Ford is Fiesta Movement’s Big Winner

Ford’s great experiment in social media marketing, the Fiesta Movement, has come to an end. After an awards ceremony held at the Hollywood Palladium, it’s clear that participants’ hard work paid off — for Ford.

“Based on the sheer numbers of early hand-raisers and the level of interest of non-Ford owners, the program is an unrivaled success,” Scott Monty, Ford’s head of social media, told Autopia.

According to Monty, 58% of consumers are aware of the Ford Fiesta — a level that eclipses some Ford vehicles that have been on the market for three years. Not bad for a car that was just officially unveiled in the US at this week’s Los Angeles Auto Show.

More importantly, Monty said, by taking a risk and putting 100 social-media savvy strangers in charge of marketing a new product for six months, the nontraditional campaign “has added to the growing perception of Ford as a company that ‘gets it’ when it comes to social media – meaning that we’re comfortable with others telling our story and with letting go of control.”

Back when Ford first handed over the keys to 100 European-spec Fiestas to 100 “agents” in exchange for six months of Facebook and Twitter content, all eyes were on Ford for the riskiness of the plan. After all, in the absence of a tightly scripted media campaign, anything could happen. We openly wondered what would happen if the cars turned out to be lemons.

Of course, that’s just what Ford wanted. “Not only did at least hundreds of thousands hear about the Fiesta when they otherwise wouldn’t have, but it further established Ford as a more open, more progressive, more accessible brand,” said Ian Schafer, founder and CEO of marketing agency Deep Focus.

In the absence of traditional marketing, the Fiesta Movement “certainly became a topic of conversation emanating from people that reach a lot of other people,” Schafer told Autopia. “This was people as advertorial media, where the brand relinquished control of the messaging and the outcomes, but the upside was big enough that they got their bang for the buck.”

That’s not to say that the agents didn’t benefit, too. At the awards ceremony, Ford highlighted agents who supported Meals On Wheels, wrestled with alligators and delivered Harry and David treats to the National Guard. One agent even used her Fiesta to elope. Through all of those missions, chronicled online, the Fiesta gained over 6.5 million YouTube views and 50,000 requests for information about the car — 97% of which came from folks who don’t currently have a Ford in the garage.

While the Fiesta Movement was a success, it’s unlikely Ford could replicate it for future vehicle launches. “The Fiesta Movement was really something of a perfect storm,” Monty told Autopia. “We had vehicles available from Europe before we had them available here, which won’t be the case with our future global platform cars.”

“We’ll certainly be looking at other creative social media integrations for our other vehicle launches, but the Fiesta Movement will always be something special.” Indeed, with so many other carmakers following in Ford’s footsteps, traditional automotive marketing campaigns seem as dated as Dinah Shore beckoning us to see the USA in a Chevrolet.

Posted in: Ford,Ford Fiesta