I’m on a raven
Not many brands who enjoyed the recent success of the Old Spice ads, would be brave enough to change the front man.
But in swapping Isaiah Mustafa, for this campaign at least, for fellow NFL athlete Ray Lewis the brand still has an excellent superspokesperson.
Sometimes good advertising seems effortless, doesn’t it?
And who needs 30 seconds when you can be funny in 15?
Mind you. if you are missing Mustafa’s shower room, that’s taken care of too.
As @OldSpice‘s updated Twitter profile puts it: “”Just an NFL superstar wearing a suit made of soap suds flying through outer space on a laser-eyed raven while smelling fantastic.”
And if you want to know why they’ve switched spokesman, this tweet makes it all clear (sort of): “There’s a variety of Old Spice superspokespersons, including the kind who outrun giant bears on the gridiron.”
Tim Burrowes
Tim Burrowes founded Mumbrella in 2008. He worked on Mumbrella until 2021. At various points he was editor, content director and editor-at-large.
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The first one was bit lame, but the second one was outstanding!
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Swapping Isaiah was silly move, these ads have nothing on the originals…
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@Dan oh you couldn’t be more wrong. It takes a seriously brave and creative brand / agency to do the right thing and not run with their first good idea so long it eventually brings the brand full circle back to “tired / yesterday’s news”.
Both of these were great, and the new guy is clearly not living in Isaiah’s shadow. Top work.
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@lachyw I agree they shouldn’t run their first idea into mind numbing staleness. But this new series just looks to me like a rehash, not a new bold creative step forward…
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I’ll clear something up for you guys…
They haven’t swapped Isaiah.
He’s the regular “brand” guy.
Ray Lewis is the spokesperson for Swagger.
Terry Crews does the Odor Blocker stuff.
It’s pretty simple really.
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Loved the first ones (with Isaiah) but these did nothing for me.
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They’ve done it again!
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The style of execution demands comparison, and by comparison, they’re not up to the originals. By themselves, they’re fun and quirky, but I would rather see Swagger taking its own direction, rather than an echo of Isaiah.
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But did it sell the product? I read that the first one didn’t set the world on fire saleswise. And the sales were tied to a 2-for-1 deal, which would work for any product.
Creatively the ads are fabulous…but did they WORK in shifting merchandise? Or just create a lot of lather on Twitter and YouTube? I dunno..
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Funny ads, product still stinks though.
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For people who liked the old ones better, Ray Lewis is an NFL legend who still plays at a high level while Mustafa has been out of football for a while and wasn’t good when he did play.
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Fellow critics,
Please be assured, if any of this advertising is not drawing greater sales, it cannot continue.
Whether it is preferred, loved or disliked with intensity by hot shot commentators such as your good selves, your opinions carry no weight at all.
If it doesn’t shift the merchandise, it’s run cannot be funded.
FULL STOP!
Kind regards
Older.
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@Brute33 and @Older Spice, it may be too early to tell about the Swagger campaign, but the OldSpice Bodywash campaign resulted in a significant increase in sales.
http://mashable.com/2010/07/27/old-spice-sales/
http://www.brandweek.com/bw/co.....d5c7b?pn=2
http://adweek.blogs.com/adfrea.....stats.html
Yes @Brute33, they had a 2-in-1 coupon running at the same time – so did other brands, some of which fared worse despite having a 2-in-1 promo. May I ask, since when is a campaign meant to run only one element at a time? The idea is to integrate efforts for maximum overall effect. It wasn’t just an online video, or a twitter thing, or some paid for spots on tv, or an instore promo – it was a multiplatform campaign.
Their insight that women have the purchasing power on 50% of men’s bodywash, leading them to target this otherwise ignored half of the equation, was brilliant.
Now, if some people hate the smell and aren’t going to buy the product regardless of the best advertising efforts, you can’t hold that against this campaign. Just like you can’t sell meat to a vegetarian. We don’t have the power to change the product that we’re promoting. Equally, it would also be foolish to assume that because some people don’t like the smell, that the smell needs changing – there are obviously other people who are happy with the Old Spice smell. The worst thing they could do is come out with a “New Old Spice” ala Coke’s bad attempt to woo Pepsi drinkers.
Instead of looking at the people who will never purchase Old Spice, you’ve got to look at what effect the campaign has on the people whose needs *are* met by the product.
It’s not just celebrities and advertising people who love this campaign – it’s been passed around by normal people: 20 million views of the first spot on Youtube. First and foremost advertising is about raising awareness – gotta have that before you can make a sale – and the huge amount of free exposure this campaign got (via social media, talkshow hosts, newspapers, bloggers, etc) is to be commended.
With that kind of awareness boost, that kind of popularity, I find it hard to believe that people who had never been exposed to Old Spice before wouldn’t have picked it up in the aisle and had a smell to see if they liked it. If they liked the smell, it would have translated to a sale. You can’t ask for more than that. And the people who already bought OldSpice now love it, because the brand has reinvigorated itself to seem cool, funny, and sexy.
Something that detractors don’t seem to ‘get’ about social media – is that Old Spice has just built themselves a dedicated fan base who they can tap back into whenever they like – without having to purchase media. If Old Spice Guy so much as sneezes, there are hundreds of thousands of people who will hear about it immediately, and as they have self qualified themselves as the core target market of fans/friends/followers, they will spread those messages amongst their network, helping communication spread to an even larger audience.
This wasn’t just a one off campaign: it did the groundwork by building a highspeed network that will continue to pay for itself in the future. Relationships are the new currency.
What I find highly ironic is that these debates about whether a campaign is truly good or not – whether it translates to sales – only come up when the creative is brilliant. Like, you think that boring advertising (which can only get an audience by purchasing media spots) is more ‘effective’? Please, do start pulling apart the 95% of normal advertising that is almost always boring, insulting, and painful to watch.
Don’t get me wrong – I’m all for effectiveness and, like you, I can’t stand creative that is too ‘clever’ for it’s own good. However, in this instance, the OldSpice campaign hit the right spot – it is beloved by normal people, by its target audience, and it’s done more than just get a short term spike in sales – it has created a fan base.
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@Luci Temple,
Nailed it. Great comment.
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@Luci Temple. 100% ditto.
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All great points – but where the hell can you buy this stuff?
Granted it’s aimed at the North American market but I would have thought it would be around here somewhere…
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anyone?
guess P&G has their work cut out for them in Aus…
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I don’t think P&G has control of old spice in OZ. I think its a distributor in a similar vein to the covergirl.factor arrangement with heat group..
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