Episode 86 - Cadbury 5 Star Valentine's Day Alibi Ad Reviewed by Gousto, Innovate Comms and Reckitt
Does Valentine’s Day fill you with dread? Do you get a sinking feeling when you’re asked about your plans? Mondelez International’s Cadbury 5 Star have made up a perfect alibi for singles this year - the My Cousin’s Wedding fake island getaway.
This ad chosen by Contagious and created by Ogilvy India combines a funny scenario with extra activations such as a NothingCoin, an embassy in Mumbai and a competition. But does it try to do too much and dilute the message? And is the original need for an alibi on Valentine’s Day a valid insight to start from?
Watch the latest episode of Advertisers Watching Ads to see the ad and hear what our guests Laura Bull (Digital Marketing Manager at Gousto), Vicki DeBlasi (Founder of Innovate Comms) and Maeedah Chishti (Comms Manager for Reckitt Health Australia New Zealand) thought of it… before scoring it only a 2 out of 5!
Transcript
Advertisers Watching Ads Ep 86 - Cadbury 5 Star Valentine's Day Alibi Ad Reviewed by Gousto, Innovate Comms and Reckitt
The following transcript is automatically generated so may not be 100% accurate, but will give you a good idea of what was discussed.
Tom Ollerton 0:00
Hello and welcome to Advertisers Watching Ads. My name is Tom Ollerton, and this is a weekly show where brands watch other brands' ads and discuss what's good and bad about them. This week, as ever, we are brought to you by our partners, Contagious, so please go to contagious.com and see all the wonderful things they do, as well as finding cool ads for us to review every week. So before we see this week's ad, let's meet this week's guests.
Laura Bull 0:31
I'm Laura, I'm Digital Marketing Manager at Gousto.
Vicki DeBlasi 0:34
Hi, I'm Vicki DeBlasi. I'm the founder and owner of a virtual agency called Innovate Comms.
Maeedah Chishti 0:40
Hi, I am Maeedah. I'm the Comms Manager for Reckitt Health for the Australia, New Zealand business.
Tom Ollerton 0:46
Fantastic! What a panel. Let's see this week's ad.
Vicki, what's going on here? What was your reaction to their Cadbury 5 Star ad?
Laura Bull 2:01
I like this sort of the anti Valentine's message on it. I like the degree of commitment in the execution. I don't think I've ever worried about somebody asking me what I'm doing. In fact, I don't think anyone ever has asked me what I'm doing for Valentine's. If the insight is not, "I'm worried about what people are saying." But actually, I just want to escape all of it. You know, all of the stuff they had at the beginning, the cheesiness, the lovey-doveyness, all of the sort of consumerist claptrap around Valentine's that actually, you just want to escape from all that ridiculousness and do nothing. We've got a way to do that. For me, that would have felt a bit more authentic to them and to me as a consumer and what drove it.
Maeedah Chishti 2:37
In terms of the execution, I 100% agree with Vicki in terms of, do I really want to go to an island with no context? What is it really that I'm going to? Whereas just, you know, building that narrative ever so nicely. And then just leaving us hanging in there, and I feel like it would have been alright for the context of the film. But if you go through the full campaign material as well, if you go through everything that they're doing on PR or social... The why or what exactly is the alternative to all of this sappiness and this Valentine's Day madness is a big part that's missing for me, and that's probably what makes it ever so jarring in terms of, okay, I'm not that worried about people asking me that I want to just vanish from my town and just go into, into nowhere.
Laura Bull 3:27
It's kind of like a classic take of like a very done format for like an insurance company or a credit card company. Like at the start, I felt like they were positioning that kind of problem. And then it kind of lost me as it went on, because it feels like they were trying to do something experiential, kind of have that very unsure activation behind it. But then they didn't quite do that because you then... We're kind of entering a prize draw to go to this place. There were lots of comments about people like, "Oh, you've got me, like, I really like this ad." But then it didn't go anywhere. Like it just... It kind of stopped. There was no, like, they could have actually made a place for you to go to called, 'My Cousin's Wedding.' Did they? I couldn't find anything about it? Like, there was nothing on the internet.
Maeedah Chishti 4:14
They went out there and did all of that effort to create that island, that embassy, but it's not there, they're not talking about it as much as they should have because when you look at the film, at the first point that it feels like, because they're being so funny, maybe it's a joke. If someone's not putting in 30 minutes of their time, really going through that entire campaign and trying to find content online and on Times of India, or of the marketing in all these blog posts, can they really understand and grasp, what is it really that the, that the brand is trying to do? And you've got your answer here.
