There seems to be a trend evolving in advertising at the moment. Companies seem to think that just because the internet is there, and that ‘the world’ is using it, they will be missing out on potential sales and customers if they don’t. As much fault in this fallacy must go also to the ad agencies they employ who are convincing them of this ‘fact’.
It’s wrong.
Kingsmill was the first such ad campaign that ignited my gall. Their Kingsmill Confessions campaign ‘encourages’ customers to log into their website and share a story about how Kingsmill has (presumably wittily) put punctuation in their lives.
It’s crass. It’s pointless. It’s so annoying that they’ve actually lost me as a customer. I used to buy Kingsmill bread. Their Confessions ad campaign so irritated me, that I have sworn never to by their bread again. I suspect I’m not alone. I cannot think of a life vapid enough that could cause anyone to waste a nanosecond on even attempting to find their website, let alone the wasted moments it would take to leave their so ‘scintillating’ (and inevitably boring) confession about how a loaf of bread has impacted their existence.
Apparently Kingsmill forked out around £11M for this campaign. The agency must have seem them coming. £11M for goodness sake! They could have paid me 1/11th of that and I’d have given them a much better idea. (Kingsmill, you can still come to me for my ideas if you’d like).
The latest household name to throw its brain in the bin and jump on the web campaign bandwagon is McVittie’s (United Biscuits). They’ve just launched an ad campaign where they split the entire nation into either ‘Dunkers’ or ‘Crunchers’. And here’s the really pointless bit…they then suggest that customers should go to their website and ‘vote for which one they are’.
It was only annoyance that has caused me to go to their website to try and find out why. Their website states:
“McVitie’s have a new Ad to support their promotional event “Dunk or Not?” (March-May). The new McVitie’s ad celebrates that we are a Nation of McVitie’s biscuit eaters, both Dunkers & Crunchers & encourages consumers to pick up a pack & vote online. Consumers will engage with the brand via many touch points including on the website / facebook & through radio.”
Again it’s crass. I mean, how comprehensively devoid of verve must your life be to even think of voting for such a pointless issue?
It’s the last sentence of their blurb that’s the most revealing about their inability to see the damage that they are doing to themselves and their brand. ‘Consumers will engage with the brand…’ No we won’t engage with it. We’ll be bashed over the head with the pointlessness of this approach. We’ll feel bruised and punch-drunk every time we’re unfortunate enough to come across the ad, and it will leave us annoyed that we’re being patronised in such a way. The result of this for me? I’m going to stop eating McVittie’s biscuits from now on. …and Facebook FFS! Facebook for biscuits?!? Jees!
Don’t get me wrong. There is a place for web campaigns to accompany previously traditional brands and styles of advertising. But, I buy…sorry bought…McVittie’s biscuits because they were the best. ‘McVittie’s – The best since biscuits began’ would have made me feel closer to the brand as a campaign slogan. Simple, traditional, (and probably) factual. I have no idea how much McVittie’s paid some Ad agency for this disaster of marketing, but it’s probably an embarrassingly huge amount, the result of which is at least one fewer consumer.
The saying goes that there’s no such thing as bad publicity. The trend in this sort of advertising is possible proof that this adage needs to be reassessed.
NB
