Pontiac plugs Google instead of own site
Cory Bergman November 18th, 2006
At the end a Pontiac TV commercial, the announcer says, “Google Pontiac and check it out for yourself” under a shot of Google’s home page with “Pontiac” in the search bar. Turns out, Pontiac did the same thing earlier this year on another ad campaign. Now, I’m a little stumped why Pontiac wouldn’t just plug Pontiac.com instead (Google was never asked if it wanted to be involved), but perhaps it’s because the local Pontiac dealers have a paid search position in the results? Any ideas?
10 Comments Add your own
1. Don | November 18th, 2006 at 7:27 pm
I’ve seen this — and figured they had a deal with Google. Maybe they figure everyone Googles - may as well just play to that. (One of the top refering keywords on google is our own domain name, so lots of folks even google URLs)
2. Steve Safran | November 18th, 2006 at 7:56 pm
Maybe they think it gives them a little more cache than simply saying “go to pontiac.com.” It certainly yields more immediate choices. (Pontiac, Michigan among them, but car buyers probably know to avoid that.)
My guess - and it’s just a guess - is that they are trying to say “We’re so confident in our brand and image that if you Google us, you’ll find good information.” Makes it seem a little less blatant, even if the top sponsored result is a paid ad.
One other observation: searching “pontiac,” I had to go 9 pages of results deep before I could find an even vaguely negative story - and that was simply one about the retirement of the always controversial Aztek.
Sadly, a search for “lost” has now dropped us to 21st place. Remember all that traffic we used to get when we were #1 or #2 when the show started?
3. thedetroitchannel | November 18th, 2006 at 8:03 pm
pontiac has been doing that locally for about a year. i, like don, thought they had some type of argeement.
safran, “googlebombing” i think the kids call it.
(google it for more information)
4. Joe | November 18th, 2006 at 8:05 pm
I don’t know how many times I’ve been in a meeting talking about some website, like Myspace.com. And someone turns to a computer, pulls up a browser, types in Google.com, and then types in myspace.com (with the dot-com at the end) in the search box and hits the search button. It has happened with many different websites and several different people, especially with Firefox. It’s absolutely amazing.
5. discreet_chaos | November 19th, 2006 at 3:06 am
If there’s no agreement, then I’d have to hope that it’s based on the positive comments and not just ignorance.
Though I will say that it makes a lot more sense than the current campaign from the Chili’s restaurant chain. The last frame of the recent Chili’s ads give the addy of myspace.com/chilis because I guess they figure, they could just lose all the grown-ups who’ll never have a myspace account and they must feel that their personal ad is somehow better than their own website.
Sure, they might get an auto “mailinglist” consisting of those who might “friend” a business, but in comparison to the numbers of people seeing their television ads and the population as a whole, I’m sure the appearance of a myspace address is enough to significantly limit their online reach.
6. discreet_chaos | November 19th, 2006 at 3:12 am
PS) Targeted ads and possibly an experiment might be one thing, but I’ve seen the Chili’s thing a few places on the dial, including during shows not considered popular with the myspace demo. It may even be throughout their entire ad run, but I can’t really be sure.
7. thefoodchannel | November 19th, 2006 at 8:36 am
chili’s has one of those names that will cause them great gas pains.
is it chili’s.com …. nope, ( ’s ) won’t resolve, but a large part of the population doesn’t know that.
is it chilli’s with 2 l’s or just one… do you feel lucky punk?
chillys?
chile’s?
ahhh, justf#ckit. let’s go to redlobster instead!
8. discreet_chaos | November 19th, 2006 at 10:57 am
It’s just one “s” just as it is as a myspace directory.
And, those “secret shows” (which I’m sure will only happen in a couple of large cities) sound like they may be neat, it’s just too bad that the vast majority of people can’t participate because we haven’t put up a personal ad.
9. Mark | November 22nd, 2006 at 11:14 am
I do website optimization and you would not believe most people don’t know what the URL bar is for. They always go to Google, Yahoo or MSN and type in the url there. Or it they use IE they type in a keyword and IE defaults to a MSN search.
It is dangerous as a few bad public comments on a high profile site will kill them
I posted a negative comment about a company once and it came up in Google third. Their website was fifth. They emailed me and told me if I didn’t remove my comment they’d sue me. I told them, go ahead. They never did and the comment stands. These companies think a high priced lawyer will scare anyone.
10. MOJO | January 18th, 2008 at 6:15 am
Wow, thanks for the excellent information!
Leave a Comment
(Please keep URLs out of the comment body or the spam filter will block you.)Subscribe to the comments via RSS Feed