How do we measure marketing, advertising, and PR strategies and tactics? Well, we often argue about what is great, but we rarely (if ever) argue about what’s bad. Very simply, marketing that makes us cringe.
Bad marketing is more than just wasted time or money. It’s lost opportunity. The 2 Guyz Larry created the 9 P’s of Marketing (Planning, Product, People, Price, Promotion, Place, Partners, Presentation, and Passion). There is so much that goes into good marketing, that’s it’s easy to go astray. Unfortunately, for some, it’s easy to turn not-so-good marketing into bad marketing.
Bottom Line: Some ads should have never run, some press events should never have happened, and some brands have just taken terrible turns for the worse.
A major lesson learned: If anyone in a client meeting or in the approval process should have said, “No way,” listen to them, and take another look at what you are doing.
So, for your marketing “guilty pleasure”, we present to you, the 2019 Baddie Awards!
cringe • /krinj/ verb
bend one’s head and body away from an ad or promotion in fear or in a servile manner.
“they cringed away from the ad and thought negatively about the brand, for almost forever.”
1. (tie) Juul
Juul’s “Product.” Mint was their most popular showing mint’s huge popularity among underage and teenage vapers. Mint accounted for about 70% of Juul’s sales in the U.S. Juul Labs has immediately stopped online sales of their mint “Products” in October, it was last month that Juul Labs announced that they would stop the sale of flavors other than tobacco, mint and menthol.
1. (tie) Santa Anita Race Track
Santa Anita Race Track, with its 37 racing and training deaths of horses. Do we need to continue a sport which horses die at a rate of 1.68 for every 1000 starts? Think about track and field and human. How is this acceptable to entertain bettors and race track goers? During the 2019 season, there were 493 horse racing fatalities. Enough is enough.
3. Political Ads
Any 2019 political ad, since most are not believable. We can’t wait for 2020. That’s sarcasm.
4. Cheez-It Pizza
The stuffed Cheez-it pizza from Pizza Hut. It gets on our list because of how it looks.
5. M&M’s
M&M’s running the “Spy” spot in their cinema advertising, running over and over and over. This cinema spot appeared on last year’s list and is on again. Still running. Enough is enough. Frequency of obnoxious ads makes them worse.
6. IHOP
IHOP’s Happy Mother’s Day to ALL the moms out there!” They tweeted a bizarre image of a towering pile of pancakes seemingly stacked inside a woman’s body, via an ultrasound. Inappropriate image and promotion. “If you have pancakes in your tum tum does that make you a pancake mum mum?”
7. Movie Pass
Last September 14, 2019, MoviePass was shut down. MoviePass, the subscription service that spent enormous amounts of venture capitalists’ money subsidizing movie tickets in a bid to upend the theater business model, is officially died. Last year Movie Pass said it had 2,000,000 subscribers at $9.95/month, letting movie goers see a movie a day. 30 movies a month. When it seems unbelievable, it usually is. Too much demand. Couldn’t sustain and had to take out loans. Dropped from 30 movies a month to 3, plus limited access to wide-release movies during peak demand. Not the same deal. Couldn’t generate any more investor money. DOA.
8. Tesla
Tesla’s Pickup Cybertruck Press Conference. Tesla is cool. Elon Musk is cool. But who told them to demonstrate breakproof glass by throwing a rock at it…twice?!?!? And doing without being 100% sure it would work. That was a PR gaff that will be remembered (and enjoyed) by many years to come.
9. Facebook
Facebook. Facebook makes over $50 billion a year. They have more than a billion users. Yet they just can’t seem to get this whole “security” thing together. This year we learned more about Cambridge Analytica and their access to all of our private data, data breeches, fines (some $5 billions of fines from the FTC alone!) Facebook…we like you, but we don’t need you to survive. You must protect our data better, or we will leave, and many are threatening to do so in anticipation of the 2020 elections!
10. Boeing
The 737 Max Scandal has really tarnished Boeing’s once rock-solid image.
The Boeing 737 MAX is a narrow-body commercial aircraft series, the fourth generation of the Boeing 737. FAA has said it again, and again: Boeing’s 737 Max is not ready for certification.
]]>And then it pops up. Or, “poops” up, if you will.
Air Wick’s new VIP (Very Important Pooper) spray rears its, well, less than attractive head.
Think back a year or two, and PooPourri.com went viral with their sweet British accented-spokeswoman chatting cleverishly about the indiscretions of bathroom smells. The spot walks right to the edge of propriety, but somehow straddles it just enough to keep it fun, and not gross.
Unfortunately Air Wick crosses the line. It could have straddled the line, but they chose not. The creatives on this thought a full frame shot of a older man, an airline pilot, sitting on the loo, with shorts around his ankle.
The 2 Guyz like funny spots as much as anyone. Heck, we’ve written and created advertising that gets close, and yes, sometimes crosses the line, but feel it’s only worth it if you’re in a competitive position to capitalize upon it. This is usually reserved for a small, unknown brand that needs to create a name for itself, and shock value matters.
Think GoDaddy.
We’re not puritans here. Far from it. But we do like guiding our clients down paths of long prosperity.
Not sure this spot fits the bill.
Baddies awarded by the 2 GUYZ On Marketing are simply unbelievable, inappropriate, lacking authenticity, bad, and/or horrible efforts in any area of marketing. It can be a concept, creative, production or execution of marketing and advertising strategies and tactics.
But not just anyone or anything deserves a Baddie. “Not good” is not bad enough. Baddie are call outs for marketing, promotional and advertising ideas that should have never happened.
