Zazou Marketing

As the future of our country’s health care is debated, the health care insurance companies look like they are getting nervous — or at least preparing for the worst. What’s the indicator? Health insurance companies have increased direct mail offers by 18% in the past year, according to Mintel Comperemedia (as reported by MediaPost’s MarketingDaily).

The reason I mention it here is because I find it interesting how they are using their copy to differentiate themselves from one another. According to MarketingDaily:

United Healthcare advertises affordability and choice in its new UnitedHealthOne brand, while Blue Cross Blue Shield of Georgia’s SmartSense plan focuses on low costs for the unemployed. Taking a slightly different angle, Kaiser Permanente’s direct mail emphasizes general health and well being, claiming “we’ll help you live well, be well, and thrive.”

No matter what you think about healthcare reform, we could probably all learn a bit from their savvy marketing efforts and attempts to grab some of the market by setting themselves apart from each other.

Yesterday I wrote about how Dunkin’ Donuts’ new ad campaign successfully differentiates the company from their competition. Today I am writing about a company’s ad campaign that fails to do just that. In fact, this ad campaign simply makes me wonder what they were thinking.

In this ad campaign, Microsoft accuses Google of causing global economic ruin as a narrator says: “While everyone was searching, there was bailing. . . . While everyone was lost in the links, there was collapsing.” The product? Microsoft’s new  search engine, Bing. All I can say to this is, “What?!”

I am not alone in this confusion. The LA Times ran a story about it today, titled “Microsoft’s Bing TV ad: Huh?”

This is my favorite part of the article:

I find many mysteries in this commercial. The first is how an ad firm with an estimated $100 million entrusted to it fails to notice the clumsy grammar (”there was bailing . . . there was collapsing” sounds as if the lines were translated from Zulu). While I’ve got my copy-editing hat on, I’d note that a long stretch of the ad’s narration — “Starting today we need the right information to make the right decisions, decisions that help us feel right, decisions that help us get to the right place at the right time, even if it’s right around the corner. . . . ” — is so vacuous it practically sucked my eyeballs out of their sockets.

Sucking eyeballs out of sockets is probably the last association that Microsoft wanted when they launched this marketing campaign. But I still do wonder what it is that they did want. Maybe the purspose of the campaign is just to turn heads? I suppose simply by getting attention some people will try the search engine. But I can’t help but think that if they gave people a good reason to switch from Google to Bing, many, many more people would give it a try — this is, after all, what any good marketing material should do.

Dunkin’ Donuts is rolling out an entertaining and fun new ad campaign. But that’s not what made it noteworthy enough for me to write about here. The reason that I’m mentioning it is because — as all marketing campaigns should — this campaign effectively differentiates the company from their competition.

Dunkin’ Donuts’ “Breakfast NOT Brokefest” advertising campaign introduces the company’s new 99-cent breakfast wrap, which is also in line with their current coffee pricing.

Dunkin' Donuts is rolling out a new "Breakfast NOT Brokefest" ad campaign.

The marketing campaign includes displays of legs that stick out of public fountains, which make it look like someone jumped into the fountain to gather coins. A sign next to the legs read: “Please do not remove change for 99-cent items at Dunkin’ Donuts.”

In a separate TV ad, a man tightens his belt, which prompts a colleague to point out that that won’t save him money.

The price-oriented advertising campaign sets the brand apart from the pricier McDonald’s and Starbucks (who are both trying to tackle the coffee and breakfast market right now).  Considering that people are feeling the need to scale back and let go of luxuries like a $4 latte, the Dunkin’ Donuts campaign may entice more than a few new customers.

By the way, if you want to read more about what Starbucks has been up to recently, read my past posts:

Starbucks vs. Stella: Two beverage companies warn against paying less

Copy Chatter: Starbucks Bucks the Short Copy Trend

And the winner is…. Burger King!

