What's Wrong With This Picture: And It's Never Coming Back Edition

by Jack Baruth

Published: May 2nd, 2012

what s wrong with this picture and it s never coming back edition

We all know Google’s evil hivemind constantly scans your GMail and targets advertisements to your recent mail threads. As a result, I’ve seen stuff from “Reliable Pregnancy Testing” to “Hundreds Of Collings Guitars In Stock” over the past few years, but what I saw this morning — “Check Out The Features Of The 2011 Lincoln Town Car” — intrigued me.

Why is Ford paying good money to direct people to the website pictured above?

While Chrysler falls flat on its face with inept social media and General Motors buys the bloggers’ bar every year at NAIAS in as heavy-handed a fashion as humanly possible, Ford’s gained a reputation for navigating the mostly navel-gazing and valueless world of “SM” a little more competently than the competition. They brought self-professed guru Scott Monty on board nice and early in the game and have reaped all sorts of rewards, up to and including giving a hundred Fiestas to a bunch of slackers for no particular reason.

Wait.

The point is, Ford usually dances where the others bumble. Why pay good money, then, to point people towards a dead-end website for a discontinued car that doesn’t even say something like, “Hey, check out the MKS!” My suspicion is that Ford, like many companies, has let their “spend” with Google spiral out of control. Ask any small businessman who uses AdWords how easy it is to blow through your prepaid budget. Google may be free for the little people, but that’s because they are in the business of selling little people to big fish.

Little mistakes like this add up. Too much wasted ad money, too many free Fiestas, too many 1000-hits-a-month bloggers on press trips, and pretty soon it’s time to cut costs elsewhere… like on the door panels of the MKT. You know what would have been a better idea than spending money advertising the 2011 Lincoln Town Car a year after its demise? Building a new, and better, Town Car. As it currently stands, the iconic Lincoln, just like that puppy your mom and dad sent to the farm when you were six, is gone, and it’s never coming back.

Jack Baruth

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3 of 36 comments

"scarey" on May 03, 2012

I drove through my local Ford Lincoln Merc...er Ford Lincoln dealer's lot tonight, and found several (desirable) NEW Mercuries available. No Town Cars, but a new Grand Marquis. Are there still new Town cars sitting on lots to be scarfed up by collectors or car buffs ?

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- NulloModo on May 03, 2012
  
  There's no such thing as a new Mercury anymore. After the Mercury brand was officially discontinued dealers who still had Mercury vehicles in stock had to purchase them and title them in the dealership name, so any unsold Mercuries are used cars with the first owner of record being the dealership. Here in the land of retirees we had no problem getting rid of our last Mercuries, in fact we were buying Grand Marquis from other dealers up north because as the word spread amongst the blue hair crowd that the car was going away we had a sudden run on them. It could be possible that a dealer or two might have some unsold still, but it's more likely that they were just particularly nice used cars parked on the new car lot as possible switch vehicles, which is pretty common. We'll typically keep a certified pre-owned vehicle or two in particularly nice shape in the new car show room to make it easier to show potential new car buyers who don't want to pay the price for a new car buy who have a mental block about buying used - having the car right in the middle of the new ones makes it easier to show how little difference there is between brand new and one or two years old with low miles in great condition.
  
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Zackman on May 03, 2012

Personally, I get a kick out these targeted ads. In a nostalgic mood one day, I owned a bugle as a kid and was curious to see how much one cost now. Went on Amazon and looked one up. For the following two weeks, almost half of the web sites I went on featured an ad either on the top or along side the webpage of a sale on a bugle! No, I didn't buy one... Same thing happens when I price a new Impala...it's quite tempting.

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