Ad Wars
Commercials are great, but ad wars are fantastic. Companies and brands are always fighting for the consumer’s dollar, but it’s never as obvious as it is when a brand calls out the competition for all to see. Here is an opportunity for product and service flaws to get exaggerated and put on blast while otherwise professional and well-respected companies stoop to the level of high school smearing and rumor mongering. I cannot stress how happy this sort of thing makes me.
Some ad wars are short, one-sided campaigns. These are generally subtle and, in a way, almost playful. When Domino's introduced a new line of sandwiches, it positioned itself against Subway and took shots at the sandwich chain’s copious use of certain ingredients...
“We got lettuce!”
As viewers, we take pause: dang- Subway DOES use a ton lettuce. What the hell is THAT about??
High school counterpart: Punk wise-cracking new kid from two towns over.
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There have been instances, particularly lately, where we have seen ad wars turn into full on brand assaults.
Apple took competitive bashing to an entirely different (and borderline vicious) level with the very popular Mac vs. PC ad campaign. PCs were exposed as woefully under-performing machines with a long track record of problems. The consumer base was positioned as unhip and not nearly as rad as Justin Long.
High school counterpart: Glenbrook North Seniors.
HP was first to take up the fight and hit back with a star-studded collection of commercials, “HP is Personal Again.”
I’m not thinking about the blue screen of death when Hov talks that baller talk. I’m not stressing about slow boot up time as Jay shows off plans for his Frank Gehry designed Brooklyn Nets stadium (“See that? Cool”). When Pharell goes all Pharell on me and pimps his Ice Cream sneaker collabos with Nigo, I am quick to forget about those viruses. All of those damn viruses.
High school counterpart: Lacoste wearing rich kid who is over-compensating for… many things.
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The most recent and damaging ad war, though, is currently being played out between Verizon and AT&T.
It all started with Apple’s benign “There’s an App for That” iPhone commercial:
Verizon quickly keyed in on the iPhone's exclusive availability through their competitor AT&T with the clever “There’s a Map for That” commercial. The idea being that Verizon could play off of people’s well-documented frustration with AT&T coverage.
I thought these were good; witty, short, and (most importantly) spot-on. Apparently so did AT&T because they sued Verizon to have them taken off the air.
Verizon continued the assault with some other amusing commercials in this campaign (love the face at 0:15):
The deathblow, however, was dealt around the holidays with Verizon’s “Land of Misfit Toys” commercial:
This has to be one of the more damning product statements I have ever seen. Verizon successfully took on the mighty iPhone and portrayed it as useless. Daring and downright disrespectful (an unwanted iPhone, ouch!)… all done with cheery Christmas music in the background.
High School Counterpart: The lone, brave soul who steps to the class bully… and wins.
Of course, AT&T had to respond. Sadly, its hand was forced and the retort was rushed and pathetic.
Fat Luke Wilson? Really? Your brand’s reputation just took an epic beatdown and you come back… with Fat Luke Wilson??
To make things worse, the core of AT&T’s message is bragging about having coverage in major US cities.
“We cover Chicago.”
Really? That’s your response? That you have coverage in the third most populous city in the United States?!?
<Stewie voice> What the deuce?
The follow up effort was no better. AT&T presents “Verizon sucks because you can’t simultaneously use the web and talk on the phone. And even if you had two phones, it would be hard to hold them both at the same time.” Oh yes, that one.
High school counterpart: Your girlfriend, smutted and scorned. Reaching for something, anything to make you look bad. (And we all know that one)
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Like I said, I love commercials and they tend to work on me (Coors Light, as an example) and I like these brand assaults as a nice contrast to promoting one’s own brand.
I used to rep Subway pretty hard, but I started to notice that there is just something not right with those subs and the Domino's commercial reinforced that. This is not to say that I’ll be dining at Domino's… I’m just saying.
Apple so thoroughly dismantled PC, not even The God Jay-Hova could sway my consideration. For anyone that knows me, that’s saying a lot.
And obviously Verizon is the winner here; every time I drop a call, I look down at my iPhone with the sort of disdain I usually reserve for water chestnuts (I hate water chestnuts). It’s funny, too, because AT&T actually does have faster 3G coverage than Verizon. But perception is reality, and commercials certainly lay the groundwork for what we believe. If it wasn’t for my contract (which lasts for the next 2-20 years), I would be long gone.
