Old Spice Guy: The Campaign Your Marketing Could Look Like
Published 7/21/2010
Author: Nancy Pekala
Nancy Pekala is the AMA's Director of Online Content and Editor of Marketing Thought Leaders.
Summary
If somehow you’ve missed the Old Spice story, here it is in a nutshell. Last February, Procter and Gamble ran a Super Bowl ad introducing its new brand character, the Old Spice Man, played by Isaiah Mustafa, a bare-chested former NFL wide receiver who promised women he was “the man your man could smell like,” even if no man could ever be as truly manly as the Old Spice Man.
Five months later, the brand’s Portland-based ad agency Wieden + Kennedy posted a simple message on Old Spice's Facebook and Twitter page: "Today could be just like the other 364 days you log into Twitter, or maybe the Old Spice Man shows up @Old Spice." Thus began a two-day Old Spice YouTube Tweetathon in which the brand’s team involving the actor, social media and video creatives, produced more than 180 video spots in an average of 7 minutes each, often within 30 minutes of a fan’s tweet. To date, the videos have garnered more than 75 million views. (You can view the videos here.)
The question is: should a campaign be defined as a success only if it sells product?
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Kimchi (Olivia) Hoang wrote:
Yes, it should sell a product to be a success...or else it's just a hobby.
Posted on : 7/26/2010
Deborah Burgam wrote:
Depends on what the marketing objective is. If it is to increase brand awareness and achieves it, then it is a success.
Posted on : 7/26/2010
Timur Aydin wrote:
A campaign can be defined as a success if it meets its objectives. In this case, I believe that the first and foremost objective was to increase brand awareness which the campaign very successfully achieved. Sales will rise as more people associate the brand with an image they want to have.
Posted on : 7/28/2010
Caroline Forest wrote:
This is the long-debated dilemna of whether marketing should aim to drive revenue (short-term goal) or brand awareness, which will likely be measured by sales only in the long-term run. I just finished reading (again!) the still very current article of Marketing Management from May/June 2009 about just this. This campaign can be a success if its goal was to increase brand awareness, make Old Spice look more hip, more fun, more interesting for the younger crowds. If they were expecting market share increase, then they chose the wrong channel IMO.
Posted on : 7/30/2010
Lee Pearson wrote:
It's a great debate. I guess I would simply say that I loved the commercials and I purchased the body wash the next time I was at the grocery store so it worked on me.
Posted on : 8/3/2010