Episode 155 - IKEA Ads That Skip You Reviewed by Kyndryl and Cisco
IKEA’s ad series, “Ads That Skip You” is a cheeky, fast and playful way of presenting the brand’s products to the Indian market. But are they too fast to drive the message across to consumers? And what’s the actual call to action for those who view them?
In the latest episode, our guests Priyanka Dasgupta (Field Marketing Manager at Kyndryl), Tejal Patel (Senior Director, Global Digital Media at Cisco), and Via Perkins (Freelance Copywriter) have their say on this marketing approach to entering the Indian market, chosen for us by Contagious.
Have a look and see what you think!
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Episode 155 - IKEA Ads That Skip You Reviewed by Kyndryl and Cisco
Transcript is automatically generated, so not perfect, but you get the idea!
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.
I'm the founder of Automated Creative. We are a creative effectiveness adtech platform, but this week's about ads and before we see some very short ads from IKEA. Let's meet this week's guests.
Priyanka Dasgupta 0:41
Hey, I'm Priyanka. I work with Kyndryl. I am the US Field Marketing Manager dedicated to the automotive industry.
Tejal Patel 0:49
Hi there, I'm Tejal Patel. And I'm a Senior Director in the Global Digital Media Team at Cisco, leading Social Media and Communities.
Via Perkins 0:58
Hi, my name is Via Perkins, and I'm a copywriter who has worked with brands like Semrush, Bombas, and Genius, and I have worked at multiple agencies as well as a DEI consultancy, and I'm currently freelancing and open to work.
Tom Ollerton 1:10
Fantastic. What a panel! Right... So let's see this week's ads.
How many votes would you give this out of five? One, two, three... A four, and a four, and a three. IKEA, there you have it. Okay... So Via, very short ads, very creative. What's going on here? Help us understand the wider context of the campaign.
Via Perkins 1:42
So the concept here is "Ads That Skip You," which I think is a really intriguing concept. I have seen some brand ads that do defy expectations like that, playing on the idea of skipping ads. But it's usually, at least in my experience, about getting the viewer to do something, whether that's sticking around to see the whole ad or skipping the ad, if it isn't relevant to you. But the idea of the ad skipping you is, I think, a really clear and effective way to make the point of the ad, which is to say that It can make things easier to find and more efficient.
Priyanka Dasgupta 2:16
I think I like the campaign and the thought and it definitely aligns to the medium. So definitely intended for the YouTube as a platform because it will not work for, let's say, a TV set up or you know, if you're watching it somewhere else. I think the ad is on point. It's simple. What I'm a little icky about is what would be the next steps? So if I'm a consumer and what is the action expected out of me? Because the six second ad goes very fast. It's not pushing me to either go on the webpage or it's not pushing me to buy your product or explore more about the product. So that's something that I don't like about the ad but apart from that, the creativity, the simplicity, the way it's being molded for the platform, I think all of that is on point. In fact, it's even low on budget, probably, because it's a six-second ad.
Tejal Patel 3:08
I think it's infuriatingly short. I watched it several... I mean, and it goes to show an ad that you want to watch again because I don't know what else is in this ad. What am I missing in this ad? And it absolutely is the ad that skips you because by the time you're able to do anything about it, the ad is over. Super smart. I think it's so clever. Very few brands can get away with this, though, because, you know, the essence of IKEA already, you know what they're about.
Tom Ollerton 3:36
Do you think it needs to be more explicit? Is average IKEA shopper going to make that tangential link in 3 seconds?
Via Perkins 3:43
I still think that it's effective. I would say it probably would have been more effective if it were, you know, a 15-second ad. That would have been, you know, my preference. But I think the goal was to create a human connection that can be relatable and can tie back to the brand. It can only work because of that brand recognition. I kind of wonder how it would perform on YouTube. I haven't gotten these ads on YouTube videos before. I've only seen them in this context that we're watching them now, but it's possible that they may have put a sort of section at the very end after it said "Skip" and that it could have given you... You know, how sometimes you get a black screen that then allows you to click to the next, like, into, you know, the company or into the pages they want. It's possible that that could have been the way that they got more clicks.
