Dieter Zetsche - Ask Dr. Z Campaign

Ask Dr. Z Campaign

On June 30, 2006, Chrysler Group announced the Employee Pricing Plus program, which featured Dieter Zetsche as Dr. Z, the DaimlerChrysler spokesman for a series of United States and Canadian television commercials, also animated in cartoon format on the company's Ask Dr. Z website, which began on July 1.

The "Ask Dr. Z" campaign included television, radio, print, online, in-dealership and customer relationship marketing media components and aggressive marketing tactics (mobile billboards, aerial banners, street teams), as well as targeting the NASCAR fan community. In the "Ask Dr. Z" ad campaign he provides answers to customers' questions and exits by saying "Auf Wiedersehen" (German for "See you later").

The ad campaign emphasized the consumer benefits of the best of American and German engineering and design built into every Chrysler, Jeep and Dodge vehicle. One included Zetsche riding in a Jeep Liberty crossing a pile of logs, another showed him at the trunk of a Dodge Caravan minivan heading a soccer ball, and the last showed him at the wheel of a Chrysler Pacifica when it undergoes a crash test where he emerges from the wreckage unscathed.

As a response of shrinking sales, the Employee Pricing Plus program was extended through the end of August, 3 new TV ads, which did not feature Dr. Z, were added to the August campaign. After 3 months however DaimlerChrysler hurriedly withdrew the Dr. Z campaign due to a significant loss in market-share. However, some of the Dr. Z ads can still be seen in Canadian television. In later broadcasts, the tagline in Dr. Z TV ads was changed to 'See the best in German and North American design in your Dodge and Chrysler dealer.'

The campaign was criticized for having a wrong guy to do funny ads. CNW Marketing Research poll showed most people thought Dr. Z was a fictional character, did not notice the employee discount offer in the ads and radio commercial listeners had a difficulty understanding his German accent.