The Big Brands Still Don’t Get It

HERE’S ANOTHER BRAND AD THAT TAKES A LITTLE figuring out.

The most important elements seem to be one of the headlines, “How About a Free Hand?” and a picture of a woman’s hand holding a soccer ball signed by Olympic champion soccer player Carla Overbeck.

This picture and headline seem at best to have a very weak logical connection. I did extensive market research (showed the ad to family members) and none of us could figure out what it meant. Could it be an ad for a soccer ball called Free Hand that is endorsed by Carla Overbeck?

But no.

Below that we see a picture of a hand holding a disposable plate loaded down with a huge double burger. And alongside is another headline, “So Strong Just One Hand Can Handle It!”

Now we’re getting somewhere: A good, strong, straightforward unique selling proposition, with an illustration that reinforces the words.

And then, to answer the question on our minds — What’s so strong, etc?) — a picture of the product (a Dixie UltraStrong plate).

And where is the Internet address just about every print ad includes these days? Where most readers wouldn’t notice: way, way down at the bottom, in white letters so tiny you can’t read them in the reproduction shown here.

So once again a brand advertiser (which, I’m sure, prides itself on the best product design, market research and advertising talent money can buy) stumbles and…well, maybe flops is too strong a word.

The advertiser fails to take advantage of the most important development in potential ad effectiveness in more than a decade. Instead it fritters money away on a jumbled announcement ad with an unpersuasive celebrity endorsement. What a pity, because the ad could be doing two jobs at the same time: building the brand and promoting the Web site. And the Web site does eight or nine jobs at the same time.

The $20 billion parent company Georgia-Pacific and its subsidiaries obviously have spent considerable time and effort getting experts to construct an extremely elaborate, multifeatured Web site that might appeal to customer households, especially those with children.

But then what? How does it build traffic? Google Adwords wouldn’t amount to much. Not many people are going to search Google for “paper plates” or “Dixie cups.” Expensive targeted banner ads or pop-ups? Maybe, but who’s the target? And will they resent the intrusion and refuse to be herded to the Web site?

No, rather than Dixie trying to find likely site visitors on the Internet, it seems to make more sense to get potential visitors to find their way to the site through the doorway of targeted brand advertising in targeted print media.

There Dixie could include, at virtually no additional cost, a number of powerful inducements for readers to visit the Web site. The ad becomes a brand-building gateway to the site, which can then bombard respondents with far more product-sales promotion and relationship marketing than is possible within the confines of a single print ad.

This way, the print ad would achieve a shallow penetration into the minds of a broad audience of millions of readers passing by. Not many would respond…but the mere thousands who did would be prime prospects exposed to a far deeper brand experience, one that could be attitude-changing.

My makeover takes the almost unprecedented step of making the Web site the subject of the headline and the ad. It summarizes some of the key attractions for visitors, and for good measure throws in one that, as far as I know, doesn’t even exist. I merely invented “free samples” — but why not? Wouldn’t that be a more powerful way to interest and convert hot prospects for a product like the Dixie UltraStrong plate than a 59-cent coupon? And don’t forget, the lifetime customer value of such a convert could far outweigh the cost of processing the free sample request.

Then I try to (a) do a better job of featured product selling than an ad with a great big soccer ball, and (b) merchandise some of the Web site’s features that stand a good chance of attracting prospects.

You like coupons? We have them for five brands. You like sweepstakes entries? We have those, too. You enjoy how-to articles in home and family magazines? We have lots of them. You have small children you need to entertain and educate? You’ve come to the right place. So what are you waiting for?

I’m convinced this is the future of brand advertising in print, but it’s mighty slow in coming. When will the big brands finally get it?

THOMAS L. COLLINS ([email protected]) has been a direct marketing copywriter, admaker, agency creative director and co-author of four books on marketing. He is currently an independent creative and marketing consultant based in Portland, OR.