It’s not complicated.
That’s the name of the AT&T campaign that’s captured the hearts of social media minded consumers across America. At a family gathering this weekend, the campaign was a big topic of conversation.
“It’s not complicated” is also a truism. You can apply several things they do to your own marketing to improve its memorability and effectiveness.
Have a bunch of variations on the same theme. When you uncover your core message, find a million ways to share it. Cute ads get noticed, but they also wear out more quickly.With Motel 6, we always knew that Bodett guy was going to say Motel 6 would give you a clean, comfortable room for the lowest price of any national chain, and we knew they’d leave the light on for us. Everything else was random and strange and somehow related. That’s what AT&T does. They’ve shot at least a dozen of these ads. Have more ads more often that are variations on your company’s theme or themes.
Spend enough to make sure your message gets tied to your company name. As a golden rule, if you use children in your ads, they should help sell the product because we remember the kids more than the product or service. AT&T was insistent the kids didn’t come across as shills – which is admirable but also a limiting factor. AT&T overcame that limiting factor with cash. In 2012, AT&T was the top advertiser in America – spending $1.59 BILLION dollars. They’ve paid to make sure we see these ads dozens of times so, eventually, we actually associate the cute kid ads with AT&T. For months, I referred to them as the cute kid ads, but I couldn’t tell you who they were for. Could you at first? But now, I’ve seen enough of them, I have built the mental bridge between speed, cuteness, and fun to AT&T.
If you use humor, don’t wink at your jokes. One of my ginormous pet peeves is writers and producers fearing you won’t get how clever they are, so they telegraph the humor. The host of the Complicated ads, Beck Bennett,plays a great straight man. For the most part, he’s perfectly content to let the kids get the great lines, but he moves the ads forward. He does a great job – as does the producing agency BBDO – of trusting that we’ll get the humor. You can do the same. If you’re going to write funny:
- Make sure it’s actually funny.
- Trust your audience to get it.
- Make sure the humor is tied into the sales message.
Unscripted can work wonders… if you’re patient. According to an Adweek story, each shooting session takes about two hours and, though guided by Bennett, they’re generally made up of improvised play by the kids. We love to put both our clients and our clients’ customers in their ad campaigns, but we have to be patient in our interviews to wait and wade through the stuff they think we want to hear to dig for the one story so great we never could have written it. You’ll know them when you get them… you just have to wait and listen.
Make it easy to share your ads. I think the first Complicated ad I saw was via Facebook. People share the things they love… if they can find them. The other day, I saw a great feature story on ESPN, and I couldn’t find a link anywhere to share it. I reached out to ESPN on twitter and got no response. I researched who produced the piece and tweeted them and got not response. #FAIL! Do you have your little bits of persuasive cuteness available on your website so your adoring fans can share your message for you… for free?
Remember that you’ll usually get sick of your ad campaign loooooooong before consumers do. I bet lots of people at AT&T are sick of this campaign. They’re sick of their friends imitating it. They’re sick of catch phrase lines. They’re sick of people doing their best boom face. Tough. The aforementioned Motel 6 radio campaign started in 1986, and it’s still running. Once you’re onto something that works for you, head back up to the top of this list and start over.
Follow these few tips and your ad campaign may improve by a factor of infinity times infinity. Boom.
Click me if you can’t see the embedded video full of awesome.
I love these ads. My wife and I have gotten to the point that we watch the kids that are NOT the focus and they are also hilarious. Sometimes they are mouthing the line of the focus child or nodding in agreement with the inane statements (the “puppy brother’ is one of my faves for this)
To underline your point, I have to really think hard to remember what these cute kids are advertising…when I polled my family they remembered it was phone service, but were not positive if it was AT&T or Verizon.
Having said all that…I look up when these ads come on TV and I look away most other times.
Sometimes in a surly mood, I find myself mimicking the kid who bemoans the werewolf who is too hot. “Whur-whur-whur-whur.” Another aspect of the ads is how the background decor or the kids’ clothes are the same as AT&T’s logo. (See? Sometimes we just don’t KNOW it’s complicated!)
I’m gonna be the contrarian here. The ads are cute and funny. But you could have tortured me with hip hop and I still wouldn’t have able to tell you it was an AT&T campaign. Even after you pointed out the “simplify” theme, I’m still not sure how this relates to their phone service.
The Verizon “Can you here me now” guy, on the other hand, clearly pushed the notion that his company was improving coverage. Similarly, Tom Bodett ended his essays with the consistent message of “clean, comfortable rooms” and the “leave the light on” folksy invitation. I always knew what products these two campaigns were about.
Maybe the AT&T kids will eventually become indenifyable with the brand. But for me…it’s just not that “simple.”