Car makers spend serious money on adverts for their products. Even when you take out the crazy event-based stunts — like driving a cross the Thames on a high wire — it’s a pretty expensive business. In South Africa alone, Hyundai spent R54-million between March and May 2015. But what if there was a simpler way?
What if the world’s biggest automakers abandoned their expensive ads for simple images accompanied by the words most frequently associated with the reviews of their vehicles? What could possibly go wrong.
No ad to show here.
In a bid to find out, UK car site CarWow analysed every review of each car to find the most popular words used to describe it. The aim, the site says, was to see of the analysis would give “an accurate representation of the cars features and flaws, or just a load of incoherent, nonsensical gobbledygook”.
Given that the results seem like what would happen if the doge dog were to ever land a position on Top Gear, we’re leaning towards the latter.
Here are the results:
Mercedes-AMG GT
Very bonnet indeed.
Lamborghini Aventador
Surprisingly, the words “mad”, “raging bull” and “Italian passion” don’t appear here, which might suggest that motoring journalists are overcoming their penchant for cliches. “Finest big understeer,” is bound to put a smile on any petrolhead’s face though.
Porsche Cayman
Despite the fact that Cayman is apparently little more than an “expensive Boxster”, most motoring journalists “just want” it.
Honda Civic Type-R
We’d replace the “although” in “feel good although rear-wheel drive” with “because”
Dacia Sandero
Apparently Dacias didn’t have engines before.
Ford Fiesta ST
No sentence has ever made us want to drive a car more than “Fun GTI Thing very hatch”.
Jaguar F-Type
This ad may reveal the biggest issue with using review text for adverts.
Mazda MX-5
CarWow says it doesn’t know “how ‘Old British aggression’ got in there,” but given how much the MX-5 is inspired by old British roadsters, we think it’s totally understandable.
Nissan GTR
“Get one”. Now that’s good advertising.
Range Rover Sport SVR
There’s so much to like about this one that we don’t even know where to start.