Tejal Patel 4:27
When you've made your ad so short. And by the time you would get to the "Skip ad," it's over. I think they've got inflated results here. Of course, you're going to get those many million... Impressions, first of all, don't mean anything. That's all based... In my opinion, based on your media buy. So let's not look at impressions as a way of measuring success. The views on, in this situation, I think they're getting a lot of those views because the format is so short. Not because people are highly entertained or they're not scrolling for something else. You're not scrolling in a YouTube environment. The click-through rates, it's interesting, but what is 32% more than what, what was your original target, you know? What is the average click-through rate on a YouTube ad? 0.2? Maybe? Something like that. So 35% more than a... I don't know, say the double that 0.4 was their target. 35%... 32% increase on that isn't that great. For awareness, it's a great brand already. You reinforcing that if you really think about organization, you think about IKEA. I think from that point of view, job done.
Priyanka Dasgupta 5:28
When I was reading about the campaign, we never got these ads on YouTube is because this was dedicated to the Indian market only. And that's why you see Indian people and their bathrooms and those kind of set-up...
Tejal Patel 5:39
Right! That explains it. That explains it.
Priyanka Dasgupta 5:41
In India, IKEA is a fairly new brand. It's a late entry compared to US, at least compared to US. If we are seeing the brand awareness from an India point of view, yes, they may know, the urban population may know what IKEA is as a brand, but building brand loyalty and trust, they need to catch up. There are many other vendors, there are like Pepperfry, Urban Ladder who are much more prominent in the Indian market targetting the same middle-class population. From a marketer's point of view, I think this is wonderful in terms of the creativity, simplicity, everything, hundred points on that.
Tom Ollerton 6:15
So if you guys were creative directors on this, what would improve this campaign for you?
Priyanka Dasgupta 6:19
When you look at the kids video, I don't even understand they're talking about the bed or the bed with drawers or the LEGO block, which they are building. It takes two to three trials or visits on the ad to actually understand what is the product that they are talking about. So increasing the length and focusing more on the product, I think would kind of resonate for me a little more.
Via Perkins 6:41
I think that there is room for more storytelling here because I like the idea. It is focused on relatability. I wish I could have seen more about what the use is. What is it actually doing? I mean, it's great to be able to build a tower, right? For instance... But what if there is a little bit more to it? One of the things that I noticed in these videos is there's this hashtag, #OrganisingIsAwesome. As someone who, you know, writes copy is that there is something about the word "awesome" to me that I think there's just a missed potential there. It's not descriptive enough to explain anything distinctive about the brand. If it were something about saving time or the idea of, you know, well-made products, making you more efficient in your life, that would be different. But I did kind of notice it up at the upper right hand corner after a few watches. There's so much potential in these ads, and with just a couple of tweaks, I think they could have been so much more effective.
Tejal Patel 7:37
This is targeted at the kids. So I don't know what they're buying... A strategy was here then the targeting strategy, but the title would suggest it was definitely a younger audience and that is a pain point. So actually what they've done is identified a pain point for that audience which is you do lose your toys especially those kinds of thing your LEGO, all of that. By having IKEA and organizing it means you're going to, you're not going to have that problem again. So actually I think if this is part of a bigger campaign, which sounds like it is, I mean, we saw a couple of other ads. I don't know what other formats they've bought. Was there anything longform? Other media? Because if it comes together as a bigger campaign, it's part of their bigger strategy in India. Then I think having just snippets of this kind of information is telling a much bigger story around organization, you think of IKEA, I mean, that's a huge win.
Priyanka Dasgupta 8:27
So what they are targeting here, clearly, is not quality. It's about organizing and saving time. And in India, specifically Mumbai and the Metropolitans, there are a lot of people, it's housing 1 billion population. So it's a $40 billion housing market today in India. So for them to target that market, they don't have to be the best quality brand out there. They have to be the most used brand. So in my mind that's the audience which they are targeting. The younger workforce that is getting a new house, going to shift with their job to different places. In my mind, that's the target audience. I don't think just the ad is going to do the trick. The ad is good for brand awareness. It's not driving any action for me to explore the products. Performance wise, it may not be as great, but for a marketer, storytelling point of view in terms of a new way to think about ad, I think this is a good case study to look into.
Tom Ollerton 9:22
Voting with a thumbs up or down, would you sign off this campaign in its current form? One, two, three... Split room. Okay... Thank you so much for joining us, guys. We'll see you all next week.
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