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Tesla to begin advertising soon : Report
The electric car manufacturer has avoided running standard paid advertising efforts and rely on the support of customers and supporters to promote its brand.
Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla, announced that the company would "try a little advertising", marking a significant change for a company that has previously shunned advertisements.
In its twenty-year history, the electric car manufacturer has avoided running standard paid advertising efforts in preference of relying on the support of customers and supporters to promote its brand.
When questioned about why the business has never explored advertising in the past, Musk went so far as to say that he "hates advertising."
Musk reversed direction, saying at Tesla's annual shareholder meeting on Tuesday that the business would soon test an advertising plan and "see how it goes" after realising the value of owning Twitter.
In answer to a query from an investor, he said, "Twitter is highly dependent on advertising, so here I am, never really used advertising before, and now have a company that's highly dependent on advertising." Advertising is fantastic, so everyone should do it, I suppose. "You advertise cars not just for the next 12 months of demand but -- quite literally -- for a lifetime beyond that point," he remarked.
Uncertainty surrounds the design of a Tesla ad campaign, but in a subsequent interview with CNBC, Musk stated that if a campaign is "informative" and "aesthetically pleasing," "it can start to approach content," and that he would use it to draw attention to lesser-known features of the company's vehicles.
We'll see how effective it is, he said, adding to the American news network: "It's worth a shot. It's still in the early stages of development because I recently agreed to it.
The statement comes one month after Musk declared that Tesla will prioritise sales growth over profit in a fragile economy when it first started a new product line.
In an effort to remain ahead of its competitors, the company, which in April reported its lowest quarterly gross margin in two years, lowered prices in the USA and China.
The company's actions were justified by Musk at the time, who said: "It's better to shift a large number of cars at lower margin and harvest that margin in the future as we perfect autonomy."