Ariston - Washing machine world ad

Great ad for Ariston washing machines with good impact because of its exceptional execution. Very esthetic with a single minded message.

It took me several times though to understand these were not just fish swimming around. And the branding was perhaps not strong enough. And indeed, they reworked the ad a little bit to improve on this: the reworked version starts and ends with a product shot and branding

Click here for the improved version.

Agency: Leo Burnett Milan

MARS – Smaller size, better sales

In 2006, Masterfoods Belgium understood consumers didn’t buy any candy bars like Mars, Twix or Snickers anymore because of their large size. No rocket science of course in a time were health and obesity are main trends, but it took a lot of courage to downsize the format. The business question was: will Masterfoods acquire enough new penetration by reducing the format to compensate the loss in volume / buying occasion?

The answer was yes. They reduced Mars from 54g to 45g (-17%), but shrinked 7 or 12 bars (according to the distributor) into a family pack to increase the volume per occassion. Communication was short and efficient: 15’ TVC with idiot proof messages.

Result? The product became relevant again and for the first time in at least 5 years, sales went up.

PS: The Mars commercial was 30" long in order to build the brand equity.

Stella Artois - The extra coupon

In Belgium, this Belgian brand is known as a cheaper, yet high quality beer. Outside the country, particularly in the US, Stella Artois has a super premium positioning. To strengthen this, they're running the "Reassuringly Expensive" campaign. This hilarious top topical fits right in their campaign idea. Nice impact.

Check out the TV ad as well. It got a golden Cannes award in 2006.

Dash - The longest clothesline

Yesterday, Dash broke the world record with the longest white clothesline. Since last Wednesday, the 60.000 collected white clothings were hung on the lines. All clothing was carefully washed with DASH and then delivered to VZW Spullenhulp, a charity organization that collects clothing.

The action was a partnership between P&G and the main distributor in Belgium: Carrefour. The communication of the mechanism went via 2 Carrefour features (door-to-doors) in a unique way.

Result: national television (VRT). Unfortionally at the non-commercial station, so non-branded, meaning without mentioning the brand name. But, this action was another example of "truly branding", meaning it's so recognizable that even without the logo. For the Belgian consumer, it's obvious who organized the event.

Levi's when still straight

In addition to my previous post on Levi's, here the a campaign on their new straight jeans.

Happiness Factory: The Movie

The sequel of the original successful TVC. Yet this time more complex, more expensive and I'm afraid off message. It made me rather think of the Lord of the Rings, not the happiness of Coke...

Ad bag

With these Alchemy Goods Ad Bag, your ad can have a second life. They're made from used vinyl billboards. Funny: the handles are recycled seat belts!

From ADLAND

Nespresso's 'butterflyer'

Very creative way of sampling by Nespresso.
The buttefly shaped flyers are attached to a Nespresso-cup, good for one coffee you can prepare yourself in the coffee corner in one of the fancy Nespresso shops you can find in the bigger cities of Europe.

McDonald's - The power of branding

For young children, anything made by McDonald’s taste better. This was the main conclusion of a recent study among 63 US children ages 3 to 5. In this study, the children got 5 types of foods: chicken nuggets, a hamburger, french fries, baby carrots and milk. The chicken nuggets, hamburger and french fries were all from McDonald's; the carrots and milk were from a grocery store. Every child got 2 portions: one wrapped in a McDonald’s branded wrapper, the other in a non branded wrapper.

Results?
- 77% of the children said they preferred the taste of the french fries from the McDonald’s bag, while only 13,3% preferred the non branded fries. Only 10% claimed both fries tasted the same.
- 59% said they preferred the taste of the branded chicken nuggets, while 18% preferred the non branded ones.

But the results are also valid for adults.

In 1999, in the Netherlands, we did the same test with the European coffee brand Douwe Egberts among coffee drinking adults. We made the adults drink 2 cups of Douwe Egberts coffee: 1 in a branded cup, the other in the non branded. 85% liked the branded coffee.

Another study even proved the power of the wine label and its impact on the perception of the restaurant where the wine is served!

From Fine as North Dakota wine:
Forty-one diners at the Spice Box restaurant in Urbana, Illinois were given a free glass of Cabernet Sauvignon to accompany a $24 prix-fixe French meal. Half the bottles claimed to be from Noah’s Winery in California. The labels on the other half claimed to be from Noah’s Winery in North Dakota. In both cases, the wine was an inexpensive Charles Shaw wine.
Those drinking what they thought was California wine, rated the wine and food as tasting better, and ate 11% more of their food. They were also more likely to make return reservations.
It comes down to expectations. If you think a wine will taste good, it will taste better than if you think it will taste bad. People didn’t believe North Dakota wine would taste good, so it had a double curse – it hurt both the wine and the entire meal. “Wine labels can throw both a halo or a shadow over the entire dining experience,” according to Cornell Professor Brian Wansink (Ph.D.), author of the book Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Think.

