube, and Google+ are at the bottom of each page

The owners tab has things about the status of owning a Mercedes with how to videos, user manuals accessories, and care guides. All showing that Mercedes has an elite type of status to it. They also have interactive panels where you can build your own car and tour cars online.

Website • We also looked at the German

Mercedes website to see how cohesive they were.

• Despite not being able to read German the website seems a whole lot more user friendly and less cluttered.

• There weren't any links to social media of any type.

• It is important to note that they offered more products as well such as RV's and merchandise like hats, watches, and winter apparel.

• We suggest that the US website should be as simple and clean as the German website, but the German website isn't as interactive. If there is a healthy combination of the two we think it would make things overall a lot better and clearer for U.S. customers.

•

Social Media Likes: 12, 045, 262 People Talking About Mercedes: 615, 173 Content • Random Historical Facts about Mercedes • Past and Upcoming Interior and Exterior Designs, • Shout outs to other automobile manufacturers, • Holiday and Special Advertisements

Positive Attributes: Responding to comments. A good variety of photos and videos. Good balance of writing alongside photos.

Needs Improvement: • Presence of people in their post. • There is no distinct brand identity when you go on the

Mercedes Facebook page, it’s as if a machine is just posting random facts every so many hours.

• Testimonials may be for past or present customers. • A timeline of the driver of Mercedes from the time the

automobile was released until now. • Better transitions between the different countries that

carry Mercedes. A customer could get confused with the Facebook page because of all the different languages included.

Social Media Followers: 329,458 Following: 558 Tweets: 3,646 Content: The page includes various tweets about Mercedes Benz. There are ‘fun facts’ about the construction of the automobiles. The page contains several pictures with different models of Mercedes, as well as links to commercials and interviews.

Needs Improvement The Twitter page just seems like one big promotion. A lot of people may not follow them on social media because they might fear being bombarded with only tweets about Mercedes. There is very low interaction with followers and retweets or replies are rare. Twitter needs to be Mercedes primary focus in terms of social media improvement.

Social Media Followers: 505,000 Following: 155 Content The Mercedes Benz Instagram page features a variety of pictures of different models and versions of the Mercedes. The Mercedes is photographed in different setting, majority of them being outside.

Needs Improvement Too much focus on the exterior of the car, with little to no photographs of interiors. The photos also speak nothing about the Mercedes-Benz brands identity. It looks like someone just took different versions of the Mercedes as they moved from location to location. Instagram now offers a video option. Mercedes should take video of commercials as they shoot them, interview the actors or actresses that they feature in commercials, so potential stakeholders can get a feel for who Mercedes is at is core.

YouTube / Video

YouTube / Video Overall Summary: Mercedes-Benz has seemingly gone in every direction possible with cars that are eco friendly, high end luxury, modest, and even cars that are low priced for Millennials and middle class homes.

YouTube / Video E350 4MATIC Wagon -- Mercedes-Benz

This short Mercedes video seems to represent the transition of the brand toward Millennials. The video is shown while the song repeats "play while your still young.“ Interestingly the short clip shows what seems to be young Millennials who take the Mercedes Wagon to the beach, almost as if its not a high end luxury car, more like a Volkswagen van.

YouTube / Video This short Mercedes video seems to represent the transition of the brand toward Millennials. The video is shown while the song repeats "play while your still young.“ Interestingly the short clip shows what seems to be young Millennials who take the Mercedes Wagon to the beach, almost as if its not a high end luxury car, more like a Volkswagen van.

YouTube / Video Here is another YouTube video that shows Mercedes partnering up with Fashion Week to show their luxury for the a wealthier demographic. This video is a complete contradiction of what Mercedes is trying to represent in the previous video. This type of contradiction perfectly defines what is wrong with Mercedes communications.

Mobile – Android

“Mercedes Benz Guides” 100,000K+ Downloads 3.5 Star rating.

This app is purely functional, designed to be a digital, more interactive drivers manual. It stays true to the Mercedes-Benz aesthetic but offers nothing new in the way of communications.

“Mercedes-Benz Parts Game” 500+ downloads 5 Stars.

It’s a branded game, that works surprising well. It’s design is on brand, pairing up neatly with other Mercedes apps. When you match a pair you receive a short message talking about the part you matched. Although there are leaderboards, a complete lack of social media integration severely damages the word of mouth potential for any branded game.

Mobile Summary The design of the mobile apps adhere to the brand standards for fonts and colors but it fails to communicate anything significant. The apps feel like ‘good ideas’ that weren’t properly supervised by a brand strategist or marketing communication specialists

BRAND HEALTH Doctor Doctor

Needs Revitalizing

Mercedes is trying to communicate too many messages to too many audiences. Whatever Mercedes-Benz is trying to say, it’s getting lost in its own noise, or being so diluted potential customers are missing the point.

DISCUSSION Your Questions | Our Thoughts

THANK YOU! Brought to you by Team 2 – Apryl, Ayla, Dan, Gardenia & Trelyn