I’m catching up on some old Advertising Ages and noticed an article about Volvo’s new “Life is better lived together” campaign.  The opening paragraph of the article caught my eye:

Volvo owners the world over are friendly and social. The inside of their cars look lived-in. No matter where they live, Volvo owners are good tippers and rarely travel alone; owners of competitive models seem to treat their cars as trophies next to which they could pose.

To glean all this information, Volvo went ot the experts: valets.

The article continues with a quote from Don Lane, a senior VP-group account director at Arnold (of Arnold/Nitro team that won the Volvo global campaign): “We found they [Volvo owners] are doers, and it’s not about possessions but what they do with their possessions.  They are users not havers, they use what they have.”

All of this interests me for three reasons:

1. The feelings that Volvo has discovered through valets are the same feelings I’ve had about Volvo drivers/the-brand for awhile.   What’s interesting to me (besides that I’m right) is that the traits identified for Volvo drivers are (I think) becoming more more popular among my “practical/green” generation; when Volvo makes a hybrid - and if they maintain this brand perception - it’ll do very, very well (like an upscale Honda/Toyota, without the ‘downmarket’ associations).
2. A Madison Ave blog post astutely notes that this “understated” Volvo vs. “flashy” BMW/Mercedes differentiation is nothing new; Buick vs. Cadillac was the same thing.   My excitement for the long-term potential of the Volvo brand is somewhat tempered after seeing how Cadillac trounced Buick.  Can understated brands survive? (Sure, different time, different marketing, different products … but still …)
3. Why don’t the actual ads for Volvo highlight the findings that Don Lane so clearly articulated?  Couldn’t they just put videos of valets saying, “Volvo drivers are nicer”?  I think the direct nature of such an ad would go against the understated-ness of Volvo’s core: you shouldn’t need to scream it if its true sort of thing.   Instead of that direct approach, Volvo went with the “Life is better lived together” slogan, appealing to the togetherness and (indirectly) safety, the underlying practical feature that Volvo owners consider.  [Sidenote: Jaguar’s hilariously direct ‘Gorgeous’ ad is a good reminder that being clear can backfire.  Tangent: that “Gorgeous pays for itself in the first 5 seconds” line is a great double-entendre… ]

What’s amazing to me is how, using the research noted above, Volvo produced two ads that alternatively support and contradict their brand message. The new S80 (a luxury sedan competing against the BMW 5/7-Series) ad portrays Volvo drivers to be James Bond-flashy while the XC70 (a cross-over SUV style all-terrain wagon) ad portrays Volvo drivers to be down-to-earth naturalists with indie-everywhere-man Stephen Merritt singing a jingle in the background.  Take a look:

These ads are from the same company??!! Maybe Volvo thinks my generation can’t afford S80s yet and everyone who can wants something that expensive wants something flashy … but geez, it’s hard to reconcile these ads with the same brand.

Woot.com just announched a partnership with Yahoo that is just too brilliantly ‘woot’ to ignore.

[For those of you unfamiliar with the site, Woot.com puts one item up for sale at midnight each day and sells it till they run out or the next item comes up.  The addictiveness/brilliance is writing, which mocks everything from the product to the buyer to Woot itself.  Pop-culture references and corny podcasts make it extra fun.]

Realizing that the loyal fanbase loves the indie-ness … and unknown-ness … the exclusiveness … of Woot, they preemptively countered any calls of ’sellout’ by calling the Yahoo-partnered site sellout.woot.com, and joking about the cash they got from the deal.  I highly recommend checking out their post and laughing along.

And with regards to Yahoo: apparently you can buy street cred.  Yahoo is now a couple points higher in my book … it’s too bad that my book isn’t the stock market.