"No one is willing to run the experiments necessary."
Tesla is one natural experiment about not spending money on advertising in the mass media compared to traditional car companies that spend HUGE amount of money advertising.
"Hyundai spent $4,006 per Genesis vehicle sold in 2018. Ford’s Lincoln brand came in second with $2,106 per vehicle sold. After Jaguar and Alfa Romeo, GM’s Cadillac brand came in fifth with $1,242 spent per vehicle sold. Tesla was the lowest at just $3 spent per vehicle sold."
Telsa is in an enviable position of selling most of their cars before they're produced. In that position, you don't really need to advertise much. They also get a lot of PR to keep up brand awareness.
If Hyundai couldn't keep Genesis vehicles on the dealer lots, they'd advertise them less too. Having a dealer network means dealers that want manufacturer support in advertising to keep dealers happy, even if the new cars sell themselves, dealers need to get people in to sell used cars.
Tesla's marketing spend is whatever it costs them in legal fees and fines to keep the mouthy celebrity CEO - and their high-profile campaigns in 2018 seemed pretty effective.
Tesla is one natural experiment about not spending money on advertising in the mass media compared to traditional car companies that spend HUGE amount of money advertising.
https://www.motorbiscuit.com/gm-spends-an-embarrassing-amoun...
"Hyundai spent $4,006 per Genesis vehicle sold in 2018. Ford’s Lincoln brand came in second with $2,106 per vehicle sold. After Jaguar and Alfa Romeo, GM’s Cadillac brand came in fifth with $1,242 spent per vehicle sold. Tesla was the lowest at just $3 spent per vehicle sold."