Friday, July 16, 2010

"Hello, ladies!" (or, "The Perfect Advertising Campaign")

Commercials bug the heck out of me.  As a rule, they try to sell you something you don't need, often with lies, or at least misinformation, and they try to make you feel un-cool if you don't have what they're selling.

However, I can respect the techniques, if not the message, when a commercial is unique, funny, or just amazingly well done.  The new Old Spice ads are one of those series that just astounds me at how good they are, and how creative the whole campaign is.  Not only do they have amazing commercials, but the star is extremely charismatic, and the personalized video responses are a completely original approach to advertising.  And judging by the number of views on YouTube, this all has been an incredible success.




First, in case you haven't seen the commercials:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owGykVbfgUE&hd=1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uLTIowBF0kE&hd=1


Their latest thing is to do video answers to peoples' questions/comments. Here are a few:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5KIYhXa_8E

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J8Bli13rO9A

http://www.youtube.com/user/OldSpice#p/u/120/zI3VohWMW1Q


On that page, there are a ton more, most pretty good.  One in particular asks about getting his voice on their answering machine:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8JsvwUcok0

So someone, not even associated with Old Spice, took that and made a program to do that for you:

http://www.oldspicevoicemail.com/

Awesome.

Oh, and it's also spawned many, many spoofs, the best of which is this one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkd5dJIVjgM

And this one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=8JsbSolUF5c

Now THAT is what I call a successful advertising campaign.  No matter your feelings on ads, you've just got to admire it.  And go buy some Old Spice.

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