This week we have a trio of Oldsmobile URLs to check out. I was tempted to break these out as three individual articles as I don’t have a lot of Oldsmobile ads to begin with. But that might look like I’m just trying to get clicks, and these three legitimately can be grouped together.
Really, I should have also included the Bravada SUV ad from a previous post in this grouping, as its URL of BravadaSUV.com is similar to the formula we’ll see today. But it seemed to work well in the other post and it also spreads out the ads a little more evenly.
So here’s our first ad for today:
I do like those first-generation Auroras. They were just so modern looking at the time and I think the styling holds up, even today. A co-worker friend of mine had one back in the day and he really liked it. I should have taken the opportunity to go for a ride in it (or even drive it) as you rarely see these on the road anymore.
Tucked into the block of text below the hero image is this call to action:
As for the ad above, there sure is a lot of blank space at the bottom. I like the minimalist look it presents, but it also seems like a bit of a waste. It’s possible that the empty void was supposed to be covered by this card insert that accompanied the ad:
The card also features the AuroraCar.com URL. Twice, in fact. Once near the top and once in the bottom right:
For the sake of completeness, here’s the back side of the card, though it doesn’t have any URLs for us to check:
The Aurora eventually pressed on into a bland second generation. And then GM killed off Oldsmobile entirely a few years later. As for the AuroraCar.com, these days we get this:
Oldsmobile is dead. The Aurora is dead. And AuroraCar.com is pretty much dead, too. It looks like GM never renewed the domain so this other domain-grubbing site picked it up and is trying to mooch a few thousand dollars out of someone. Not worth it in my opinion.
Okay, let’s move on to the next ad in this trio:
I suppose we’re supposed to think the lady lurking behind the window is intrigued by the the Oldsmobile Intrigue.
I don’t know about that. Is she looking for something to steal? Is she stalking her ex? Is she just a figment of our worst nightmares? I don’t know but it seems pretty creepy to me.
What isn’t creepy is the reference to IntrigueCar.com in the lower right-hand corner of the ad:
You’re noticing the pattern now. Back in the day, Oldsmobile had a series of domains featuring the name of the vehicle and the suffix “car” or “suv” or such.
Let’s take a look at IntrigueCar.com today:
Wait? What? I’ve got nothing here.
So the screengrab above was taken in June of 2020. The text is Japanese (at least according to the browser’s translation tool) and is all about hiring a cheap mover. It’s now February of 2021 and I just revisited the site. It’s still in Japanese, but now it’s about the benefits of staying in high school.
I hope this makes sense to someone! It’s certainly of no value to GM anymore.
With that, here’s the third ad for today:
As far as minivans go, I suppose you could do worse than the Oldsmobile Silhouette. But was it really all that different from its Chevy, Pontiac and Buick siblings? I don’t know. I’ve never closely compared them.
What I do know a bit about is websites, and tucked waaaaay down in the teeny-tiny print at the very bottom of the ad is this little nugget:
As this is a van, of course, and not a “car” the domain here is for SilhouetteVan.com. I’m not optimistic about this one, but here we go:
Yup, this one’s dead, too.
However, there may be a shining light at the end of this depressing dark tunnel. That’s because SilhouetteVan.com appears to be currently available for purchase (and not for thousands of dollars – just a few bucks a year, actually)!
Do you have a thing for badge-engineered GM people movers? Is there some Silhouette fan club out there that has, shockingly, not attained international notariety? Well, if you answered “yes” to either of these questions, SilhouetteVan.com could be yours!
I guess it’s just too bad that GM doesn’t care about it anymore.