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I don't get Domino's. They don't fit in anywhere. Pizza Hut owns low cost chain delivery, Papa John's owns high quality chain delivery, and your local place takes up everything else. Domino's tries to throw sandwiches and pasta bread bowls at the problem, but the real issue is that they have no identity. This new admission of criticism campaign reeks of desperation.
Although I recognize that they are extremely effective, I never liked the Justin Long Mac commercials. As someone who has had a Dell laptop with Vista for the past three years and couldn't be happier with it, those smug, borderline rude commercials only galvanized my love of the PC. I felt like I was being assaulted and had to stand up for myself.
Finally, I think AT&T's counter-branding as a "better 3G experience" is stupid. It seems like a capitulation to Verizon's ads. It's as if to say, "We admit Verizon has better coverage, but we're the best when you actually do get a signal." It's like they're the Metro PCS of 3G service.
Papa Johns is a high quality delivery chain? Maybe in how they attempt to market themselves. For the most part, and especially true of larger chains, if a restaurant is a chain it is serving low-quality food.
You're right in that Domino's doesn't really have a competitive advantage. Papa Johns has that delicious cheese bread (watch it, John) and Pizza Hut has the P-Zone (and if that's not still available, they are criminally negligent).
Curious, what do you think of this new campaign? "Hey we sucked so bad and we know it. But we're owning up to it and we promise it's good now!" I think there are a few ways to look at it, but I'm interested to hear what you think.
As for Apple, for awhile I thought that they were just piling it on with the JL commercials. But then they came out with the "Broken Promises" ad:
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BpOvzGiheOM)
and I was reminded that they were right in picking a fight with PC. So. Many. Problems. I can't be be mad at Apple for pointing that out.
AT&T is really blowing it. Now with the news that Apple might end iPhone exclusivity in the US by summer... they lose. They lose a lot.
Re: John, agreed. Papa John's food is definitely not high quality.
They are however successfully marketed as the highest quality of the large delivery chains and they charge a little more because of it. That's why they position their brand as "better ingredients, better pizza." Pizza Hut has their "Big Eats, Tiny Price" menu with a bunch of cheap value items on it (p-zone, pizza mia, pizza rolls, etc) in order to position themselves as the price leader. The real high quality position goes to local pizza places.
You can't point to any one thing that Domino's does well. They have no brand identity. For a while, they were trying to roll out wacky non-pizza items to differentiate themselves. Then they started in on this "we sucked so bad and we know it" (as Jason put it) campaign, which goes for quality by revamping their pizza taste and price by introducing the 2 mediums for $5.99ea deal. They are deliberately attacking Papa Johns and Pizza Hut (respectively) where they live. I doubt it will work well. Trying to compete on both quality and price simultaneously at the very least dilutes the message and at the worst causes cognitive dissonance in the mind of the consumer. This is to say nothing of the fact that starting the ad spots with an admission of poor product immediately casts your brand in negative light. The spots will really have to engage the viewer for them to be successful and for the viewer to process the turnaround message. Finally, Domino's is setting themselves up for failure by focusing so intensely on taste. When the consumer opens a Domino's Pizza box, their mind will be focused on appraising the taste. They will be thinking, "I wonder if this pizza is all it's cracked up to be." One would rather have the consumer open up the box and think, "YAY! PIZZA!" I would expect tepid reactions like the ones the AV Club had when they reviewed the new pizza.
First off, calling Papa John's "high quality" might be a little inaccurate as people have pointed out, but I absolutely believe that there is a seed of truth there. Their toppings and whatnot seem to be of higher quality than the Hut and Domino's - it's not ALL marketing doublespeak. Of course it's still shitty chain food.
Domino's new ad campaign is indeed mystifying, especially for someone like myself who like Domino's pizza just fine. For all the many differences between the chains that have already been pointed out and the marketing strategies identified, the whole thing is very simple for me.
