Auto Companies Increased Their Online Advertising Activities, Increasing Unit Sales, Particularly Light Trucks

There was a significant increase in online advertising activities from six leading auto companies this past summer: Ford, General Motors, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, Nissan Motor, Honda, and lastly Toyota. This rising trend for greater online advertising presence in turn, influenced unit sales across the board. According to a Wall Street Journal report, the number of auto sales, including all major brands, increased 5.3% with a surprising 51% increase in light truck sales, in particular.

Using our own database of ad sales intelligence, we were able to dive into the numbers to dissect this trend amongst leading automakers.

Here’s what we uncovered:

With a strong lead, Ford Motor bought ads on a whopping 97% more websites from January through August of 2015 than during the same period the year prior.

Listed below are the remaining 5 auto companies who have demonstrated an increase in website presence:

General Motors- bought on 68% more sites (1,966 sites)
Fiat Chrysler Automobiles- 80% (2,138 sites)
Nissan Motor- 90% (2,061 sites)
Honda- 73% (1,680 sites)
Toyota- 67% (2,140 sites)

As a result, auto companies saw a significant boost in unit sales, light trucks, specifically. Listed below are examples of percentage increases of light truck sales:

General Motors- 13% increase in light trucks (194,727 units)
Nissan Motor- 23 % increase in light trucks, (54, 974 units)
Toyota- 8.6% increase in light trucks (70, 613 units)

MediaRadar uncovered the correlation between unit sales and advertising when discovering that despite Toyota’s slight increase in light truck sales, they had not significantly expanded their light truck advertising as much as General Motors and Nissan Motors had, leading to only a meager increase in truck sales.

Lastly, it was revealed that it is only sometimes the case where both online and print presence had both increased at the same time. Listed below are the auto companies who saw either both in increase in their online and print presence or those who focused on online while letting print drop.

Increased print and online budget:
Ford- 26%
General Motors- 3%

Decreased print budget:
Fiat Chrysler Automobiles- 7%
Nissan-9%
Honda-18%
Toyota- 37%