How Cadillac Wins at Brand Marketing

The auto industry is famous for relying on history and tradition. But in today’s world, that alone might not be enough to appeal to new generations and thrive as a business. For that reason, iconic brands like Cadillac put in a lot of effort to take that nostalgia and power from the past and propel it into the future. To understand what the company is doing to drive those efforts, we invited Melissa Grady Dias, the chief marketing officer at Cadillac.

Grady Dias joins Suzy founder and CEO Matt Britton on the latest episode of The Speed of Culture podcast in collaboration with Adweek. They discuss how Cadillac appeals to new generations yet remains iconic through brand marketing strategies.

In her role as the CMO at Cadillac, Grady Dias has led the launch of Cadillac’s “Make Your Way” campaign, the debut of the 2021 Cadillac Escalade and helped the brand address the Covid-19 pandemic by launching the new “We Have Your Back” campaign. Today, she shares Cadillac’s omnichannel strategy and brand messaging, the importance of data for driving marketing performance and how to succeed as a marketer professional in the auto industry.

Scaling a CPG Brand in 2022 and Beyond

Stream the new episode below, listen and subscribe on Apple Podcasts or find it on Spotify.

To learn more about Cadillac’s brand and marketing strategies, check out the key takeaways of this episode below.

Key Highlights:

• 03:32 – 05:02 – Balancing Data With Creativity – Many people still believe advertising is all about TV commercials or creative ads. Though creativity plays a huge role in the designing process, the math and science are more important than ever. Start with understanding data, whether that is about people or technology. Once you understand data, you can hypothesize and figure out the best advertising strategies.
• 05:02 – 07:29 – Different Messages at Different Times to Different People – When you think about the auto industry, with longer sales cycles and fewer purchases over a consumer’s lifetime, it’s easy to assume that data plays a secondary role. But the reality stands different. Marketers need to advertise various messages to specific clients at different times. It’s critical to understand the audience you are targeting and what actions you are trying to drive.
• 07:30 – 12:07 – Iconic Then, Iconic Now – Cadillac is considered an American icon with a remarkable history behind it. The company has done a great job modernizing brand messaging and making it relevant for new generations. Though Cadillac focuses on the EV future and is part of GM’s Zero Crashes, Zero Emissions, Zero Congestion Vision, the brand still positions itself as a luxurious American icon, which takes the nostalgia and power of the brand in the past and propels it forward.
• 12:07 – 16:25 – GTM Strategy and EV Future – Cadillac aims to take an older industry and adapt how it communicates with its customers, whether on the phone, online, in-person or combined. It comes down to meeting the customer where they are and ensuring they interact with the brand as they want. Cadillac also puts a lot of effort into building its EV products and communicating the vision of a better world with its customers.