Survey Says: GM's "Payback" Ad Is Working

Edward Niedermeyer
by Edward Niedermeyer

GM’s now-infamous advertisement touting the payback of government loans “may have elasticized the reality of things,” in the words of Steve Rattner, but stretching the truth apparently pays off. Automotive News [sub] reports that a London public perception-tracking firm surveyed some 5,000 consumers, and found that The General’s image has improved since the ad started running. Of course, on YouGov’s brand image scale of 100 to negative 100, GM is up only five points to “17.” Clearly there’s still work to do.

For comparison, Toyota was at 45 on the scale before the recall scandal hit earlier this year, dropping the Japanese brand’s perception score to negative one. And, says YouGov’s managing director, when it comes to GM’s progress on the strength of its recent ad,

we don’t know if it will last one week or one month

Either way, any uptick is a good sign for a state-owned firm that’s being accused of misleading consumers over its obligations to the government. Especially considering that JD Power’s research shows the ad in question simply polarizes consumers. Ultimately, as JDP’s Alexander Edwards puts it,

If GM is to find success, they need to talk about the cars

Edward Niedermeyer
Edward Niedermeyer

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  • Tommy Boy Tommy Boy on May 13, 2010

    >>>Like it or not, those of us who are US or Canadian citizens (through our respective governments) are the majority shareholders in GM. The ONLY way were are going to get any of that money back is if GM succeeds. Is this ad misleading? Yes, because most people have no idea about who owns GM. But if we don’t get those same people back into GM dealerships buying cars (and, face it, many of them are potential customers who resent the bailout), we’re all screwed. We won't get our money back, any more than the the British taxpayers saw a return on their "investment" in British Leyland. The best outcome now is for these entities to go away so that we can cut our losses, for now, as long as they continue to exist, the UAW (via GM / Ford / Chrysler) will keep coming back to the taxpayer trough, claiming that they need more lest the taxpayers' previous "investment" be lost. As I just posted on another thread re: the UAW at Ford: After the taxpayers bailed out the UAW, with extra-legal coercion from Comrade Obama … (see here): http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/White-House-puts-UAW-ahead-of-property-rights-44415057.html http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Gangster-Government-becomes-a-long-running-series-91656284.html We get the UAW back to business as usual, so once again they can sink the automakers, confident that the taxpayers will end up footing the bill for their rapacious ways. NOBODY is talking about the UAW paying us back. The PATRIOTIC thing to do is to purchase vehicles assembled in America by non-UAW labor, and drive the UAW to extinction (which it deserves). For as long as the UAW exists it’ll continue to be a parasite feeding off of us taxpayers.

  • Kita Ikki Kita Ikki on May 13, 2010

    "Clearly there’s still work to do." "Clearly they have more lies to spread."

  • Mrcrispy Mrcrispy on May 14, 2010

    Of course its bloody working. We elected Bush twice didn't we?

  • Porschespeed Porschespeed on May 14, 2010

    Proving once again that the middle and left of the bell-curve would starve to death at the first opportunity...

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