Under the title of ‘The Joy of Moving You Is What Moves Us’, the idea, which is driven by Australia and is not a global program, is to reinject the Honda name with some of its lost mojo and show a new wave of Australian customers that Honda has a strong history backed by a new product range.
Spearheading the change is Honda Australia general manager of customer and communications, Scott McGregor, who this week outlined the plans with GoAutoNews Premium.
“We started on this plan in November last year,” he said.
“We thought now was the right time to tell the story of Honda to a new generation of customers. I think that the Honda story has gone untold for a reasonable amount of time and with the raft of new product coming through, there is strong evidence for us to talk about what Honda is and what we stand for.”
Mr McGregor said the idea was born in Australia as a way of getting customers closer to the brand.
“We thought about what would be the best way to engage with the audience and that came down to putting the customer at the centre of everything we do,” he said.
Scott McGregor
“It revolves around the phase ‘man maximum, machine minimum’ which is a fundamental principle that goes back to what Soichiro Honda was thinking to engage the customer.
“It is about how the Honda products are thoughtfully designed, about the ease of use of the vehicles that sets us apart. The principle doesn’t just affect our automobiles but extends across everything we do from a generator to a lawnmower or a motorcycle.
“So we wanted to use this opportunity to start telling the story.”
The first step in the campaign is a trio of recently-launched digital television commercials, one at 30 seconds and the others at 60 seconds, under the theme ‘The Joy of Moving You Is What Moves Us’ and shows a circle of moving Honda products around the central consumer.
“So the first thing we had to do was to build the story,” Mr McGregor said.
“We have produced the core video assets which have been aired. There are three – the brand in 60 seconds and 30 seconds in digital TV and cinema; then specific pieces for the Civic and one for the CR-V.
“The basic principle for each piece is the story of Honda and then we express that through the nameplate. So for Civic customers, the video tells the story of Honda through the Civic name.
“It is all about how Honda approaches things more generally so it is taking a holistic approach.”
Honda CR-V – VTi-LX AWD
Mr McGregor said that the line for consumers is “The joy of moving you is what moves us” and that “really gets to the centre of what we are talking about”.
“Everything we try to do is motivated by a customer outcome and we are evolving our brand and our business along this line,” he said.
“We have the first roll out with TVCs and now we are starting to get into digital content, social content and PR content. We are looking at opportunities with individual Honda owners.
“We can use the story of a Honda product to tell the story of Honda. Led by our cars and SUVs, it’s possible to reference all Honda products so people will see Honda as a more diverse brand than perhaps they did before.”
Mr McGregor said that the new approach to the customer is attributed, in part, to people being unaware of Honda’s history.
“There’s a sense that we were a brand that is respected and known for strong attributes in quality, safety and reliability, but we know we had to add a dose of desirability into that,” he said.
“We needed to get a bit more emotion back into the product and so that’s what we are doing with the way we are now presenting ourselves to our customers.
“It’s timely because now we also have the products to back it up with an all-new Civic, new CR-V, HR-V, Type R and NSX.
“These products give us the platform to have substance behind what we are saying.”
ASIMO
Honda Australia has involved its national dealers from the start of the campaign in November.
“Over time, every time customers come into contact with Honda they will know about us and why we exist. That will take time to roll out around the dealers.
“Dealers have taken them on this journey from the beginning, so they have been a strong part of this.”
But he said that aside from some subtle changes to the language of the advertisements – including a bolder typeface – there wouldn’t be an exterior change to the dealerships.
Mr McGregor said that the benefits for consumers was being part of a company that designed a car with the customer in mind.
“If you take our small SUV, the HR-V, and look at the way it has been designed to function, that’s an indication of the benefit to its owner,” he said.
“That’s an insight to Honda thinking – maximising the amount of customer utility out of a small car is where the HR-V comes into its own.”
Mr McGregor said that the line for consumers is “The joy of moving you is what moves us” and that “really gets to the centre of what we are talking about”.
“Everything we try to do is motivated by a customer outcome and we are evolving our brand and our business along this line,” he said.
By Neil Dowling
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