G is here

The news is out: Gatorade is busting a move. They're either going to take it to the next level or confuse the hell out of us.

This is big. More to come.

Hey Pepsi: You forgot something

Yay, Pepsi! They’re full of happy, joy and love! Despite the economic woes, the renewed fighting in the Middle East, and the moon-crater-size potholes springing up across our fair land, Pepsi is debuting their happy-or-bust act in Times Square to bring their new marketing platform of no-holds-barred optimism to the world.

Seems right, right? Obama is coming, and it’s the perfect time to change to the good side. They just forgot one thing:

They forgot the humanity. The part where we’re human beings and we don’t like being TOLD to feel a certain way. Especially being SCREAMED at to embrace the optimistic side of life.

We far prefer to be told a story that makes us feel something. The Coke Macy’s day parade commercial immediately springs to mind.



Not humans, but endless humanity. Makes you feel good.

Yesterday, I went to see a restored 70 MM print of West Side Story at the Music Box Theatre, a slightly run down but still wonderfully gemlike anachronism of a movie palace in the times of 18-theatre megaplexes.

For all of you showtune dissers, I will acknowledge that a bunch of pirouetting, knife wielding gang members is a bit silly, especially in our times of special effects violence. But c’mon, this is West Side Story. Best Picture, 1961. A ridiculous number of smile-inducing showstoppers. How could you not beam for 5 minutes watching this:



With the new print, the sound was massive, and the colors were spectacular. But most important: the movie was huge! It’s over forty years old, so I’ve never seen it in a theatre. On the big screen, the story was so much more powerful. You couldn’t help but feel the love and frustration and grief from these trapped kids. Powerful stuff.

Everyone in the Music Box yesterday felt it.

So when you go on Pepsi’s related site and are told to be happy, you probably just move on. Because you can’t tell someone how to feel. You can tell them a story that might make them feel something. You can appeal to their human being-ness. Pepsi's new campaign is admirably eager to make us feel the happy, but in their eagerness, they forgot to tell us why.

A brilliant holiday message

You may have seen this already—891,706 people saw it before me on Youtube, and it was in Adage.com, and countless other sites and blogs—but it’s a wonderful piece from an agency called AKQA, a global shop that’s kicking serious ass as we hurtle toward the new age of communication.

If creativity will rule the future of marketing regardless of what media is employed, these guys will be the Kings and Queens. Although I’m hoping next year they go old school and haul out the egg timers for a rousing version “I have a little Dreidel.”

MJ and Nike (cont)

I’m starting to look back on sports advertising and marketing from 2008, and I have to start at what has been the epicenter of great sports ads for eons: Nike and Michael Jordan.

Early in the year they ran a series of “Become Legendary” ads featuring MJ for the Jumpman brand. A couple of them just had his voiceover, one had a bit of him on camera, one highlight-filled spot didn’t have him at all. This one was my favorite.



They were beautifully filmed and nicely written. But for the most part, they weren’t as surprisingly fresh as the ads they did together when he was playing. And that’s primarily because he just doesn’t provide the same raw material.

He was the lead actor in a spectacular drama, night in and night out, for a decade. Win or lose, he was brilliant, and the fodder he created was so rich and full of possibilities. It enabled Weiden & Kennedy and Nike to make ridiculously great commercials like this:



It’s just not the same now.

His words in the Become Legendary series ring true. They speak to young athletes craving greatness, and he still inspires. I’d bet these spots work hard against those win-at-all-costs hard core competitive athletes. And that may be where the biggest difference may be: he doesn’t have the broad impact he once had over a wider swath of people. That was what made him so valuable in his days of stardom on the court. MJ as an athlete was both a charmer and a winner, which made him universally loved and invaluable as a spokesman.

The next time you see that again will probably be…well…never.

Should Nike continue to use MJ in their ads? Is he still effective? You tell me. I'm happy watching him do his thing for as long as he chooses.

Although I do wish he'd stop doing those Hanes ads. Cuba Gooding was bad enough. Kevin Bacon and Charlie Sheen? Yikes. Who's next, Ashton Kutcher?

Real stories are the best stories

Get ready for the hype...!!!!

The NFL playoffs start soon. So after weeks and weeks of preparation, and in some cases, last minute scrambles to be ready for the Big Game, all eyes and ears will hone in on the most important event of the year: the Super Bowl commercials.

