Matthew McConaughey's Car Commercial Helped Increase Lincoln Sales in an Unexpected Way
Carlos Kirby
· 4 min read
When car companies release commercials, they hope to raise brand awareness among consumers to ultimately sell more vehicles. One of the best ways to do that is by
hiring celebrities to represent your company in commercials
. Perhaps the most successful of those partnerships in recent years has been with Lincoln
.The company has created several Matthew McConaughey car commercials to help sell Lincoln vehicles. With Lincoln being a luxury brand, it is especially important to get people talking about their commercials because word-of-mouth helps sell cars and build brand equity. The McConaughey ads have helped to do that for the brand, but for an unexpected reason.
Matthew McConaughey car commercials for Lincoln
Cheat Sheet
writes about some of the Lincoln commercials McConaughey has done
. The relationship stretches back to 2014 when the Dazed and Confused star was featured in his first ad for the company. It showed him driving a Lincoln MKC SUV through a hilly Texas landscape, with him saying–in his usual Zen-like manner–that he drives a Lincoln not because "it's cool," but because he "likes it."
Another of the actor's commercials is for the MKZ sedan, which he gets into after leaving a cafe on a rainy night. He opens the moonroof, says "there we go!", and drives off toward the city. Another, more humorous, ad sees McConaughey in a Wild West-style standoff with a large Texas longhorn bull standing in front of the Texas native's MKC.
Other celebrities spoof Matthew McConaughey car ads
Matthew McConaughey car ads became so well-known that they became fodder for other celebrities to spoof them. That is what helped boost Lincoln's sales. Ellen DeGeneres was the first to spoof the commercials, sitting in the back seat and responding to McConaughey's comments.
Other parodies of the ads include one starring Jim Carrey from Saturday Night Live and South Park doing its own version that ended with an animated McConaughey being pulled into a wormhole.
There's a saying that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery; that may be true, but for Lincoln, it's also a way to sell cars. Based on the carmaker's projections, the parodies of its popular ads helped to boost sales of the company's models by 13% within a few months of the commercial’s release.
The MKC, in particular, has seen a gradual increase in its sales numbers since being featured in the McConaughey ads.
What are some of McConaughey's other commercial partnerships?
McConaughey is a very popular actor, which means Lincoln is far from the only brand that uses him as a celebrity spokesperson. His commercial career dates back to the early 1990s when he had his first speaking role in an ad, a commercial for the Austin American-Statesman local newspaper in his home state.
One of his first national campaigns came in 2008 when he became the spokesman for the National Cattlemen's Beef Association's "Beef. It's What's for Dinner" radio campaign, a seemingly natural fit for a Texan.
Aside from Matthew McConaughey car campaigns, he is also partnered with Wild Turkey bourbon. As part of that partnership, McConaughey worked with the brand to help create a new bourbon inspired by his parents, who met not far from the Wild Turkey distillery, at the University of Kentucky.
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