Best of Ads, Worst of Ads

Abby Fritch

Tiffanie Heestand

The Ads of 2007• Last year a long list of companies, including General

Electric Co., Chevron Corp., and Home Depot Inc., all jumped on the eco-friendly bandwagon by coloring their products green

• Well many companies turned to the green theme for their 2007 ad campaigns, not many of these ads gained nationwide attention

• Other ways companies gained attention through ads in 2007 was by littering the Web with viral videos, adding smell to print ads, and even showing ads on TV screens at gas pumps.

• While many companies tried new ad ideas this past year, one thing remained the same, some ads were hits while others were big flops.

The Best• Eye of the Beholder

-Unliver’s Dove -Constructed a video that cost less than $150,000

-Video shows an average looking women being transformed into a supermodel with help of lots from

makeup, lighting, and airbrushing.

-This video is one of the best examples of a company using the Web for advertising.

-The ad which was posted on YouTube last year has

been viewed more than 24million times. http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1351303131

The Best• D’Oh!

– The Simpson’s Movie-A part of a cross-promotion with News Corp’s. Twentieth Century Fox, 7-Eleven converted 12 of its stores into Kwik-E-Marts, the fictional chain of convenience stores in the animated TV series -As part of the promotion the stores sold specially created items such as Squishees, pink-frosted Sprinklicious doughnuts, and boxes of KrustyO’s cereal. -Due to the conversion of the stores, 7-Eleven saw major sales lifts at 11 U.S. stores -The company says total merchandise sales doubled; fresh bakery sales increased sevenfold, and customer count went up almost 50%.

The Best• Drummer in a Hair Band

– Cadbury Dairy Milk chocolate bar-Cadbury Schweppes PLC launched a TV ad in the United

Kingdom featuring a gorilla playing the drums as Phil Collins's 1981 hit "In the Air Tonight" blares in the background

-The ad ends with a shot of the candy bar and it’s slogan “A glass and a half full of joy.”

-When the ad was placed on the Web, the spot became a global sensation, gaining 7 million downloads.

-Cadbury has credited the spot with lifting sales of the candy bar.

The Best• The Human Stain

– Procter & Gamble Co,’s Tide to Go-The TV commercial shows a man interviewing for a job

who is repeatedly interrupted by a talking stain on his shirt.

-For years the company has tried to add some fun to its often staid advertising.

-This specific ad won a Silver Lion Award at the annual International Advertising Festival, this is one of the ad world’s top honors and one that rarely goes to soap.

http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1351303134

The Best• K-Fed, Insurance Salesman

– Nationwide Mutual Insurance-This ad features Brittany Spear’s ex-husband, rapper Kevin Federline working at a fast food chain-The ad gives the impression of K-Fed rapping but as the camera pulls back you actually see he is just working the drive-through window-The video ends with a voiceover saying "Life comes at you fast. Be ready with a Nationwide annuity and you could be guaranteed income for life.“-This ad became a PR sensation because of its use of an in the news celebrity. -The spot generated 3,584 news stories, which the company, a unit of Nationwide Financial Services Inc., estimates to be worth $23.3 million in free publicity

http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1351322173

The Worst• Stunt that Bummed

– “Aqua Teen Hunger Force”- Cartoon Network Show

• Attempted to promote the TV show by planting 40 boxes with blinking lights and in the shape of the “Hunger Force“ Characters Err and Ignignokt around Boston

• The boxes prompted a major bomb scare that closed highways and subways.

• Major PR mistake• Time Warner, the parent company, paid the

Massachusetts attorney general 2 million dollars to settle the civil and criminal claims that could have occurred

The Worst• They Built It, No One Came

– Anheuser-Busch Co• Online entertainment Web site that contains more than

2,000 minutes of original programming such as stand-up comedy and “The Joe Buck Show”

• The brewer is struggling to find a way to translate funny radio and TV ads that they make to the Web in order to appeal to the beer drinking young men who spend most of their time there.

• The number of visitors to the site is low and did not meet Web-tracking firm com Score Inc’s threshold for the amount of visors throughout most of the year

The Worst• Mental Meltdown

– General Motors Corp• Super Bowl Commercial that shows a robot jumping off

a bridge in a dream sequence after making a mistake on the assembly line

• A suicide-prevention group made GM re-edit the jumping off the bridge scene

• Thought the ad was insensitive to the auto workers that had lost their jobs

http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1351322174

The Worst• Kiss It Goodbye

– Mars Inc.’s Snickers• Shows two mechanics eating the same candy bar at the

same time- spin on the scene from lady in the tramp. The end up locking lips and then in attempt to do something manly rip out clumps of their chest hair

• The Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation said that ad was antigay and Mars ousted it even though they had high positive feedback from consumers

http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1351303138

The Worst• RoadKill

– Chrysler• Web video ad that appeared on YouTube that

featured a Dodge Nitro and a dog sniffing the tire looking for a place to relieve itself. The dog was then zapped by an electric bolt that came from the car and the dog burst into flames

• The Ad was made for European Market and made its way to the web via a consumer and was removed because it was not made with the companies permission and it appeared at the same time as the incident with Michael Vick was taking place

QUESTIONS?