Desserts Taste Great, But How Does Diet Dr. Pepper Taste?

I’ve been enduring the Diet Dr. Pepper “There’s Nothing Diet About It” campaign for most of the year and felt it was time to discuss it. I have had the opportunity to come across the print, outdoor and TV versions of the campaign, which are all visually well executed by the folks in Young & Rubicam’s San Francisco office. For those of you that have not had the opportunity the see these ads they all compare Diet Dr. Pepper to desserts – cake, jelly beans, ice cream, etc. with the “There’s Nothing Diet About It” themeline paying it off.

The band strategy for Diet Dr. Pepper is to focus on “Taste” with the message basically being that just because it's Diet does not mean it tastes bad. The problem is they went way too far with it and overshot the mark. Rather than making me want a Diet Dr. Pepper it makes me want cake, jelly beans, ice cream and to download old Tom Jones songs from iTunes (maybe Carlton from The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air was a man ahead of his time after all). Funny thing is I always thought advertising was supposed to actually interested in the product being advertised, go figure.

For years the message that Diet Dr. Pepper tastes just like regular Dr. Pepper had been pushed, a good message since the public perception is you’re sacrificing taste when you go diet – your waistline will be happy but your taste buds won’t. As a Mountain Dew addict myself, I can tell you that Diet Mountain Dew just does not cut it for me taste wise. If Diet Dr. Pepper has in fact solved that problem then that’s a great brand position for those who like Dr. Pepper and want to watch their calories, and a creative concept should have been developed to communicate just that. Instead we’ve got ridiculous creative that focuses a whole lot on taste, or a least other things that taste good, and does not demonstrate at all on the benefit or “Decadent Taste”, as the spot says, of the actual product.

There are a whole lot of people out there that like the taste of Dr. Pepper and there are a whole lot of Americans out there with expanding waistlines. Diet Dr. Pepper needs to scrap this campaign and start communicating in a clear way that Diet Dr. Pepper is the one brand that gives consumers a great tasting diet soda; then hammer home that simple brand position over and over again.

Jake Crocker is a Partner and Brand Marketing Director at Martin Branding Worldwide, Inc.

Is PetSmart’s Branding "Smart"?

PetSmart shoppers, in case you're wondering where the “smart” place to shop for you pet’s needs, the answer is now right in front of you. Recently the national pet supply mega store has changed their logo and is gradually changing its signage to go from PETsMART as seen here here to PETSMART with the “SMART” now in blue and “PET” in red, as seen here. It’s a subtle change, with the only real difference being the S has been enlarged and it along with “MART” changed from red to blue. Now instead of being a “mart for pets” the store is now the smart place to shop for your pet.

After doing a little research on the topic I found an explanation for PetSmart’s move from their VP of marketing saying the name reflects their desire to offer “smart solutions” for pets. All brands should focus on one core consumer value, the one thing it does better than anyone else and differentiates it from the competition. So PetSmart is positioning itself around “Smart”, since it’s already in the name this was a nice position to stumble onto – but is it the correct position? I think it could be but they will have to tell the consumer why its smart to shop at this pet supply store over competitors like PetCo, Wal-Mart or a local pet shop or grocery store.

Let’s break it down for them and answer the question of why shopping at PetSmart is smarter than shopping anywhere else. Being a pet owner myself and having frequented the store over the years I think I am in a pretty good position to help answer that question. Is it smart to shop there because of low prices? Not really, I can get the same dog food at the grocery store for the same price or less. Is it smart to shop there out of convenience? Well they do have a lot of locations, but making a trip to PetSmart for dog food I can buy at stores like Kroger or Wal-Mart, along with things I need to eat and any other supplies I need for the house would not be very “smart” of me now, would it.

