​Kia is hustling to the top, followed closely by Toyota in our Mexico Social Media Marketing rankings.  Both brands appearing to be in pursuit of the most loved Volkswagen brand.

As an indicator of which brands are “working hard”, Kia is actively flexing its social media muscles.  Among non-luxury brands, Kia made the largest year-over-year gain, maintaining the number two position in the rankings behind number one Volkswagen.  Volkswagen has actually lost strength, but maintains a very healthy lead.

The growth of Kia and Toyota is a clear indication of which brands are working hard to become the best known and possibly the most loved brands in the future.

Among luxury brands, Mercedes-Benz, BMW, and Lincoln each made positive gains in their year-over-year scores.  Lincoln’s growth has brought the brand up to the same level as Cadillac, which has been on the decline.

The Social Media Marketing study is designed to help marketers quickly understand their brand strength among fans vis-à-vis competitors across core social media platforms.  The complete study provides platform-by-platform metrics, helping marketers understand brand strengths, challenges, and the opportunities that can lead to greater overall love for the brand.

​Spending a sh!t ton of money on marketing?

Is it working? Is it landing in front of your audience?  Need help finding your audience?

Consumers listening to music on the radio is a big (gigantic) market and is fairly well-dispersed across age groups from 16 to 55+ years of age.  Done correctly, radio can be very effective for staying in tune with your target market.

News on TV captures another large audience of new vehicle intenders, but be careful that your ads are not a follow-along to negative news.

While Reality TV captures a large audience, tread cautiously as few new vehicle intenders are getting caught in the deadliest catch of bachelor watching.  And don’t make your ad spend strategy a family feud either because game shows have the lowest draw among new vehicle intenders.

Need help finding your spending sweet spot?  We have experience sorting through the numbers so you can know with confidence if you are over or underspending.

Among All-New Vehicle Intenders in the U.S., percent participating in this activity Almost Every Day

Is your digital marketing strategy giving you the results you want or expect?

While most may think of Facebook as the 800 pound gorilla that should get the lions share of your digital budget, only 60% of new vehicle intenders are visiting Facebook every day.  Sure, 60% is a big number, but if you are overlooking other channels that range from music streaming (41% every day) to YouTube (40% everyday) and Instagram (28%), you may be missing a large and very valuable segment of consumers for your brand.

Perhaps even more important is to understand by automotive brand, where are your brand intenders spending their time online?  It can be easy to push all your marketing chips into the Facebook bucket, but if the larger portion of your target audience is spending more time on Instagram, wouldn’t it make sense to re-balance your digital investment strategy?

​Luxury brand Porsche extends its Social Media leadership.

MIAMI, FLORIDA, 7 May 2019 – Social Media Marketing (SMM) is vital to advertisers and the success of their brands.  As a no-to-low-cost platform for connecting with consumers, SMM allows brands 24-7 access to communicate with consumers, share product news, and grow powerful earned media.

“Porsche is very active on social media, continuously attracting new fans, helping to lift its year-over-year score from 96.5 to 100.7 and remaining number one in the rankings,” said Mike Weil, President, Global Automotive Research and Insights at Insights 4 Less, LLC.  “Ford is the Non-Luxury brand leader, despite slipping from 95 to 93.1 in the latest rankings.  Key strengths for Ford include YouTube while Instagram is an opportunity to be more active.”

Following are some of the US Automotive Social Media rankings for April 2019:

- Despite shutting down its Facebook page, Tesla (79) has added a massive 13 points to its overall social media score since April 2018.
- Jeep (35.7) is steadily building social media strength, now ranked number nine, up two spots from year ago levels.
- Luxury maker Mercedes-Benz (34.1) has strengthened and is also up two spots from year-ago levels.

The Social Media Marketing study is designed to help marketers quickly understand their brand strength among fans vis-à-vis competitors across core social media platforms.  The complete study provides platform-by-platform metrics, helping marketers understand brand strengths, challenges, and the opportunities that can lead to greater overall love for the brand.