It’s amusing to know that they used Charles Shaw wines for the test. This is probably the cheapest wine in the U.S. :-)

Pepsi's answer to Coke ZERO

Until last spring, there seemed to be a silent peace between Coca Cola and Pepsi in Europe: Coke focused on women with Coke Light, Pepsi on men with Pepsi Max.
But this year was different. Coke broken the unspoken rule and launched Coke Zero in Europe: a soda with zero sugar and a great taste. The same positioning as Pepsi Max (launched in ’94) but different execution. Prime prospects are young men.

For PepsiCo France this was the perfect opportunity to start with comparative advertising, as both companies have been doing in the past few decennia in the US. Yet, as the advertising rules are stricter in France, they’ve done it in a subtle way.

Pepsi started with a press campaign from June to December 2007 on Pepsi Max. The ad shows a cursor from ZERO to MAX. On the left, you see an ordinary guy. On the right a very sexy looking guy. They’ve done the same with a boring looking and sexy looking female nurse. It’s not real comparative advertising, but you can clearly see this is about both brands.

Furthermore, PepsiCo launched this year Pepsi Light, for a more female target. With this sexy fashion brand, Pepsi again tries to stand out: you drink it to stand out the crowd.


Agency Pepsi France: CLM BBDO.

Coke - Inside the Factory

A further glimpse inside the Happiness Factory. I admit, the charming interviews of the Coke employees make me melt...

Gay marketing finally out of the closet

Levi's latest campaign featuring its 501 jeans is produced in 2 versions: one for straight audiences and one for the gay target. The second version will exclusively be broadcasted on MTV's gay network LogoOnline.

Innovative media move, for a limited additional budget (some additional production costs) in which I truly believe. The gay world is known as trend setters and early adopters. And they represent more than 10% of the population! Right on target

Enjoy!

Dreft uses consumer insight as RTB

If you want to know if your dishes are really clean, just slide your finger over it. If it tweets, the grease is gone!
Dreft used this insight last year in one of their commercials as a reason to believe.

Refresh but stick to your brand DNA

When I was watching this BMW commercial, I noticed how faithful the BMW 3 Series has been to its brand DNA over the past 40 years. Its distinctive and highly recognizable characteristics remained: the front grid, the position of the branding, the wheel spokes, etc. Yet the brand is fresh and updated until today.

This consistency is extremely important to keep your brand loyals.

Dynamite surfing by Quicksilver

According to the homepage of the creative agency GoViral, this ad generated after 2 months already more than 10 million views worldwide. Not on TV but on-line!

The goal was to broaden Quicksilver’s appeal by making the brand more relevant to the European consumer. They did this by proving Quicksilver is more than just surfing: it’s original street wear for original people.

The 2 key success factors of the campaign probably were:
1. The myth around the unusual and slightly provocative video: is it fiction or reality? It created a huge WoM effect.
2. The effective seeding. To re-assure a firm kickoff, you need a minimal basis of people who really believe in sending around the message (= 1st peak in graph). Once you got this, the ad lives on itself (= 2nd peak in graph).

Quote GoViral:

Daily views:
This figure illustrates daily views. The number of daily views peaked in the first week of the campaign which is when the major seeding took place. The second very large peak is a direct effect of sites starting to pick up the viral campaign and the buzz created by people discussing the viral. After the first month, the daily number of views decreases to a steady number of approximately 20,000 views, which a very high daily average.

Total numbers of views:
This figure illustrates the total number of views accumulated from campaign start.
The blue area shows the views generated in the target markets, and the red area is the views generated outside of these. As the target markets included both the US and eight major European countries, the spill-over effect only accounts for 16% of the total views.

30 golden packaging principles from Nestlé

I got these 30 principles in autumn 2005 from a packaging training by Lars Wallentin, former Senior Executive Packaging & Training, Nestlé (Switzerland). There’s no structure, but it's a useful shortlist of your possibilities.

