AutoFun Ph EIC, Mikko David joins YouTube motoring content creators on the Jetour World Journey in China. The experience was refreshing.
Disclaimer: Jetour Auto Philippines invited AutoFun Philippines to a 7-day all-expense paid trip to China.There, we visited Auto Shanghai 2023, the Chery manufacturing plant in Wuhu, and several tourist attractions in the province of Anhui.
Back in the day, we in the motoring press were considered the be-all and end-all of accurate and timely news about cars, motorcycles, and the automotive industry in general.
If you wanted to know about a newly launched car model, you only needed to flip through the motoring pages of the big dailies or the monthly magazines to get your fix.
As production costs soared and advertising money shifted, websites and the web versions of magazine titles, condemned the glossy print to its eventual demise back in 2017. It just didn’t make sense anymore to spend so much for production when websites offered nearly instant, and many times free, content.
But as online disrupted the motoring beat a few years ago, today's dawning of motoring-dedicated YouTube, TikTok and Instagram accounts has seen a new force emerging that is set to once again rock the establishment.
"We are Content Creators, not vloggers." - Reygan
For four extra days, old-timer me spent some quality time with three YouTube channel owners who have been invited to join the Jetour Auto Philippines’ delegation to China.
Rey Gan, the man behind Reygan’s Ride’s on YouTube has been creating car content since 2018. He began with videos about his personal ride, a Mazda Miata MX-5. From there, he approached dealerships to secure showroom cars and test units to add new car reviews to his playlist.
Today, with more than 500 videos, and more than 75,000 subscribers to his YouTube channel, Reygan joins his first foreign trip with a car brand under Jetour.
Alex Zosa started his car-focused YouTube channel, The Jaywalkur, even earlier in 2011. Like Reygan, he reviewed his own cars. He attended car shows to gain access to new car models and, like Reygan, he also reached out to showrooms and dealerships to review newly launched vehicles and add content to his channel.
Now with 44,600 followers, Alex is on his first international trip and with Jetour Auto Philippines as the host.
Finally, the oddball and relentlessly funny man in the group, Joohyuk Lim. Better known for his 97,000 subscribers-strong SoJooCars YouTube channel and social media accounts, Joo is a South Korean who has lived in the Philippines for almost 30 years.
He began his foray in YouTube car reviews back in 2019 with his boss’ car, a Nissan Terra (Specs | News). He kept knocking at dealerships, visiting mall displays and attending car shows as he introduced himself as a content creator who featured cars.
Joo only used a mobile phone initially for his shoots. A friend who noticed him enjoying what he did decided to donate a GoPro Session to Joo so he can pursue his passion. Again, like Reygan and Alex, this trip with Jetour is his first foreign one as a motoring content creator.
A breath of fresh air
In the few days I have been with them, they seized every opportunity to make content out of any situation. Whether it’s half a day at the Auto Shanghai 2023, or a cruise along the Huangpu river, or even a field trip to a traditional Chinese village, these three found opportunities to post and share their experiences to their growing audiences.
It goes without saying that once a Jetour T2 prototype presented itself at an RV resort we stayed in, they were in the zone.
From walkaround videos that described what they saw in front of them, to crawling under the car, to taking the opportunity to test drive vehicles even for just five minutes, these gentlemen were relentless and full of energy.
They didn’t have spec sheets of the vehicles with them, something motoring journalists often require to base a story on. And yet, they talked and talked and created something out of a virtual nothing.
And that’s what a growing number of car brands, especially a new one like Jetour, is looking for. Fresh insights and alternative viewpoints from the alternative media that would open up their market to bigger audiences previously untapped by the gatekeeping motoring press.
“China brands have been the most accommodating,” says Joo. As they should be, given the long, troubled history these brands have had with the so-called mainstream media.
Not so welcoming arms
Like Jetour, and for argument’s sake, Chery, these content creators have faced resistance from some of the veterans of the motoring beat. Some even had a few derogatory and racist slurs to hurl.
But as car brands have become more welcoming to the idea of having social media influencers, and now motoring content creators, join its events, it is more of a question of who will not invite them than if they’ll be invited at all.
Granted, there are still some brands who would not engage with them whether it’s because of their brand positioning or some other outdated justification. And frankly, it is their loss. Most of the viewers of these channels intend to buy cars. That’s why Google posted them in the search results in the first place. And with their videos earning tens of thousands of views regularly, oftentimes even more than the established press, it is no wonder that they are now being tapped to get the brands’ messages out.
Now why do these people matter? Well, they represent a wave of new, alternative media that is barrelling down on the legacy titles and giving them a run for their money.
Some in the mainstream media would argue that they’re not even motoring journalists and shouldn’t be included in motoring events, let alone foreign junkets. But that’s why they got invited in the first place, they don’t pretend to be journalists, not even attempt to behave like one, and yet they reach audiences that the mainstream titles do not resonate with.
Nevermind the shaky camerawork, or the less than vibrant colors of the videos, these content creators shoot from the hip if needed, and their audiences love their videos for it. The rawness of it all makes them more authentic and belivable, something content from established media brands struggle to match.
"Filipinos in particular love to be entertained," shares Joo. "But I still think they watch my videos because of the cars I present, not because of me."
A paradigm shift
By the time you finish reading this story, assuming you even made it this far at all, these three would have posted more content on social media than I would have. And that’s why we old timers should learn to adapt. The rules of the game have changed.
Who wants to read long, winding car reviews when they can watch a video and see the vehicle move about in different angles instead? Why are long-form videos on YouTube and short-form on Stories, Reels and TikTok a growing trend even among us in the website realm?
The numbers are clear, if brands want to reach a bigger audience, they must cast a wider net. Something that Jetour Auto Philippines, by virtue of this China trip, is fully aware of.
With an automotive career spanning 27 years as a former touring car racer turned automotive journalist and photographer, Mikko also handled marketing and PR for two major Japanese car brands before finding peace and purpose in sharing his views about cars, driving, and mobility.