Vicki DeBlasi 4:47
I also actually wonder whether you know the "Do Nothing" platform obviously kind of extends beyond this campaign and has existed before and presumably after. And I wonder whether actually you're tying something into Valentine's Day that closely, actually necessarily was the best thing to do because actually your window in which you can build and do all of that kind of full marketing funnel execution that we've sort of talked about being missing. You've got a very small window of time in which to do that. There is a huge pressure now as we come out of COVID, like we need to be doing exciting things all the time and actually like, maybe they could've tapped into that a bit more and it would have had more longevity and given them the opportunity to build something more impactful over time than linking into a time where there was a huge amount of noise. And the, potentially, they've just not got sufficient window in which to build that full campaign in a way needed to be built to be successful.
Laura Bull 5:42
I disagree with you there because they have like a partner brand called Cadbury Silk, and they're messaging on that is, "How far will you go for love?" And those two, like, played off each other massively and a lot of... Yeah, and a lot of the comments about people saying this resonates or like this is really interesting, actually, the fact that those two brands are playing off each other, I don't necessarily think that they needed a bigger window of opportunity to build that funnel. It was just down to the execution of it more than anything and then trying to do too many things, even with the prize draw stuff like you didn't just enter a prize draw. There was something about like mining Nothing Coin going as well, which like...
Vicki DeBlasi 6:23
I saw that. I was so confused by what that was.
Laura Bull 6:26
And there's literally like two sentences about it somewhere, and I can't really figure out what the details are, but you don't even just enter the prize draw. You have to mine some Nothing Coin to enter the prize draw. And I just think they've spent too much time like complicating this, when they could have simplified it bit and had that kind of full funnel with their embassy that they clearly built to take, like have this press opportunity and like amplify that with like UGC and stuff like that, which we didn't see.
Maeedah Chishti 6:56
If the goal is that we want to get great PR around it, then just the embassy and making it a really big deal to your point would have been enough. If, if the idea was CRM and they wanted loads and loads of sign ups, then the focus problem possibly could have been more on what is it that I'm getting out of it? What is the prize? What is this? How important is it for me or how exciting is it for me to be on that island? For me to go and sign up and give you all of my data. If we just wanted to penetrate a little bit more then possibly there was just no point of doing all of that, and focus could have just been on the campaign, extending it really nicely to social. And I think the big area where I felt it could have delivered more was social because you can do so much more now with all these filters and all of these interactive platforms and possibly the, the loss is, is not having that clear intent of what the end goal is. Is it PR? Is it CRM? Is it? Is it just getting the point across or is it more sales? Because then just scanning the chocolate and buying the chocolate could have been it? So yeah, I think too much happening at the same time.
Tom Ollerton 8:08
What do you think the industry can learn from this, Laura? What would you be taking away from this?
Laura Bull 8:12
I think just being focused and really clear on outcomes. It just needed to be kind of, okay, what are we actually trying to achieve here? And are we going to stop at the mid funnel? Are we going to go for the sales? Like, how can we make this as simple as possible for people? Because like that execution was so strong at the beginning. And then as you got further and further into it, you're like, hang on a minute, can I go to My Cousin's Wedding? Am I scanning a pack? Like, will I get to go to this island? I'm sorry. Yeah.
Vicki DeBlasi 8:42
I would agree with that in part, I think it's essentially don't necessarily feel you need to bottle the ocean. I think that, might've probably hit the nail on the head in saying that there is a temptation to try and do everything and this, this to me looks a little bit, and I think we will kind of been there. Someone has the great idea, and then we're all like, "Oh, we could do this! Oh, we could do that! Oh, we could do this!" And then it just kind of morphs into something. You know, actually keeping it small might have been a more better, more effective campaign. For me, I still think that that core first insight is not quite right for me and that sort of filtered through into everything else subsequently. So I think being really clear about what you're trying to do and also being really clear about what your insight is and that insight is valid and resonates.
Tom Ollerton 9:23
So unfortunately, we have come to the end of the show, so we're going to get you to do now is vote for how good you thought this execution was. So, three, two, one... A two, a two, and a two. Well, 5 Star, you have a two. Thanks so much, guys, for joining us and we will see you all next week.
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