The Baddies:
- They make us cringe.
- They lack taste, sensibility, or propriety
- And, as the 2 Guys on Marketing teach, these marketing and advertising executions are lost opportunities.
In discussing Baddies, a quality we measure is that “it never should have been approved. Anyone in the client meeting or in the approval process should have said: “No way.”
cringe – /krinj/ – verb: bend one’s head and body away from an ad or promotion in fear or in a servile manner.
“they cringed away from the ad and thought negatively about the brand or company, forever.”
So here, for the first time ever, are the 2 Guyz On Marketing’s Baddie Awards for 2018.
10. Domino’s Pizza: In September, a Russian Domino’s franchise owner launched the “Dominos Forever” campaign. Just tattoo Domino’s and you would get 100 Domino’s pizzas a year for life. First off, not sure that’s really the kind of promotion you want…tattoos can fade, sag, scar, etc. In this case, the response was overwhelming. Domino’s had to restrict the offer after they were inundated with people getting Domino’s tattoo. This whiz-bang campaign was supposed to last months, but it was pulled within a day. .
9. Movie Pass: In 2018 Movie Pass said it had 2,000,000 subscribers at $9.95/month, letting movie goers see a movie a day. That’s 30 movies a month. To the 2 Guyz, when something seems unbelievable, it usually is. Too much demand. Couldn’t sustain and had to take out loans. This product and marketing offering dropped from 30 movies a month to three, plus limited access to wide-release movies during peak demand. Not the same deal for consumers. Now it can’t generate little investor money. This reminds us of the dot.com bubble days, what startups believed that somehow, someway, horrible business models could somehow “make it up in the volume.” We think that Movie Pass likened their business to gym memberships, which go largely unused. Well, they proved that avid movie goers WILL use a “too good to be true” service.
8. Burger King: Burger King launched their Smartphone Social Media Campaign. The promotional idea included the activation of Burger King’s list of burger ingredients, which were posted on Wikipedia. Problem: Hackers altered and added special ingredients such as “cyanide.” The 2 Guyz teach that user-generated material has to have monitors and carefully watched and legally approved. Wikipedia is policed by a highly active fan-base, and is easily updated by users. In this way Burger King not only lost control of the message, the message changed…for the worse. Positive PR, turned negative or “negatory,” as they say on the street. Burger King slipped on a really big banana peel. As we say, “know thy customer, know thy competition, know thy media.”
7. LeVar Ball: Do we really need a reason? Okay, here’s a few. LeVar Ball talking “at,” not “with” any media. Media management is challenging for professionals. Letting LeVar Ball represent you to the media is like handing someone a stick of dynamite with a lit fuse. He also preceded to piss off or insult the Lakers, UCLA, President Trump, China, Steph Curry, and a host of others. Big Baller brand is laughed at by pros and financial experts. And his Big Baller Brand was given an F grade by the Better Business Bureau. .
6. Papa John’s: John Schnatter, founder of Papa John’s, suing his own company, prompting loss of sales. Really? Pretty sure this isn’t in any business or Marketing textbooks, the strategy of suing your own company being good for business. Terrible for partners and for sales generation. Allegations of racial epithets, media rants, and blaming the NFL for bad pizza sales…not smart promotion of the brand. John’s action fit under many of the 9P’s of Marketing.
5. Diet Coke: Cringe worthy Diet Coke with flavors. Trying to sell Diet Coke by giving buyers the reasons, too, with the pixie dancing girl. A non-scientific poll conducted by the 2 Guys On Marketing on Gen Z and Millennials indicated this campaign, and the Super Bowl spot in particular, for “Twisted Mango”, was universally panned. Marketing “cool” is very difficult, and the risks frequently do not justify the rewards.
4. Ford: The world before #MeToo and after…it’s all different now! Ford stepped in the poo on this one by running a horrible visual in their ad, three women were bound, gagged, and stuffed in the trunk of a new Ford. Really Ford? Even before Harvey Weinstein this was bad taste at best. Press, media and PR was brutal.
3. Any 2018 Political Ad.:More specifically any 2018 political ad with Nancy Pelosi or Donald Trump. There were over 1,500 TV spots featuring President Trump or Minority Speaker Nancy Pelosi neither of them was running for a local or statewide office. David Ogilvy would say an ad is more successful when you put the “product” in. Were these selling local politicians, or building the brands of these two Washington politi-brands? And political advertising in general stooped to new lows of insensitivity, lying, and bad taste.
And tied for #1:
1. (tie) Michael Avenatti: Michael Avenatti’s Campaign for President ended with his arrest. He’s the lawyer for adult film star Stormy Daniels. A “spokesperson” with repeated exposure across mainstream media much of the year, he was arrested in Los Angeles on a domestic violence charge, according to several media outlets. Avenatti, freed on bail, said he was “not going to be intimidated.” Add the bankruptcy issues and partners’ disputes, plus eviction from his offices for lack of payment, this makes him one of our poster kids for bad Marketing planning. As a brand, his work has not gained him brand value, it has plummeted. He’s a “total” PR nightmare.
1. (tie) Ford: While the recent Southern California fires raged, taking lives, communities and homes, this local Ford dealership in Simi Valley, California ran an ad making light of the fires. Really dumb move. Cringeworthy or is it: “cringe-worthy?”.. it’s both, no matter how you spell it. Local business are like neighbors. Good neighbors? This was a bad move that should have NEVER passed approval.