5 takeaways from our AM Live session that will make you rethink your automotive marketing

Our very own Jens-Peter Sjöberg recently took the stage at AM Live 25 to explore one of the most overlooked yet powerful drivers in automotive marketing, emotion.

In a presentation that ranged from buyer psychology to the rise of AI-generated storytelling, he explained why emotional value matters, how it gets lost along the customer journey, and what the industry can do to restore it.

As the buying journey becomes increasingly digital, understanding this emotional layer is becoming essential for every retailer.

Here are the five biggest takeaways from his presentation.

1. Emotion drives 95 percent of purchase decisions

Research from Harvard Business School suggests that 95 percent of all buying decisions happen subconsciously, guided much more by emotion than logic.

As Jens-Peter explained, the cars people choose often reflect how they see themselves, whether that’s adventurous (a Jeep), eco-conscious (an EV), or powerful (a V8 SUV).

The challenge is that most automotive marketing still leads with specs and features when it should start with feelings. As he noted in the session:

2. The car-buying journey has an emotional drop-off

Even though OEMs invest heavily in emotionally rich brand campaigns, that emotional momentum often fades quickly. Today’s buying journey spans around 400 touchpoints, and by the time customers reach dealer websites or marketplaces, much of that emotion has already disappeared.

Low-quality images, generic descriptions, and flat storytelling all contribute to what Jens-Peter described as an emotional drop-off. It creates a gap between the excitement buyers expect and what they actually experience.

And when expectations aren’t met, trust erodes.

This loss of emotional energy makes it even more important for retailers to rethink how they communicate.

3. Storytelling beats specifications

To show how emotion can be reintroduced, Jens-Peter highlighted two companies that have mastered emotional marketing, Apple and Nike.

When Apple launched the first iMac and later the MacBook Pro, the marketing didn’t focus on RAM, CPU speed or thermal performance. Instead, Apple positioned the Mac as a tool “for the creators,” highlighting what people could do with it rather than what was inside it.

Nike’s most iconic campaigns — from “Just Do It” to its athlete-driven storytelling — rarely talk about materials, tread patterns or performance science. Instead, Nike adverts focus on ambition, perseverance and becoming your best self.

These brands do not win people over with technical details. They build stories that make people feel creative, capable, or inspired.

The same principle applies to automotive. The message should not be “400 horsepower” but “freedom on four wheels.”

That emotional connection is what transforms a car from a commodity into a dream. As Jens-Peter explained:

4. AI can help rebuild emotional value

AI is opening up entirely new possibilities for restoring emotional storytelling across the whole customer journey.

With the right data, from inventory information to customer behaviour, AI can now generate personalised, emotionally rich content at scale.

At Phyron, we already use more than 20 AI models to automatically create videos and imagery that stay true to each OEM’s brand identity while also resonating with local dealership audiences.

Jens-Peter refers to this approach as emotion preservation because it keeps the emotional thread alive from OEM to dealer and from dealer to buyer.

5. The future is personalised emotional storytelling at scale

The most exciting part is what comes next.

Jens-Peter predicts that within the next two years, dealerships will be able to produce cinematic, emotionally driven ads for every single car in stock. These will be the kind of videos that once cost OEMs millions to create, now generated automatically.

This is the future of automotive marketing, where emotion is powered by AI.

Want to see what this future looks like? Follow Phyron on LinkedIn for more insights into how AI and emotion are reshaping the automotive industry.