April 2008: Going green has gotten easier
Case Study: Can Toyota maintain its green brand status online?
Toyota’s Hybrid Synergy Drive Community site is one of several digital initiatives that the company has pursued to establish itself as a green automotive brand online.
Have you played the automaker brand association game? Someone says the name of a manufacturer and you respond with the one word that is most closely identified with it. Volvo = Safety. BMW = Performance. And Toyota? Easy. Quality, right? Actually, more car owners associate it with Green.
While it helps that Toyota is one of the Top 10 Green Brands, online consumer perception has been shaped by the automaker’s dedicated focus to aligning its brand with their needs.
The automaker has added a hybrid filter to its online showroom, created a site about its Hybrid Synergy Drive technology and a community site that lets Toyota hybrid owners create a profile based on their reasons for purchasing their vehicle.
Even consumers who aren’t currently in market, but interested in where Toyota stands on green issues, need go no further than the company’s Open Road blog, where “Being Green” is listed as the first category.
That same blog has been employed by the automaker in recent months to address criticism from environmental advocacy groups that it is “two-faced on fuel economy.”
Perhaps due to this criticism from the environmental community, Toyota has made a number of online and offline moves recently in support of conservation efforts.
While these efforts are laudable, full-line brands like Toyota need to maintain alignment between their green branding efforts and promoting products that are not as eco-friendly.
–Mary S. Butler
Related links:
- Top 10 Green Brands, PR Newswire, May 1, 2007
- Top Five in Brand Perception by Category, Consumer Reports, January 2008
- Toyota: Hybrid Synergy Drive and Hybrid Synergy Drive Community
- Toyota Open Road blog: Being Green
- Toyota Campaign to Scuttle Stronger Fuel Economy Measures in Energy Bill Undermines Its Green Reputation, Union of Concerned Scientists, October 5, 2007
- Arbor Day Foundation and Toyota Partner to Make VirtualTrees… Real, Toyota, March 20, 2008
- Audubon and Toyota Announce Five-Year Alliance to Promote Conservation Action and Grow Leaders of Tomorrow, Audubon, March 26, 2008
- The hybrid promise: one owner’s experience
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2 Responses to “Case Study: Can Toyota maintain its green brand status online?”
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What other OEMs are co-opting a green message? What are other online tactics?
Green is associated with the Prius, but that may soon change. Chevy is pushing hard online and in other areas to make the case that they are greenest with their Chevy Volt (not yet available). Other brands coming out with “green” vehicles besides hybrids:
Honda Civic GX - compressed natural gas (here now in NY/CA)
Th!nk City - highway capable electric car (tentative 2009)
Subaru R1e - highway capable electric car (tentative 2010)
Mitsubishi MiEV - highway capable electric car (tentative 2010)
Nissan - highway capable electric car (tentative 2012)
All brands have a version of a hydrogen fuel cell vehicle, but will they every be ready for the public (on a large scale)?
Plug-in hybrids are coming soon, too. Who will be first?
Toyota needs to stay up on their game and continually improve their cars to make them greener (and not just stay in the hybrid game and fall back on the Prius). If they don’t, these other brands will bypass them as being the green car company.