No, it’s not the Academy Awards. It’s the Effies, which, if you’re in the advertising and marketing world, you already know is a big deal. The point of the Effie Awards? To honor marketing communications ideas that work.

So, the 2009 Grand prize was awarded last night to Burger King and Crispin Porter + Bogusky for the “Whopper Freakout” campaign.

The Grand Whopper Freakout campaign removed the Whopper from Burger King's menu and won the 2009 Grand Effie last night.

Here’s a summary of the campaign (go to the Effie Awards page for more details):

First, Burger King removed the Whopper from the menu without letting their customers know. Then, in phase two of the campaign, customers were given competitors’ burgers instead of the Whopper. Finally, Burger King TV ads to drove traffic to Whopperfreakout.com, where you can view an eight-minute documentary on the experiment (and, of course, you can upload it — see below). This part, of course is key, because the very entertaining and funny video focuses on the reactions of people who are being deprived of their beloved Whoppers. The result of the campaign was that Whopper quarterly sales increased by double-digits.

Double digit sales increase on the whopper? It just goes to show you that innovation and showing the value of your product or service can go a long way in your marketing campaign.

Recently I posted about how Starbucks was bucking the short-copy trend — opting for a page of copy rather than a one-line zinger. But it looks like they have been out-copied by a long shot!

As part of Cesar Sunrise’s launch of “the first-ever gourmet canine cuisine breakfast,” they have created an eight-page, make-believe humorous newspaper. Called The West Highland Herald, it is chock-full of stories written by dogs for dogs. Yes, you read that right: The stories are written by dogs with their dog peers in mind. (You can also view the paper on their Web site.)

To give you a sense of this newspaper, in the “fashion and lifestyle section” the headline reads, “Bold Shapes Dominate Milan Runways” and runs with the following photo:

This story includes the following excerpt:

First, let’s talk collars. Expect them to get tougher than leather, with several designers taking their cue from the junkyard and early 80s punk music. That’s right, studs and spikes are back! Goodbye bitch—hello butch!

And in the “Regional News” section a headline says, “Dog Saves Family from Vicious Vacuum,” with a story that starts with the following copy:

LOST GATOS—A very brave and fast-acting South Bay Pomeranian put an end to an upright vacuum bent on destruction this past Saturday. Teddy, 4, of La Serra Terrace, made a split-second decision that spared his family certain harm.

And there is a lot more where this came from.

You may ask, “Where is the Cesar ad in all of this?” That’s easy: On each page there is a labeled advertisement (definitely keeping things authentic here).  One says, “wake up to something special, cesar sunrise breakfast entrees.” Another says “new! cesar sunrise brand.” When you click through any of the ads, an extensive, multi-paged interactive Cesar ad pops up.

As for whether this humorous campaign will generate additional business, as always that remains to be seen. However, this ad campaign is entertaining and is certainly designed to go viral. If it does (with the help of a few people like me) it may very well increase sales.

If you’re launching an ad campaign, you certainly want a return on your investment. So it’s nice to know that research shows how to make your ad campaign increase sales or profit.

Here are the results of a study done by The Journal of Advertising Research, as published in Ad Age today, which found that the following strategies are most likely to increase sales or profit:

* Focus on hard objectives, such as specific market-share gains, rather than soft ones, such as brand awareness
* Focus on price, not volume
* Focus on penetration (winning new consumers) rather than loyalty
* Influence consumers emotionally rather than rationally
* Create ads with “talk value”
* Have a high share of voice relative to brand market share
* Include TV in the mix
* Include a small number of media channels with a concerted message

Source: Les Binet & Peter Field, June issue, Journal of Advertising Research.

While some of these elements are part of an overall marketing strategy, many of them are very much intertwined with your copy. So remember, for instance, to consider keeping your focus on specific objectives that win new consumers.

Of course, each advertising campaign is different and some “rules” are meant to be broken, but the above list is certainly a good guideline when mapping out your ad campaign — or, for that matter, any marketing materials or marketing campaign.