Category Archives: Website

McWhopper for World Peace

mcwhopper

Burger King released a video proposal on Wednesday as an open letter to its No. 1 competitor McDonald’s, calling for the two burger powerhouses to bury the hatchet in honor of World Peace Day on September 21st.

The fast-food chain proposed a pop-up shop at the halfway between its headquarters in Miami and McDonalds’ headquarters in Chicago, in Atlanta as the middle ground. The shop would exclusively serve “The McWhopper,” half-Big Mac and half-Whopper, designed to “settle the beef” between the two companies for a day. In addition, to the video, the company also created a website illustrating the logistics of the proposal, even featuring an endorsement from nonprofit Peace One Day founder Jeremy Gilley and the recipe for the proposed hybrid burger.

However, the advertisement was seen by some as both a not-so-subtle challenge and a cheap marketing stunt, namely, by the face of McDonald’s himself, who released a public rejection letter of the proposal. “We commit to raise awareness worldwide, perhaps you’ll join us in a meaningful global effort?” wrote Steve Easterbrook, CEO of McDonald’s. “And every day, let’s acknowledge that between us there is simply a friendly business competition and certainly not the unequaled circumstances of the real pain and suffering of war.”

Despite what is clearly a highly-publicized branding move, Burger King seems sincere in its efforts to contribute something meaningful using its status as a popular fast-food chain. McDonald’s seems a little more reluctant to do so, at least in partnership with Burger King.

So who “won”? McDonald’s is making it clear that they refuse to play the game, and in terms of tactics, what was doled out to them as a friendly curveball was slam-dunked over Burger King’s head. But the circumstances of the offer should be taken into account as well. Was it smart or snobby for McDonald’s to reject the offer given that it was for a good cause, especially considering McDonalds’ struggle to stay relevant as of late? You decide.

But all things considered, McDonald’s had better come up with a really great campaign with all this talk of “global awareness.”

What Sparks Our Fire: Creative inter-brand collaborative marketing campaigns (and a little beef)

And So It Begins

old spice

For the first time in history, the two Old Spice spokesmen (Isaiah Mustafa and Terry Crews) are squaring off in a spot together. Last week, Old Spice released a commercial simply entitled “And So It Begins,” which features Mustafa as the rugged everyman in-touch with nature spokesperson for the brand’s Timber scent. Mustafa pitches the scent as “what the angel-faced woman in your life deserves” but is interrupted by Crews, who interrupts him by bursting onto the scene, the embodiment of the aggressive, hyper-masculine male personifying the Bearglove scent. The third scent, Swagger, is also portrayed by Mustafa, as a smooth-talking, debonair gentleman.

mustafa

The campaign encourages consumers (particularly male millennials) to choose which scent best fits their personality and “make a smellmitment,” and the use of both iconic Old Spice spokespeople in one campaign has garnered widespread attention for the brand. However, the two actors aren’t the brand’s only first. Old Spice, in conjunction with the video advertisement, partnered with Imgur, a popular image-sharing site frequented by male millennials, to create a sponsored post that would appear on the site. Its innovative use of GIFs, laser-shooting helicopters, and Imgur-friendly terminology won the community over, and the brand was commended for its familiarity with its target audience, with users commenting things like “a shamless ad I can get behind” and “I’ll allow it”.

bearglove

The scents are available in a variety of products, from body wash to deodorant, and will be promoted through a series of six more spots this fall.

What Sparks Our Fire: Brands that not only invent creative and engaging campaigns, but know their audience well.

Google+ is Going Through a Breakup

google plus

Google+ has been suffering from what many tech blogs and business publications are calling a “slow death”—its initial launch established the site as an attempt to be a fully-integrated social platform, with its multifaceted approach rivaling companies like Facebook, Dropbox, WordPress, and Skype.

However, after failing to gain both traction and users in the social media community, it recently announced that it will be splitting the platform into three different components: Hangouts, Photos, and Streams. Hangouts is a video chatting service that will remain independent of Google+, photos is a storage space for images that will be added to Google Drive, and streams covers the rest of the Google+ experience along with News and Blogger.

While the idea of a streamlined, all-in-one social media platform sounded like a good idea, perhaps it was the ambition of the venture that led to its demise; users considered the Google+ login to YouTube a nuisance, found the interface unaesthetic, and the whole system a cheap Facebook facsimile.

Google has finally compromised, maintaining the best aspects of Google+ like Hangouts and Photos, and has removed the Google+ sign-in on YouTube, much to users’ delight.

The moral of the story: Don’t put all of your digital marketing eggs in one basket, especially if your product is at risk of being disruptive—and not in the good way.

What Sparks Our Fire: Google+ taking the next step forward and making smart decisions in the face of a highly-publicized technological failure.

Vice Goes Broad

broadly

Popular media website Vice has announced the release of its 11th channel, Broadly, which caters to female readers.

Its tongue-in-cheek tagline “For Women Who Know Their Place” is a tribute to its mission to promote broader coverage of issues with a female perspective, including “politics, culture, sex, and fashion.” While its content (reproductive health and fertility, gang activity, drug culture, etc.) maintain’s Vice‘s edge and envelope-pushing tendencies, Broadly aims to add a new dimension to such topics.

A major distinction from its other sites is the noticeable lack of comments section, in order to encourage civil discussion and a safe space. However, in true Vice fashion, it will focus on subject matter that is generally underreported by the mainstream media.

This marks an important shift in focus for Vice, capitalizing on the momentum of feminism in the media and seeking to carve out its unique place in branding culture.

What Sparks Our Fire: A digital publication expanding its brand by creating a space for candid conversation among women about prevalent modern issues.