An hour of TV commercials

For this blog entry, I chose to watch an hour long program on TV and to pay close attention to the advertisements and see how different companies are using TV advertising as one mean of marketing communication to sell their brand, or to build brand equity.  In an interesting twists, I had pre-recorded the show Chuck on NBC, but instead of watching the program and fast forwarding through the commercials I fast forwarded through the show and watched the commercials.  

Marketing communications are the means by which firms attempt to inform, persuade, and remind consumers- directly or indirectly- about the brands they sell. When it comes to having an effective TV ad, the ad should contribute to brand equity in some demonstrable way by enhancing awareness, strengthening a key association or adding a new association, or eliciting a positive consumer response.

Some of the main commercials I saw multiple times were for the companies and that showed aspects of building brand equity were:

H&R Block

Ford/ Knight Rider

Aflac

Kia - Kiamatch.com

Dunkin Donuts Coffee 

H&R Block is a place that assists people with their taxes.  Their current mantra in their commercials is the "I've got people."  One of the commercials involved two men that worked at a German type of restaurant and were looking through a catalogue of new German clothes.  One guys was talking about how 'his people' helped him to be able to write off a bunch of these clothes because they were a work expense.  The commercial was goofy and odd, but instead of the guy just saying that he uses H&R Block, the 'I've got people' mantra makes him sound more important.  The other commercial involved a couple and the guy was doing the taxes online from a program he bought from H&R Block.  He gets stuck and his wife, talking down to him because he did not just have them do their taxes, but reminds him that he can still get online help with the software.  So even though they were doing their taxes online, they 'still had people.'  If you go to H&R's website, you do not see that mantra, but you do see images of actual people who look like they are ready to assist you, so they are really trying to give an image of personability and appeal to an individual.  They really appeal to the fact that they can get a larger refund back to you, so they are building their brand equity with people because they are claiming that they can create more value for people when you use them to do taxes.

The Ford/ Knight Rider commercial was a spot for a new television series that is going to be on NBC.  It is a new series, but a remake of the old Knight Rider show, but the spot is more of a Ford commercial, because the car that will be featured in the show is going to be a suped up Ford Mustang.  The way the commercial plays feels like a car commercial and not a tv show spot.  A quick search on the Internet with "kight rider + ford" brings up more sites talking about the car than the new TV series.  Popular Mechanics has an article comparing the Ford Mustand to the old Knight Rider car (Trans-Am).  Ford's website features press releases talking about the car's new starring role.  NBC.com has a small picture and link to previews for the show in the very bottom left corner of their site.  So this is a co-branding opportunity for both companies.  Ford is attaching to a well known tv series (at least the old one was well known) and to a well known network.  NBC is doing the same in bringing back a known tv series.  The challenge with that is not creating awareness so much as it is upholding previous awareness and expectation that are created from the original show.

The Aflac commercial continued to use the Aflac duck as a central point, but more so in showing points-of-difference when a fictitious company does not have Aflac.  While an eager employee in a factory is asking the boss if they have Aflac, the boss begins to tell the employee they do no and he continues to explain all of the things they don't have because they don't have Aflac.  Meanwhile, their insurance company is represented by a dumb monkey that does not know what it is doing.  So, Aflac is the duck, and the bad insurance company is the monkey.  I personally do not remember what the main points of difference were and what exactly Aflac offered that the bad insurance company offered, but the main point was that a company would be ill equipped insurance wise if they did not go with Aflac.  The duck is smart and can talk, the monkey is mute and throws factory parts around.  The Aflac duck has also become a very recognizable marketing tool for Aflac and a consumer can easily understand the intended message for this commercial, which was presented in a creative and somewhat humorful way.  I personally think the duck is annoying and would be wary of choosing insurance from such a cartoonish image of a company.  Yes, I am very aware of Aflac, but I am aware in a negative way that deters me from ever wanting what they offer.  

The Kia commercial utilized the idea of Internet dating to compare their vehicle offerings, which can be found online.  The commercial is a spoof of Internet dating and customers find their 'match' online and talk about their news cars like they found a new boyfriend or girlfriend.  This commercial in itself is utilizing multiple marketing communication channels in that it makes direct reference to their online entity and how searching for a car at kiamatch.com.  The actual website also play to the idea of car dating sites.  There is a clear and consistent communication to the consumers from Kia.  It is simple and Internet dating is a well known fact of life these days, so targeted consumers can relate to this marketing campaign.  This campaign also seems to coincide with the upcoming Valentine's holiday.

The Dunkin Donuts commercial stuck out to me as a brand building communication because lately, Starbucks in facing increased competition from Dunkin Donuts, as far as coffee sales go.  This commercial was geared to make consumers aware that Dunkin Donuts coffee could now be purchased in a grocery store, and not just in a Dunkin Donuts store.  The idea of the commercial was that a stocker in a grocery store could not even empty his cart of Dunkin Donuts coffee onto the shelf before people grabbed it up.  The message of the commercial was one that showed the popularity and consumption of the brand, but also the new availability of the brand in grocery stores.  Dunkin Donuts, as a brand, has been around since the 1960s and is one of the top ten franchises in America.  I am curious as to how they will fare in grocery stores.  My personal feelings about the brand as a coffee maker are that the coffee is cheap and I have always found Dunkin Donut stores to be dirty.  Seeing their coffee brand in a store would dredge up those same feelings, as opposed to how I view Starbucks brand, which seems to me to be nicer coffee (maybe because of the price) with nicer stores that have character in their environment and look.  Yet, if the price for the grocery store Dunkin Donut coffee is cheaper than the Starbucks brand, I would give it a try I think.  But, I would never choose a Dunkin Donut store over a Starbucks based on my past experiences with the stores.

These were not all of the commercials I saw over the hour of programming, but the ones that really struck me as creating more brand awareness and attempting to build brand equity through the marketing communication of television advertising.