Here they come:
1. Use all the tools available: graphics (lay-out), material, shape (form), illustration (photo, drawing, and window), copy (words), touch, sound and symbolism. Always keep the 5 senses in mind.
2. Strengthen the brand and make the brand more interesting.
3. Fight over-communication! Keep it simple!
4. Facilitate handling.
5. Emotional advantages stimulate trial purchase, functional ones to re-purchase.
6. Don't be modest, be generous.
7. Improve constantly. Competition does. So store-check ofte!
8. Be unique. Try to surprise.
9. Communicate… don’t just inform.
10. Make the tray and the shipper sell!
11. Without taste appeal, who wants to taste it? Make it look good!
12. Design for the consumer, not for your management.
13. Treat side panels as front panels.
14. Call it service panel, not back panel and amplify important information.
15. Ecology: neither negative nor boring if seen from a marketing point of view.
16. Packaging is advertising and always includes some sort of “call-to-action”.
17. Don’t believe all what you’re told… There are exceptions to most rules.
18. Never change all variables at the same time!
19. Events, seasons, holidays, etc. offer opportunities. Develop special editions (cf. Coca Cola, Toblerone)
20. Don’t loose your common sense. Therefore ask questions.
21. If something looks interesting, new or different, it will be READ.
22. If we concentrate (on the essential), it will be easier to read.
23. If we highlight a service, the consumer will use it.
24. Without a clear positioning you achieve nothing.
25. A question mark makes us curious!
26. Headlines provoke interest.
27. Print clear opening instructions and verify if they work.
28. Use all space available (inside, top, bottom, sides, flaps, etc.)
29. Make the nutrition information understandable.
30. Cross advertise … it costs you nothing.

I would like to add 4 extra important points:
31. Clearly visualize your key benefit. Make it self explanatory.
32. Brand: the larger your branding the better you will be seen (attention).
33. But make it “truly” branded: if the packaging had no branding, the consumer must immediately know what brand this is.
34. Make your product accessible for 50+: readable copy (large typo with good contrast), right place in shelf (not too high or too low).

Spa Echo

In my opinion, good ad because:
- Great impact from the unusual format (black and white echo unborn baby)
- Drama is right on the benefit. A benefit that is relevant to the consumer.
- Good targeting: extremely engaging for the prime prospect (people with small children) + it works as a RTB for people with no or older children.
- Truly branded: clear pack shot and pay-off in the end.

And… according to the book “Winning with the P&G 99”, the first pack shot or branding must come after 7”. In this commercial, the first branding comes a little later (after 20”) which is still OK in my opinion.

Create your own M&M's

M&M's have been sweetening consumers' palates and making them smile since they were first introduced in 1941. Now, M&M's goes on-line where you can order your sweets in your favorite color with your personalized message: www.mars.be

The idea is nice and fits with the brand equity (colorful chocolate fun). It creates some WoM and makes the consumer rediscover the brand. As the brand is older and became out of fashion, this is a good way to increase brand consideration again.

I was disappointed though by the poor execution:
The world wide known M&M’s look&feel (e.g. the packaging you find in your supermarket) is completely lost. The site and the event packaging are branded, but not “truly” branded. This means, if you would take the logo away (or “smash your brand, as Martin Lindstrom would say), would a consumer still recognize this is an M&M’s site?
And where are the famous M&M’s characters? They are the key to the success of the brand. The "cast" of characters reinforces the distinctive product quality and overall brand essence as well as creates a strong bond between M&M's and consumers. They are fun, quirky, cross all age barriers and appeal to both sexes. In stead of a static website with a boring 1-2-3-4 step description, the funny characters could have leaded the consumer through the process.

Last but not least: why M&M’s on the Mars homepage? Why not create a fully dedicated micro-site?

Magic Happens

This is my favorite in the category "My favorite commercials". It won the Cannes Silver Lion 2001. Great equity ad because of its emotional impact. It's extremely engaging and has a clear message (drama on the benefit). In the end, it makes you love Disney and buy a Disney video.

Innocent's Big Knit

Barely 8 years old and Innocent already decided a few years ago had its first social marketing events. In the summer of 2006, the supergrans of Age Concern started knitting 175,000 little woolen hats. During a few cold winter weeks, these hats were sitting on the Innocent bottles at Sainsbury's and EAT Café. For each hat-wearing smoothie, Innocent donated 50pence to Age Concern. This organisation helps older people through the cold winters with hot meals, heating, blankets and advice.

Last winter, 220,000 hats in total were sold and £110,000 were donated.

This event is one of many of the Innocent Foundation. It's a registered charity funded by 10% of the profits from Innocent Drinks. It offers help to enable local communities to develop long-term solutions to their needs.

It looks small, but it's a great effort for a fast growing company. And right on target:
- it strengthened the "innocent" equity (honest, helping, health, ...)
- it raised the share of heart of their current consumers who started talking the brand (WoM)
- it temporarily improved the shelf impact of the small bottles

Check out Flickr for more pics: supergran2006