Sure, they’ll play a game, too. But except in rare instances, the lion’s share of the post-game debates is around the ads.

The regulars will almost all be there, even at a starting price tag of $3 million, the highest ever. FedEx, who consistently ranks in the Top Ten in USA Today’s Admeter and hit #2 last year, is taking a pass. The logic is logical, but it’s too bad. They make great ads.

Speaking of which, this was just about my favorite from last year.



It’s so smart for the Super Bowl. A human story to break through the clutter of beer humor and animal jokes. An ode to friendship and teammates. And it’s all true, which made it even better.

The NFL is hoping lightning will strike twice this year. Their site is split in half, with players stories’ on one side and fans’ stories on the other. Again, real stories, and they hope they turn up another diamond. We get to vote for the best ones, with the winner appearing on the Super Bowl. Fun promo. Check it out.

I'll tell you what: some of those fans are awesome. They should get them into a broader audience, whether it's pre or post game, or at the stadium, or in movie theatres...wherever they can get a lot of people to see it. It's what football fandom is all about.

Ironic, how real people are way more interesting than the professional athletes they idolize.

Nike's lovely luke warm thoughts on the BCS

A few posts ago, I talked about the importance of topicality in creating ads that stand out. And how Nike is so good at taking advantage of current topics in sports.

Their latest effort has been running quite a bit; I saw it tonight during the Bears’ improbable come-from-behind OT victory. It’s a play on all of the controversy surrounding the BCS system of determining a college football champion.



The fitness of the BCS to be the final say on college football’s best team has been discussed in ways humorous and rancorous (won’t you please buy our bumper stickers and hoodies?). And who isn’t aware of President-elect Obama’s stance on the subject? When it’s a prime topic on 60 Minutes, it’s not just a prime sports topic. It is, in the words of ZZ Top, Nationwide.

So of course, Nike’s going to tackle the subject. And they do it with their usual sense of style, complete mastery of authenticity, and clever juxtaposition of words and images.

In the end, they tell us, hard work is all that matters. So it may be that they were taking a stand by not taking a side, merely expressing the inner thoughts of a true athlete, which is, of course, that the only thing you can do is go all out on every play, in every practice, in every game, and let the pollsters, computer experts, and voters do what they feel is right. State your case on the field. There is no guaranteed equation.

Makes total sense. But for me, something was missing. A fresh point of view, perhaps?

How much Thrilliciousness can we handle?

Overheard on Madison Avenue sometime in mid to late 2007...

"Hey! What should we do for the new Sobe LifeWater TV commercial? We have time on the Super Bowl. Let's make a big splash!"

"Hmm...what if we got a supermodel who isn't all that super any more and has no dancing ability to dance with some animated lizards with blinged out teeth?"

"Cool! But we'd need a famous piece of music that would be prohibitively expensive for any other ad at any other time, but we could justify buying it for 5 or 10 million because waters are the new sodas and this is Pepsi's big bet."

"Awesome! As long as the commercial has no real strategic foundation whatsoever."

"Wouldn't have it any other way! Let's do it."

And the rest is history.



Regularly chastised, sure. Lacking a strategic backbone, absolutely.

BUT...it was a cultural phenomenon. Over 5 million viewings on Youtube, youbetcha. The most viewed Super Bowl spot of '08. Inspired a series of wonderfully goofy claymated thrilliciousness. Like this.



Times Square video billboard blizzards, plush toys, the list goes on.

I hated the spots. But while I can present a pretty decent argument about Ms. Campbell's lack of talent on the dance floor, I can't argue with the spot's infectiousness.

So what do you do for an encore?

Early reports have NFL players Justin Tuck, Matt Light, and Ray Lewis taking Naomi Campbell's place as the lizards' new dance partners for this year's super bowl. I'm sure it'll be even less strategic and even more expensive. What moves will those krazy lizards pull off this year?

I lay awake just thinking about what funny gag they'll do with their teeth!

G, it should be interesting

I'm extremely close to the Gatorade brand, having written, produced, and creative directed their advertising from 1991-2006. I am unapologetically, emotionally attached to Gatorade. Not only did I savor every minute I spent helping build the brand, I actually believe it works for athletes on the playing field. Really, I do.

So you can safely assume that I'm a bit biased.