Papa John's - delicious cheesy bread
Pizza Hut - amazing lunch buffet (not offered anywhere in NYC therefore I don't even pay attention to the Hut anymore)
Domino's - Twofer Tuesday coupon and online Pizza Tracker delivery system
Honestly, on food alone, I don't really care which place I'm eating from. But Domino's is succeeding with me where it matters the most at this point in my life - specialty pizzas at a decent price and not having to deal with a real person. That's all I need.
Also, I've seen local pizza places getting a lot of love for quality here. And there are definitely great small pizza places out there, where you pay more for quality. But there are just as many (if not more) shitty local pizza places that still charge more than the chains, and sometimes you don't know what you're going to get.
I am encouraged by the level of discourse here. On Monday the site will become Pizza Blues and we will only discuss pizza.
I was just talking yesterday to people in my office about how awesome the Pizza Hut buffet is. I was surprised- they had no idea such a thing existed. I feel like that's up there with the Red Lobster Shrimp Off in terms of binge food activities that most guys have done before.
What's crazy is that there is only one Papa Johns in the entire city of Chicago, and it's not close (at all) to any of the neighborhoods where young post-college types live. Same thing with Pizza Hut. And there are only two Taco Bells that I am aware of (one is right next to Wrigley and it's 24 hours, so I suppose that's pretty good).
This has always stumped me. How is that possible? You would think that any of those chains could make a killing here.
Anyway, more to the point... I was happy to hear what you said, Jeremiah, because that's interesting. Domino's is basically alienating their customer base that was perfectly happy with their product before. Now they're effectively telling people "You were eating (and enjoying) bad pizza all those years". Seems like a risky move.
On the whole, Domino's just seems really confused about how to position itself.
Well hold on now. I've heard this idea before that Domino's is offending their customers who were happy, and there is certainly logic to that. But I'm not alienated. I didn't think I was eating "good" pizza before. I just knew it was delicious. They can say whatever they want in their dumb commercials (especially if it means that gross walking turd isn't strolling up to people's front doors anymore).
I'm going to order some Domino's next week. I bet it's still delicious, and I bet I can't even tell you what's different about it, and I bet you I don't care either way.
I should have mentioned that my enjoyment of Domino's IS pretty heavily dependent on upgrading to the deep dish crust, which immediately places you in the "baller" zone. Maybe that's why I didn't hate the crap they've been serving all this time, cause that shit definitely does NOT taste like cardboard.
I don't know many Chicagoans, but the ones I do know are fiercely protective of their city's pizza to the point that they would never even consider eating at a shitty delivery chain. Do you think this has anything to do with the lack of locations there? If not, would you guys like to open up a Papa John's in Chicago with me?
I'm surprised the Verizon/AT&T battle has been overlooked here. It's rare that two cell phone companies will go head to head like this and blatantly LIE about the coverage/service/capabilities etc. of the opposing carrier.
Verizon would have you believe that west of the Mississippi your chances of a clear signal with AT&T (perhaps outside of California) are basically non-existent. Are you serious? So AT&T, the the carrier with arguable the most popular cell phone EVER isn't giving service to roughly one half of the country?? Please.
The other side is equally ridiculous. AT&T wants us to believe that using/transferring to Verizon will leave you incapable of surfing the web while in the middle of a phone call. First of all, I think I've needed to do this maybe twice in my entire life, but the point is that I have Verizon, and I'VE DONE THIS!!
Frankly my view is that both companies have hurt themselves by trying to make the other look inferior, although with the amount of oblivious couch potatoes in the U.S. it wouldn't surprise me if the majority of viewers didn't pick up on this, even with how easy it is to see through both campaigns.
Hey Ben,
I wonder if maybe you just looked at the comments and missed the above post?
(I talk about the Verizon/AT&T battle pretty extensively)
That'd be really funny if that is the case.
Anyway, Verizon is only showing a map of AT&Ts 3G coverage, which AT&T argues that Verizon is implying that they don't even cover these areas (a fair argument). They obviously do, but it's just 2G (Edge). The courts sided with Verizon on this.
One thing I actually overlooked (haha) is how all of this really exposes how irrelevant Sprint/Nextel has become.
I remember when pretty much everyone rocked a Sprint phone. Now? Puh.
And Nextel... where to start? If you're getting chirped anywhere outside of a construction site, I think you need to take a serious look at your life and decide what you are doing and why you haven't reevaluated your cell contract in the last 6 years.