Now why would it be smart to shop at PetSmart? Because they have the wide variety of the pet accessories and products I want. These products include toys, collars, supplies to clean up after my pet, chemicals to prevent my dog from killing the grass when he takes care of business out back and even a line of outfits in case I ever felt the need to dress Charlie, my 70 pound boxer, in a tutu. But this does not necessarily make it smart to shop there, no it means this is the place to go for true pet lovers, those who love their cat enough to spend hundreds of their hard earned dollars on a 6 foot tall multi-tiered climbing pole. The real brand position for the folks at PetSmart is that it’s a pet lovers paradise – that is what keep the shoppers coming back and that is what will bring new shoppers in the door.

Turns out the marketers at PetSmart do understand because they nail it in this spot. A spot so well executed that it almost brought a tear to my eye. But the spot ends with the tag “That’s Smart PetSmart” which seems forced after the previous 28 seconds were spent tugging at your heartstrings.

While emphasizing the smart in their logo may be convenient and send a subliminal message to the consumer that they are a smarter human being for going there – it’s not really what is primarily driving the PetSmart brand. So the expense and effort of overhauling a logo that’s change is so subtle that most customers would probably not even realize has changed seems like a waste in resources that could be spent on emphasizing the message that it’s the place for pet lover to shop. People love their pets, and PetSmart is the store for pet lovers; a good brand has strong emotional drivers and people’s love for their pets is almost as strong as their love for their own children – PetSmart needs to leverage that connection in all of their branding rather than focusing their subliminal tactics that will hardly do much to grown their bottom line.

Jake Crocker is a Partner and Brand Marketing Director at Martin Branding Worldwide, Inc.

Super Bowl Bust

The Super Bowl, it’s now more than just a football championship game, it’s the showcase for America’s top consumer brands and a chance for savvy marketers to show the country just how good they are. This is such an important stage because a great Super Bowl ad can bring a brand out of obscurity and put it on the top of everyone’s mind, as did Apple’s famous “1984” spot launching the Macintosh, and more recently GoDaddy.com series of attention grabbing spots that have men everywhere glued to the TV waiting to be sold domain names. It’s the one time during the year where Americans get up to go to the bathroom or the kitchen during the actual program so they don’t miss the commercials. So what happened this year? By the fourth quarter I was staring at the TV stunned at what had been unfolding in front of me all night. There were a few that were perfectly acceptable, but somewhere in the process of buying the time for the $2.6 million spot (plus the hundreds of thousands it cost to conceive and produce the thing) someone forget they were selling a product and communicating it’s core benefit. The following is a breakdown of a few of the spots that got it right, a few that got it wrong and a few that make my head hurt when I think about how it ever could have made it through the extensive development and approval process these things have to go through.

The Good

Emerald Nuts - Boogyman
This ad by Goodby Silverstein & Partners in San Francisco is just flat out good advertising. Emerald Nuts has used the Super Bowl to build their brand over the past few years, but this year’s effort was the first one to actually get it right. How does this one succeed over the others? It actually communicates the benefit of the product being promoted (last years just spelled out the name of the product). Consumers can relate because late in the work day everyone is dragging and not very sharp; this spot communicates that by snacking on Emerald Nuts you could boost your energy levels and get through the end of the day. Using Robert Goulet as a “boogyman” character that creates havoc around the office when no one has the energy to pay attention is unexpected and quirky enough to draw people’s attention to the message being conveyed. Well done all around.

Nationwide – Rollin’ VIP
Ah Kevin Federline, what can I say? I can say he finally found his true talent; making fun of himself and Nationwide was smart enough to pick the perfect poster child to communicate someone’s life going terribly askew almost overnight. Unlike the previous Super Bowl execution of this campaign with MC Hammer, this one works because the KFed reference is so current and is so worthy of this level of ridicule. The team at TM Advertising in Dallas really nailed it, communicating the urgency to purchase your insurance from Nationwide because you never know how fast your whole life can change and you better get covered before it’s too late. My only problem is that I actually now feel bad about the disdain I expressed in a previous entry for the former Mr. Britney Spears. I regret it because this spot has made him endearing and I was perfectly satisfied with the world not liking him. It takes a big man to make fun of yourself as a wannabe rap cliché on such a big stage.