And you won't be surprised that I will have an opinion on the massive rebranding effort Gatorade has embarked upon. But not yet. The packaging re-design has been much debated. The new bottles are ready, and are starting to appear on the shelves. But the website hasn't changed (please lord, help it get better).

And the ads haven't appeared yet. They're being done by TBWA/Chiat Day. They're a smart agency with sports minded folks who've done good work in the past. From what I understand, it's all about "G." Cool idea. I won't be surprised if the work is top notch.

Big question will be, will they mess with the tremendous equity that's been so important in connecting the brand to millions of athletes?

Stay tuned.

Ralphie sells the Bushes

Up until last week, I was one of 37 people in the United States who hadn’t seen A Christmas Story. Another of those 37 was my son, so we decided to join in the fun and watched it over the weekend. Just in time, too, to really appreciate some fun ads for the Greenville Drive, a minor league team playing in the South Atlantic League.

So many factors go into making a great ad. One is topicality. Nike is very best brand at making ads at the right time. I can’t find the ad I really want to find—the one during the last baseball strike asking the players to come back—but here’s an oldie that took advantage of the news at the time:



They struck while the iron was hot, for sure.

The ads for the Greenville Drive strike while the iron is hot, but in a different way. At a time when every single media outlet in the world is red and green and covered with Christmas, the Drive also goes down that road, but makes their ads stand out by referencing A Christmas Story. So smart. Even the copy is smart. My favorite, of course, is the play on the leg lamp. Love the spikes.

If I lived in South Carolina, I’d buy me some tickets. That and a Red Ryder Carbine-Action Two-Hundred-Shot Range Model Air Rifle.

Two Johns unable to save the AFL

Arena football has been cancelled. Too bad. Ever see a game? It's fun. Pure joy-of-the-game stuff.

Maybe if they had ran some of their old advertising, they could have drummmed up enough suport to get a grass roots campaign going to save it.



Then again, maybe not.

The Winter Classic: marketers love, humans tolerate

For marketers, the Winter Classic is a dream. For regular joe sports fans, it’s getting more and more annoying.

Yes, the very idea of hockey at Wrigley Field is cool, and the fact that it’s the Red Wings playing the Blackhawks makes it even cooler. So why shouldn’t the Blackhawks and the NHL take advantage of it? They absolutely should.

From Reebok watch and win contests to merchandise and more merchandise, it’s a win-win for anyone trying to make a buck off the game. Unless of course you’re trying to get a ticket. Good luck (Got 40 grand for a pair?). Or, if you’re from Canada. Ooops.

Don’t get me wrong; the Winter Classic is a wonderfully fresh idea, and the league and the Hawks deserve all the fringe benefits they can get. Just makes me wish even more that the advertising wasn’t so barely average. Anyone think this is any good?

If a tree falls...

I found a relatively interesting marketing platform but I may be the only person who's seen it. Actually, it wasn't that hard to find, since it was profiled on Adfreak a few days ago.

It's called Line of Scrimmage and it follows the Sunshine High School Tigers of Newbern, Alabama. The whole program is sponsored by Toyota. Some of them even air on NFL's Sunday Night football.

If you visit the site, spend some time and watch some of the videos. There's a myspace connection as well, where you can watch more. Great personalities, interesting little films.



Good for Toyota for giving us these wonderful little slices. Not sure it's real strong marketing, or how Toyota's going to benefit from it, but it's a step up from Saved by Zero.

Et tu, Titus?

Why I like most of the new Titus bike ads:

They’ve created fresh ads out of a relevant insight. It’s a campaign in the truest sense. It has legs (pardon the pun).

I just wished I like the ads more.

I love this one. The simple stripped down cubicle, the gear at his feet, the completely unsexy co-phone sex operator in the cubicle next to him. Say it with me: it’s all about the details.

Which is why I like this one less. How do I know he’s a biker? Where’s the insight? Not as clear here.

And this one, well, I just like looking at. Makes me smile. She’s not super white hot, she’s just cute enough, and her posture doesn’t hurt. Her bike shorts peeking through her Girl Scout Uniform is a nice touch. I’d like a dozen boxes of the Thin Mints, please.

These ads are getting some interesting attention. Good for them.

Although the best Titus ad I’ve seen was in their last round of ads. Subtle, but clear. Great performance, interesting framing. Good production value. And really surprising. I’d trade the Girl Scout for the horse any day.

Not something you hear all the time, but there you have it.

