ADVERTISING – a word that plays a very big role to put your business on the map. Advertising is an activity or profession of producing advertisements for commercial products or services.
As a business owner, our main goal is to SELL – which means that we should be familiar with the art of advertising. Because how else can you let others know your presence, right? And how else can you convert leads to gains?
Advertising businesses can be straight up traced way back the 15th and 16th century, but it mostly revolved around advertising through word of mouth and eventually leveled up its game when the printing press was invented.
Through the years, we might have thought why are there still advertisement flops, boycotting products, marketing meltdown when we have had years to practically enhance the way marketing is done? The truth is, every waking day is a challenge for all of us to think how we may be able to let our products/services be the talk of town. This may sound like a broken radio message, but NO ONE IS REALLY PERFECT – even big business started with 1-2 advertisement flops. Well, if we are going to be an optimistic and risk-taker kind of businessowner, we know that marketing failures will eventually lead us to successful marketing strategies, as long as we never stop trying to make it.
The downside of advertising failures may result to a decrease in sales, lost credibility and reliability, broken partnerships, and eventually complete disappearance from the market. BUT for us not to get to this point , we thought of sharing THREE OF THE BIGGEST ADVERTISEMENT FAILS to get an idea what WE should NOT DO when marketing our business.
1. MISTAKE #1: MISSING THE MARK
In the age of consumerism and brand awareness, businessowners should stay true to what our products/service stand for or believe in – that of course is relevant to what we are offering. Sometimes marketing campaigns just doesn’t hit that mark though, our biggest advertising blunder would be creating an advertisement that doesn’t even, get close to our brand.
Example: Kendall Jenner’s Pepsi Commercial Fiasco
(c) NBC news
This has gone viral 3 years and has since made rounds in social media and worldwide news, not because it is an awesome commercial, but because it was a COMPLETE DISASTER. Who would have thought that a certain drink could be the solution to world peace? LOL. At some point it’s hilarious how they were able to come up with the idea. It may have sounded awesome in the meeting room, but it ended as a complete fiasco when they finally got it out there.
The point is, this should not have happened if they just hit the right mark – marketing the real message of your brand.
Consumers these days has been more keen in pointing EVERY wrong choice of word, EVERY material, EVERY sign, actually EVERYTHING they see in any advertisement. Not because it’s their hobby, but because it’s easy to see when a certain brand message is NOT AUTHENTIC
So how can we make sure not to repeat the same mistake as PEPSI did? STAY TRUE TO THE MESSAGE OF OUR BRAND. Webuild the trust of our consumers by being true and authentic – selling the brand for what it truly is and not inventing things that are way wayyy out of what it is supposed to be.
2. MISTAKE #2: LOGO GONE LOCO
Logos are a must-have for any business or brand as it is what identifies us from the rest and gives us leverage among our competitors. If this isn’t carefully thought of and made right, it may just be one of our tickets to saying goodbye to what we want our brand should be about or say to people.
Example: CONTROVERSIAL 2012 LONDON OLYMPIC GAMES LOGO
(c) Sessions College
Around the time this colorful logo was revealed to the public, it has garnered more backlash than a warm welcome. Some 34000 people have petitioned for it to be changed for the following reasons: It was said to provoke epileptic seizures, it looks like some sort of comical sex act between “The Simpsons”, it Is not beautiful and memorable at all, etc.
This has created ruckus and followed by a lot of explanations, but since it was already approved they did decide to keep it that way because they believed people will warm up to it in time.
Coming up with the perfect logo that would speak for our brand is a challenging part of the business. Some big brands even had to change theirs 2-3 times just to arrive at the perfect one that would send the right message and be loved by all. (Ex. NASA, Google, Starbucks, etc.)
Logo design is an art itself. Thinking about it long and hard, getting the opinions of others, testing the waters, etc. are all vital to its success. We need to find the perfect mix of clean imagery and brand representation to make our logo a memorable one for consumers.
When our uniqueness, personality, and reliability is clearly well-represented in our business logo and people start coming through, then we can say we have made the right one.
3. MISTAKE #3: THE MISMATCHED GAME
Brand extension is one way of expanding our reach and of course create more revenue for our company. Creating new products under the same brand and hopefully the same intention would give us a chance to sell better amongst our competitors. We may even capitalize with what’s in demand as long as it matches our game.
Some big companies who has done this are Cadbury – most known for their sweets, has added more products like ice cream, oats, etc. and Toothpaste companies with their toothbrushes
However, moving in with this type of advertisement also has its downfalls when not thought of well.
Example: HARLEY DAVIDSON WINE COOLERS FLOP
(c) Pinterest
Again, with the brand message! Advertising is challenging especially when what we are advertising is as confusing as heck. We all know that Harley Davidson is known for selling luxurious and amazing motorcycles, in which case a message along with it would be NOT TO DRINK AND DRIVE. How on earth have they thought of extending their brand to wine coolers!?
Don’t get me wrong, the wine coolers are amazing, but are they not advocating “Don’t drink and drive”? So, does this mean, by buying this from them, you are now persuaded to drink and drive and live a little? Hmmm…
Brand Extensions can really do wonders for our business, if done well, it can help us build on a wide array of a diversified product line that can lead to upselling opportunities! But, they can also be our downfall and get us to lose loyal consumers if advertisement is done poorly.
CONCLUSION
Marketing is fun if you have the right people to help and back you up! It all starts with getting to know your people and making sure that your brand stays true to what you believe in or what you stand for. Stay away from this kind of advertising fails and your business will go a long way.