The Bad

Sierra Mist - Combover
This ad was created by BBDO in New York, one of the country’s legendary advertising agencies and a true Madison Avenue powerhouse; so how could they have let this happen? The ad basically communicates that drinking Sierra Mist is a good decision and that drinking Sierra Mist is such a good decision it could make up for bad decisions, such as growing a long beard to use as a comb over while wearing cut off jean shorts and roller skates to work. The joke of course is how ridiculous the bad decisions are; unfortunately it’s just not funny and fails to really sell me on why I should buy Sierra Mist over the other two hundred brands in my convenience store’s freezer.

GM – Robot
This sport was disappointing, primarily because I was starting to enjoy it and really connecting to, of all things, an assembly line robot. Poor GM robot got let go from the plant and you just knew it was going to end well for the little guy, until he commits suicide. Suicide? Now it turned out to be a dream sequence but the fact is a large American auto maker just made a commercial about letting someone go and because all that someone knew was working in the plant, it was unable to find a decent job and took their own life. In a time when this scenario is not a nightmare, but in fact a reality to thousands of recently laid-off auto workers, I’m stunned at how insensitive GM is to have not realized how bad this came across. Now I know the spot was meant to communicate that GM does not tolerate mistakes and is committed to producing quality products. Unfortunately that message is barely sent and is lost almost immediately in the sequences that follow the robot’s journey to a heart-breaking end.

FedEx – Moon Office
If the purpose of this spot was to let me know that FedEx now has a distribution center on the moon and they have a fleet of spaceships to supports my offices on Venus and get packages to my clients on Mars, then I would say well done. But since it's 2007 and not 2057, I have no idea what they’re trying to communicate. I think it’s that they’re pioneers, but I had to watch it four times to even pick that up; and if so, who cares? Please tell me what you’re doing for my delivery needs right now. The special effects are well done, but good special effects can’t make up for a weak concept. Even the one shot at humor at the end when the guy floats off and gets nailed by a comet is rather sad and not funny at all. Last year’s FedEx dinosaur spot, which did a great job communicating "reliability", but also ended with someone getting killed unexpectedly (interesting trend for your brand guys, FedEx=Death), was still one of the best of that year’s crop, so it’s amazing to see how far they missed the mark this year. This is another spot from the esteemed agency BBDO and has really made me question more than ever if Madison Avenue agencies have lost touch with consumers since good advertising executions no longer are coming out of New York, but instead from former advertising outposts like Miami, Portland, Richmond, San Francisco, Dallas and Minneapolis.

The Ugly

Snickers – Mechanics
This ad was so bad I spent the rest of the game wondering where the entire marketing profession made a wrong turn and actually considered leaving marketing and turning to a more respectful career, like a job as Kevin Federline’s personal assistant. Gay jokes? Snickers spent more that $2.6 million to air a really bad gay joke? Everything about it is so flat out bad it’s just hard to fathom how this came into existence. Having been through the process multiple times and knowing how many hoops an idea has to jump through to see the light of day, I just can’t comprehend how this bad idea did not get shot down instantly, much less have traveled the long road to advertising’s biggest stage. None of what happens or is said in this spot communicates anything about Snickers and why I would want to buy it. The best I can guess is they’re telling consumers that Snickers is so good it drives you to homosexuality. Of course since the men in the ad freak out about kissing each other, they also offend gay people. This results in a situation where gay men and straight men have been equally offended and therefore all men are now less likely to purchase a Snickers bar. This ad was created by yet another New York agency, TBWA Chiat Day, which has seemed to throw basic marketing principles out the window in favor of something with extreme shock value. Here is a tip for the next one, since the new tagline of Snickers is “Most Satisfying”, Snickers should try spots that end with people being satisfied rather that horrified.