Sports Bra Humor

You'd have to either be running really fast or have very sharp breasts or some combination of the two. Neither applies to me, so I'm obviously not the target. Do female runners think this is funny? Relevant? Convincing? Can't believe it helped sell a lot of sports bras.

Hopefully, for Running Free, there's a lot of sharp breasted fast runners out there.

Stupid Brilliant

“Whopper Virgins” is on the air.



Attention getting, yes. Not often do you get to see costumed, toothless citizens of the world in a charmingly confused state, picking apart buns and pickles and greenish beef patties as they try to figure out how to eat an American fast food burger.

Breakthrough? Check.

But it also feels a bit perplexing. Is it serious or funny? They sure seem to want us to take it seriously. Especially when they put a lovely long form film on their website.

But in the ads, they use a the big over the top voiceover and cinematic music that make it feel goofy, and it all just feels kind of schizophrenic. And silly.

Which may be irrelevant if all Burger King is doing is, once again, trying to get noticed in a broiler full of fast food sameness, zeroing in on their irreverence-loving target, and getting more attention than their competitiors.

The campaign may be stupid, but those guys are brilliant.

Opportunity Missed

Sometimes the best thing that can happen to a really good creative person is to get a ridiculously challenging assignment. It brings out the best in talented people.

Conversely, having too much fodder has the potential to set yourself up for failure. Great expectations can lead to disaster if the finished product isn’t spectacular.

I know this from years of creating ads for Michael Jordan and Gatorade, and directing creative teams to do the same. We did some great work but it was never easy. Having the single greatest sports asset on the planet at our disposal was awesome and amazing but also added a great deal of pressure to create greatness every time.

So I understand the challenge the folks at Y&R had when creating ads for the upcoming Winter Classic at Wrigley Field. The Blackhawks and the Red Wings playing a hockey game outdoor at Wrigley Field; how cool is that? Tremendously, opportunity-filled cool. The mind races with possibilities.

Unfortunately, Y&R’s minds didn’t race very far, choosing to produce what could be the most unremarkable, uninteresting ad of the year, considering the fodder they had.



Sometimes, the first thing you think of is the most obvious, but because it's pure and simple and great, you just say, obvious be damned, it’s great. In this case, they nailed simple, but definitely not great. They should have pushed much harder for something far more surprising.

For example, something like this…



Fresh, surprising, unexpected use of film and music. Not at all what you’d expect.

Sure, I’m biased. But “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” to promote an emerging American sport? Cool and unusual. “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” to promote a hockey game at Wrigley? An uncontested layup. Too bad.

There are other ads in the campaign that I haven’t seen that may take a different tact. If you see them, please pass them on. Hopefully, they take better advantage of the opportunity.

Use what you got

Nike has the swoosh, Gatorade has colored sweat. Under Armor has its signature logo, Adidas has the three stripes, and Reebok has…um…that thing that looks like an airplane that’s been stabbed by a javelin.

Proprietary icons help give brands meaning and reasons for consumers to interact with them. Where you see the swoosh, you think sports authenticity; when you see colored sweat, you think rehydration. When you see the three stripes, you think…what? I’m not sure.

Adidas is such a perplexing brand. Their Impossible is Nothing campaign is a wonderfully powerful body of work, from its website to its TV and print (many many too numerous to mention, but here's a classic) that screams We Know Sports and We Know Athletes. But much of their other work is all over the place. Not in a bad way, just in an inconsistent way.

Here’s a good example.



Cool spot to celebrate 60 years of Adidas originals. Nice shoes. Star-studded, fun to watch. New school meets old school, all awash with the three stripes. If nothing else, it makes you feel good about the brand. And definitely generating lots of chatter and discussion, around the world.

So sports authenticity aside, good for Adidas, taking advantage of what they own. It’s a powerful tool. Look at President-elect Obama (Hope). And the Cubs (the Curse).

Sometimes, it helps. Sometimes, not so much.

All hail the Virgins!

More brilliant marketing from Burger King.

What is the purpose of great marketing? To get the people who are most likely to purchase your product to like you.

If you’re trying to win a popularity contest, you can’t piss people off, but Burger King understands that for their purposes, it’s not about getting the whole world to love them. It’s about nailing their target with a relevant message.

