BennyEast.Com/Blog The official blog of Kenny West

Missed Marketing Opportunity

This is my editorial blog post of sorts.  I'm commenting/weighing in on that emissions issue with VW that I had a thought about.

As everyone knows there's this whole scandalous debacle thing going on with Volkswagen.  Here's a related article:

Volkswagen models sale halted in Switzerland (http://www.bbc.com/news/business-34365794)

As a business, this isn't the kind of news you want going around about your company.  It's like walking into a party and the first thing everyone gossips about is how you cheated on your tests in school.  Who's going to want to come up to you and be your friend?  Probably only the other people that also cheated.  Ok, maybe not, and maybe that's not a great comparison... But... Do you want to be known for cheating?  No matter what the situation is?  Unless it's like helping some hiker cheat death in a special mountain pass rescue operation and you scaled some mountain side in a snow storm with ice picks and your barehands to bring a lost and cold and confused hiker that had run out of supplies back to basecamp...

In that case every single person would be hanging on your every word!

I feel like there's a pun in there somewhere.  Well, anyways...

I follow lots of business news because I'm full on invested in lots of different companies.  While, I don't own any shares in VW, one of the world's largest car manufactures...

According to this article here they are number 2:  http://www.forbes.com/sites/andreamurphy/2015/05/06/2015-global-2000-the-worlds-biggest-auto-companies/

I have owned shares in the past in other companies.  I also own shares in a paint/chemical company that makes the paints used in some aspects of building new cars.  As well I have shares in a car auction company.  So I follow a good amount news related to the automotive industry.

Recalling memories of my basic business classes back in college, there's a general concept of a SWOT analysis.

Read about it here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWOT_analysis

 

 

If I were to do this analysis on Volkswagen, I'd file the current emissions issue under both a weakness and a threat.

While the origin of the issue is really an internal problem, and it's a weakness... I'd say it presents a threat externally because other car companies would potentially benefit from grabbing the number 2 spot from this competitor.  After all, when you're at top of your game in any industry, there's only one way down that mountainside.  And the fall can be a rough one.

One competitor trying to climb to the top that could potentially benefit from the bad news currently making headlines worldwide is Telsa Motors...

Maybe I just haven't seen anything yet.  Maybe they are using this as a marketing opportunity.  Or maybe they just decided that they don't need the PR...

But, I think that they should be running an ad campaign currently to the tune of...

 

"Emissions?  What emissions?"  Tesla Motors Premium Electric Vehicles.  We don't bother to test emissions because... There are none to test.

 

How powerful is that?  I just kind of pulled that out of the air, so I'm sure a team of marketing PR professionals around a table could think of something better.

Obviously that statement could actually not be true depending on the power source used to recharge the vehicle.  If coal is being used to generate the electricity, it gets complicated.  As well there are various other environmental factors to consider in the manufacturing of the vehicle itself.

But the main issue we're dealing with are emissions coming from the tailpipe.  Since Tesla vehicles don't have tailpipes, I think they could run an effective marketing campaign that they would be able to file under external opportunities in a SWOT analysis.

Tesla has everything to gain and Volkswagen has everything to lose on this.  It will be interesting to see what effect this might have.  Nissan makes the Leaf so they could also take advantage of this.  Or, if VW is smart, maybe they could introduce an electric, or hybrid vehicle themselves.  Or possibly use this as an a reason to boost their strengths in the SWOT analysis as a company and do an internal review to fix their weaknesses.  Why did this even happen in the first place?

One could perhaps consider this a very large catastrophic failure in quality control... Swiss Cheese Model anyone?  I imagine lots of things went wrong in a row to upset the swiss so much that they have halted sales.

Even the cheese models in Switzerland aren't happy about the cheating!  From the linked news article at the top of this blog post:

"Switzerland has temporarily banned the sale of Volkswagen (VW) diesel-engine models which could have devices capable of tricking emission tests.
It said the move could affect 180,000 cars - not yet sold or registered - in the Euro5 emission category."

Depending on how VW customers react to their beloved car maker, it might be time to call in the mountain rescue team for Volkswagen.  Tesla to the rescue-la!

 

Missed marketing opportunity part two:

My other random thought is that PayPal should be sponsoring Papal mass here in Philly.  I mean... That would just stick in everyone's mind.  Every time someone mentions the word papal, I just keep thinking... PayPal.  Ohhhhh you mean the PayPal mass?  No.  Oh.  Wait... Are you sure?  Yes.  It's papal.  Hmmm, well ok.

 

"Papal mass, brought to you by PayPal!  The papal mass won't take 3 to 5 business days to be completed, why should your online payments?  PayPal!  Because this papal mass will be completed before you know it, and if you had used PayPal, so will your online payments."

Cut to a shot of the Pope using the PayPal website.  Or app on his phone.  Then he smiles and gives a thumbs up.  PopePal!

The Pope uses PopePal for his online payments... For everyone else, there's PayPal!

Again, I just took that randomly off the top of my mind.  But I think it's kind of catchy.  I should get into marketing!

Speaking of which I think I have money in my PayPal account actually.  I forgot all about that!

Wow.  I just checked and I do have money in my PayPal account.  This is like when you find five bucks in the pocket of your jeans that you just sent through the laundry and somehow the bill survived miraculously unscathed.  Sweet.