Chevrolet – Car Wash
This spot was the winner of a student competition, so I’m going to try to be kind since the concept did not come from a professional. Of course this spot, along with the almost as bad amateur spot for Doritos’s are good example for why you should leave this to the professionals. I know everyone thinks they can do advertising, but people actually go to school for this and suffer through years of low paying gigs just to get to a point in their career where they might, just might be able to work on a Super Bowl ad. So why are we now opening it up to competition from the general pubic? I’m not sure, but I do know I leave the accounting to the CPA’s and surgery to the MD’s, so can we leave advertising to the ad gurus from now on please? Okay off my soap box and back to the Chevy ad. This ad just does not work; it’s not entertaining and tells me nothing about the car. All it really seems to be is a bunch of guys stripping and throwing themselves on this car for no apparent reason than “it’s hot in here” and they feel compelled to wash a car that is not even dirty.

Well that wraps up my review for this year’s Super Bowl ads; I’ll be spending the next 12 months attempting to forget most of these and hope everyone is back in peak form next year.

Jake Crocker is a Partner and Brand Marketing Director at Martin Branding Worldwide, Inc.

The Cingular Brand, Shot Down In It’s Prime

A great one is leaving us, one that was so young, yet had already accomplished so much. This one could have been a truly great brand, but now we will never know. I’m talking about Cingular, the wireless phone brand that is now being phased out and lumped in under “the new” AT&T brand name. What a shame, this was a brand that grew so fast since its 2001 launch and was so fresh, that its little orange icon was well on its way to joining the ranks of the Nike Swoosh and McDonald’s arches as one of America’s most recognizable brand marks.

So how did this happen? Well first you must understand its corporate makeup; Cingular was a joint venture between two Baby Bells, SBC and BellSouth. The companies came together to create a new unified brand to unite all their regional wireless phone companies (11 companies total) under one new national brand, Cingular. The former AT&T Wireless brand was then acquired by SBC and also absorbed into Cingular in 2004, but not completely with it’s “Raising The Bar” tagline staying alive and adopted by Cingular. So AT&T Wireless became Cingular which has now become AT&T; that would not be confusing to customers at all, now would it? The AT&T brand reemerged as a powerhouse when SBC decided it wanted to put the old telecom giant back together and began acquiring the other Baby Bells that had made up AT&T before the government deregulated the telecommunications industry and split the company apart. SBC acquired what was left of AT&T in 2005 and changed its corporate name almost immediately to “the new” AT&T, with a freshened up logo (now at&t rather than AT&T), Kiefer Sutherland voice over and theme song form the British rock band Oasis. Just a few months ago “the new” AT&T acquired its joint venture partner BellSouth and without any hesitation, now owning all of Cingular, they moved to transition it’s wireless band to the AT&T brand name as well. Are you still with me here? If I lost you, then just watch this great clip from the Cobert Report.

Now I understand what they’re doing, they’re uniting all of their corporate divisions and entities under one brand umbrella, allowing them to more cost effectively promote the AT&T the brand nationwide. It also allows AT&T to easily bundle services and sell packages such as wireless phone services along with cable TV and internet to consumers. As much business since as that makes, my gut still tells me that this move was wrong. AT&T, despite its makeover, still stands for the old American Telephone & Telegraph Company. The brand is so old the ticker symbol that goes with it is “T”, yes that’s right, not three letters, just “T”. My point is It’s just flat out stodgy brand and by using lower case letters, a theme song from a washed up 1990’s band and agent Jack Bauer won’t have the edge it needs to successfully connect with the youthful and trendy consumers that make up a good percentage of the wireless phone market. That’s what made Cingular more than just a great brand, but a great wireless brand; it reflected the youth and energy of the wireless industry and its consumers. Fortunately for AT&T, or at&t, they will be the first to offer service on Apple new iPhone, which seemed like a much better fit when Steve Jobs announced Cingular was going to be the exclusive iPhone services provider that it does now as AT&T. The AT&T brand is not a bad brand, but it’s a brand that connects more strongly to an older generation, the Cingular brand was one that connected with a younger one; it will be interesting to see how this brand will evolve and we will only be left to wonder what that little orange guy, with all that energy and spunk, could have achieved.

Jake Crocker is a Partner and Brand Marketing Director at Martin Branding Worldwide, Inc.