Burger King has been exceptionally good at this over the past few years. And now they’ve taken the god ole’ taste test to a whole new level. “Whopper Virgins” hasn’t even been rolled out yet but the teasers are already generating tons of news, lots of chatter, and a good deal of controversy.

Last time I checked, breaking through and getting noticed is another thing great marketing is supposed to do, especially in a category as fiercely competitive as the fast food burger wars.

Once again, the King rules.

Why Nike is like the stock market

Many joyous ups, some surprisingly horrific downs, but over time, trustworthy.

The new ad featuring the King is wonderfully sublime. Terrific music with an addictive hook. Cool cameos by a cool star (Li'l Wayne). Great faces. Authentic sports. Transcendent superstar. Makes you smile. Classic Nike.



Thanks, W&K, for reminding us that Nike really is the King.

And just for fun, another Nike ad by the same name.



Also a smilemaker. Thanks, Youtube.

HEY! MARKETING WORKS!

Thank you, John McDonough. You are a smart, creative marketer who makes things happen.

People could have said that you had an easy job running the marketing for the Cubs. It’s the Cubs, after all. How hard is it to put a microphone in someone’s hand and create memories that last



a



lifetime?



But that was just one of his innovative, game changing ideas he had for the Cubs.

He and Head of Business Operations Jay Blunk have brought that fresh thinking to the Blackhawks, turning an entity that for years has been an afterthought for 99% of Chicagoans into a front page team that fans are excited about.

The latest news out of the United center is around the Winter Classic, the January game between the Hawks and Red Wings in Wrigley Field. Blunk and McDonough are trying to get President-elect Obama to the game. 44’s a big Chicago sports fan, and it’ll be a seminal moment in Chicago sports history. Why wouldn't he want to come? Think it might attract a little attention if he does? It’s genius.

People talk about the emergence and importance of non-traditional marketing. These guys have been doing it for years. And it works because it’s so different. It doesn't hurt that they’re their own clients. Streamlines the decision making process quite a bit, wouldn’t you say?

But it all starts with great ideas, of which they have many. Good for them. I hope, for their sake, the Blackhawks tear it up this year.

You get what you pay for

Buy a cheap watch, it’ll break before what can say “What time is it?” Buy a Honda instead of an Audi, it’ll run just fine, but it won’t purr. That’s what you get for the extra 20 grand. Hire a shoddy plumber, you’ll need a really good plunger.

You absolutely get what you pay for. Truer words were never spoken.

Or maybe not, given a couple of (completely unrelated) recent events.

One: I just returned from a cruise in the Caribbean. They call it a cruise, of course, because you spend most of your time cruising from one buffet line to another. Or to the pizzeria. Or Johnny Rockets. Or Ben and Jerry’s. Or the midnight buffet. All of which were on this one floating city of neverending gastric overload.

Every time I saw another corn-fed sun burnt dude with a cut out tank top showing way too much of his hairy back pile another fried pork cutlet onto his pile of gravy-covered mashed potatoes, I winced and felt a pang of sadness for him and his family. In his case, he was looking to get more than what you pay for. But that’s my opinion; he probably figured, “I paid an arm and a leg for this cruise, and I‘m going to get my money’s worth.” Everything is relative, yes?

Two: Stephon Marbury. He’s getting paid 21.9 million bucks a year to wear the Knicks colors and sit his ass on the bench. When the Knicks signed him in 2004, they thought he was the final piece of the puzzle that created the right mix of veterans and youngsters to make a run at a championship (or two). He helped them into the playoffs that year. But you know the story since then. All bad, with our current unhappy ending.

Truth is, GM’s make their bets based on all kinds of assessments and the rest is a roll of the dice. A-Rod gets 250 million. The Redskins pay Steve Spurrier 25 extremely large. Becks gets his 250 mil to enjoy the LA lifestyle and the sidelines. None of them produced any more than some fun headlines for the pundits.

There will always be busts.

And as hard as it may be to find them, there will always be Sure Things.

Michael, Tiger, Mia, Peyton…world champion athletes and likeable people. Obviously, it costs more to sign them, but in their cases, the adage proves true. I know they were worth every dollar to Gatorade, and I’d bet Nike and Mastercard and Amex and Rolex, etc, would feel similarly. In each case, those brands got far more than what they paid for.

Quality people--loyal, sincere athletes--who are also winners are incredibly few and far between. They are, to borrow from one of Peyton’s commercials:

Priceless.