Mercedes CMO on marketing EVs during sales slowdown

In its latest campaign, Mercedes-Benz pulls off a powertrain trifecta—advertising EVs, hybrids and gasoline SUVs all at once. Such marketing flexibility has become a must for automotive brands, which are contending with a slowdown in the electric vehicle market. Mercedes, like most big automakers, has a lot riding on consumers ultimately buying EVs in big numbers, given it has poured billions of dollars into electrification. But for now, the luxury brand is spreading its bets—it is boosting its U.S. combustion engine and hybrid vehicle supply this year, as it pushes back once-ambitions global EV sales forecasts. For its U.S. marketing department, that means deploying campaigns such as its recently released “Trinit-E” effort, which presents powertrain flexibility as a plus, showing different versions of the same woman simultaneously pulling away in hybrid, EV and gas-powered GLE and EQE SUVs. Omnicom’s Mercedes-dedicated agency Team X created the ad. Subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, check us out on Spotify and hear us on Stitcher. This is our RSS feed. Tell a friend! Mercedes-Benz USA CMO Melody Lee described the approach on the latest edition of Ad Age’s Marketer’s Brief podcast: “When adopting any new technology, you're looking at a certain curve and I would say that we're just now reaching a flattening of the curve,” she said about current EV trends, noting that “we see electrification as a marathon, not a sprint.” “We just need to prepare for several different eventualities instead of perhaps what we thought at the beginning of this race,” she said. The new ad, which features actress Kelsey Asbille of “Yellowstone,” is not so much about the technicalities of powertrain options—but more about “the luxury of choice. Because at the end of the day, that's what's true to the Mercedes Benz brand,” Lee said. Also on the podcast, Lee discussed Mercedes’ approach to sports marketing, including its long-running sponsorship of golf's Masters Tournament. She also explained why Mercedes must stay in touch with younger generations, even if they lack the disposable income to afford a Mercedes. “We want even Gen Alpha hanging posters of Mercedes cars in their bedrooms, even if they can't buy the car,” she said. “We want them to dream about Mercedes so that when they do get old enough and they have saved up the money and they're in a position to buy, they become our customers as well.” Check out the latest Ad Age events and award programs Lee took the Mercedes CMO job about a year ago, joining from the design company MillerKnoll, where she led brand strategy for Herman Miller and Knoll brands. It marked a return to auto marketing—she previously held executive roles at General Motors-owned Cadillac, including brand marketing director and global director of the subscription service Book by Cadillac, before departing in 2018. That program, which charged users a monthly fee and allowed them to swap in and out of different models, was paused in late 2018. The subscription-buying model for autos rose in popularity in 2017, but automakers struggled to make it profitable, although some brands still offer it in smaller quantities. Lee on the podcast said she remains proud of Book by Cadillac: "It really was valuable in showing to the industry that we had to meet our customers a different way.” “It was born out of the fact that we actually asked customers what they wanted and they said we want a different way to experience a vehicle that doesn't necessarily entail a purchase or a lease,” she added. “As marketers, or as anybody in this industry, we need to continue to ask ourselves those questions.”

Mercedes CMO on marketing EVs during sales slowdown

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