Imagine a typical stroll through Instagram: There’s that pesky person from high school. (Still on the algorithm for some reason.)
Perhaps a post from a bestie. Maybe your NBA team shares a thank-you post to fans after collapsing in the playoffs. And so on.
Then, a pretty post calmly stops the scrolling. It’s giving warm, spring vibes, with a color palette to match.
“How to Find the Perfect Road Trip Ready Car,” the first slide says. It doesn’t feel like an ad trying to sell cars.
And that’s exactly what the creators aimed for.
Driving the news: Ed Morse Automotive Group, which owns 60 automotive franchised dealerships and powersports stores across multiple states, recently launched the campaign in an effort to sell the experience, not the car.
“I think everyone already knows that we sell cars,” Tyler Sloan, creative producer for Ed Morse Automotive, told CDG News. “I think my job is to let people know why we sell cars and why we're different from other dealerships.”
Tyler Sloan
Ed Morse
Automotive Group
Between the lines: The infographic ad, as it is called, is part of a broader campaign called May Family Miles, a company-wide push built around road trips, family moments, and Mother's Day, rolled out simultaneously across all Ed Morse social media accounts.
Maleia Satterlee, director of advertising and marketing for the group, nudged the team to develop something tangible that could be deployed uniformly across all properties.
The idea, Sloan said, was to sell the moment, not the metal.
"We're trying to celebrate the things that these vehicles take you to, and the memories that you make inside of them, versus just trying to push them onto the vehicles themselves," Sloan said.
In short, the team wanted a campaign that could apply to all 60 rooftops in several states, including home-base Florida, Texas, Arizona, Missouri, and Colorado.
The above ads went out on Instagram and Facebook, along with the sidewalk chalk Mother’s Day post seen at the top.
Nuts and bolts: The infographic format was deliberate.
As was the two-part carousel structure that is engineered to work with social algorithms, not against them, according to Tariq Gonzales, social media manager for the group.
“The idea behind the infographic is it breaks the viewers' attention,” Gonzales told us. “It kind of gives you information that's helpful in making a decision to get the vehicle, and then you're intrigued, so you scroll to the next slide.”
Tariq Gonzales
Ed Morse
Automotive Group
(For context, a carousel is a post with multiple photos or videos that users can swipe through in one post.)
It’s a great way to show different angles, features, or moments in a single piece of content, Gonzales said.
The first slide gives useful buying information, no sales ask.
The second slide keeps viewers engaged longer, signaling to the platform that the content is worth spreading. Et cetera.
Plus, this style of advertising doesn’t require funds from the group’s ad spend budget. Those dollars are saved for the typical ad spaces sharing inventory, specials, etc.
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Why it matters: Getting 60-plus dealerships to look and feel like one brand is no small task.
Sloan, Gonzales, and Kathryn Colella, the group’s social media coordinator, travel between Texas, Florida, Arizona, and other markets with a lean corporate team, trying to keep visuals, tone, and campaign themes consistent across every store page.
They use AI in part, for tasks such as running campaign concepts through ChatGPT, and using it to help generate that carousel content that used to take three days to build. (Now, it’s just one to three hours).
Because this is all organic and the first time they’ve tried this style, Sloan and Gonzales don’t yet have a ton of metrics to share.
But a stat from one store showed that the ad's reach and views increased by 54%.
Worth noting: The campaign designed to hit the customers in the feels came about after a successful user-generated campaign earlier in the year.
For that, Gonzales and Sloan had team members film themselves doing activities in their respective vehicles.
Think of the Little League coach who needs enough trunk space to fit that giant equipment bag.
It performed well and sparked the May Miles campaign, with more planned for this summer.
Looking ahead: The duo plans to keep leaning into the idea of selling the experience of buying a new vehicle, not just advertising the latest sale of the week.
In June, for example, the team has a theme that brings a vintage road trip postcard aesthetic under the “Summer Starts with Morse” banner, with content focused on destinations, car prep tips, and adventure.
And of course, Dads.
July will go bigger with a freedom theme tied to 250 years of American independence, woven through the names of Ed Morse's own dealerships.
Bottom line: The test will continue for this organic campaign to see if they’ll do more in the future. It’s not designed to sell cars per se, but again, to “get more emotion or tugging on the heartstrings,” Gonzales said.
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