Encouraged by 10 straight months of sales gains, Nissan last weekend began a massive new marketing campaign designed to keep its momentum going as it pushes to increase its U.S. market share and, perhaps, eventually to unseat Honda as the No. 2 Asian automaker in this country.
The campaign kicked off on ESPN's college football TV preview, showcasing the automaker's vehicles — including the U.S.-built Altima sedan and Maxima “four-door sports car,” as well as the new Leaf electric car.
Ads will be shown in a variety of media, beginning with television but also including print and online. The first five TV ads are designed to promote “Nissan's history, track record and process of innovation,” the company said.
One of the ads shows a man who has just learned his wife is having a baby going out to his driveway and stretching his two-door Nissan 370Z sports car into a Maxima, with a back seat for the baby.
Another shows a small boy trying to destroy a model of the Altima by plunging it into a plate of mashed potatoes, stomping it and throwing it to the dog. But it ends up unscathed, and then the announcer, actor Robert Downey Jr., says:
“We put it through 5,000 quality tests so it'll stand up to just about anything. The Nissan Altima. Innovation that lasts. Innovation for all.”
The campaign is designed to increase brand awareness and to help Nissan build U.S. market share, said Jon Brancheau, vice president for marketing at Nissan North America Inc., based near Nashville, Tenn.
Downey was signed to do the voice-overs for all of the TV spots because he has “lots of swagger,” Brancheau said.
The goal is to deliver more than 200 million “media impressions” of the automaker by the end of the year to help build U.S. market share.
Nissan has a long way to go to catch Honda, which had a market share of 11.1 percent in 2009, compared to just 7.4 percent for Nissan.
