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John Tantillo's Brand Winner... And Loser: Paranormal Activity and Frosty, The Inappropriate Snowman
Posted by The Marketing Doctor at 12/6/2009 11:11 PM 
Categories: Branding
Tags: Charlie Sheen controversial Target Market Paranormal Activity Paramount The Inappropriate Snowman buzz marketing Two and a Half Men core brand characteristics Adam Lambert social networking horror movie How I Met Your Mother branding Frosty The Snowman Neil Patrick Harris CBS grass roots cross-promotion Tantillo adpublitizing cross-promote Frosty core brand features marketing campaign
Categories: Branding
Tags: Charlie Sheen controversial Target Market Paranormal Activity Paramount The Inappropriate Snowman buzz marketing Two and a Half Men core brand characteristics Adam Lambert social networking horror movie How I Met Your Mother branding Frosty The Snowman Neil Patrick Harris CBS grass roots cross-promotion Tantillo adpublitizing cross-promote Frosty core brand features marketing campaign
Brand Winner… | And Loser |
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John Tantillo’s Winner and Loser of The Week:
Winner: Paranormal Activity
Loser: Frosty, The Inappropriate Snowman
Folks, two takes on marketing and media. Wow! The Winner and Loser couldn’t be more different in action and outcome —it’s the difference between smart marketing and try-hard, too-clever marketing going terribly wrong.
The Winner
Paranormal Activity, the box-office smash, is this week’s winner. The horror movie was made for a reported $15,000, and as of this past weekend it has grossed 100 million dollars worldwide.
That’s a 433,900% return on investment.
But as you may have suspected, it’s not just the money that makes it our brand winner; it’s the marketing.
First, Paramount did their marketing/internet-smart magic to first identify the right Target Markets (mainly college students), then start a grass roots campaign via Twitter and Facebook. They followed this with a small release and an Internet campaign that allowed people to “demand” a larger release.
But second, and most importantly, Paramount had a product that was genuinely worthy of the buzz. This is a bare-bones, psychological thriller that scares people. A horror film that really horrifies. That’s a brand.
The marketing campaign simply got the word out about that brand the best way possible, and with the greatest impact possible. As is usually the case behind all the most successful marketing efforts in history, the first and most powerful marketing step is having a great product that meets the needs of its Target Market perfectly.
The Loser
I’ve been a marketing man a long time, but I’ve never been as appalled, outraged and saddened as I have over the “Frosty The Inappropriate Snowman” trailers created by CBS.
These trailers are not only morally bankrupt —they are the stupidest kind of marketing imaginable. The dirty-minded lunatics have definitely taken over the asylum this time.
Here’s the background on the story:
CBS seems to have decided to re-cut scenes from its perennial classic Christmas cartoon tale, Frosty The Snowman, with voice-over from two of its most depraved and dirty-minded sit-com characters, played by Neil Patrick Harris and Charlie Sheen.
Apparently, the idea was to cross-promote Frosty, a holiday delight aimed at kids, with its two adult shows “How I Met Your Mother” and “Two and a Half Men.”
The result, a disgusting amateurish marketing catastrophe for four distinct brands, shows Frosty talking about his “porn collection” while surrounded by crowds of smiling minors. What’s wrong with these people? If you want to see for yourself, here is the link to the Neil Patrick Harris clip.
Here’s the damage to each of the four brands as I see it:
CBS
Talk about insulting and possibly injuring your audience. Now when kids look up Frosty The Snowman online, there’s a very good chance that they’ll stumble on one of these two clips. Instead of being regaled with Christmas spirit, they’ll be treated to Frosty talking about porn and picking up women. CBS is a venerable network, but this kind of desperate, depraved and hare-brained approach to marketing its properties will lead to serious questions about the strength of its brand, its management and its future, especially in the current environment, where network television is one big question mark (i.e., after all, just this week Comcast made a deal to buy NBC). While out of my marketing purview, I’d go so far as to say that CBS’ legal department might be putting in some overtime on this one.
Frosty The Snowman
Poor Frosty! What did he do to deserve having his snow-white image dragged through the mud? Nothing. But now it will be hard for many to watch the original without thinking about the smut. Already, people are screaming about never being able to look at Frosty the same way again. This is about stealing people’s memories of childhood and polluting the precious memories of children being formed at Christmas. In an age when big media is talking about the value of its content, this prized piece of content just took a body blow. This might just be the kind of heat that will permanently melt Frosty, magic hat or not. A true shame, and totally avoidable, had CBS simply remembered the Frosty brand.
“How I Met Your Mother” and “Two and a Half Men”
These two shows might come out the least scathed of all four brands in question. Bottom line: the adult content and cynicism of the Frosty clips is in keeping with the content and spirit of these shows. Still, it is possible that both the shows might lose viewers. Why? Because when you watch the “Frosty” clips, you hear just how foul some of the dialogue of these shows is against the snow-white background of the cartoon. Plus, with Adam Lambert recently banned for being lewd and lascivious, isn’t it possible that these shows might come under some pretty serious scrutiny? Moreover, Neil Patrick Harris and Charlie Sheen may lose respect because of their role in this debacle. After all, they’ll be seen as trashing Frosty, a sacrosanct Christmas tradition, and indirectly hurting kids.
A few more points:
You hear people speak about demographics all the time. Presumably, the demographic that watches Frosty and the demographic that watches the two adult shows are different. Yes and no.
The folks watching “How I Met Your Mother” and “Two and a Half Men” likely grew up with Frosty. Around Christmastime, this same demographic probably tunes back into Frosty for a trip down memory lane. They might even share their childhood experience with their own kids.
I can see the brainstorming at CBS that led to this disaster now… Same demographic will appreciate the humor of having foul things come out of Frosty’s mouth. Brilliant!
Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.
Fact is, you’ve got two demographics in the same person. When that fan of “How I Met Your Mother” watches Frosty, he becomes a kid again, especially when he’s watching it with his kids. People don’t wants to see their Christmas traditions dragged through the mud, or be perceived as associated with something dirty in front of their wide-eyed kids.
There’s also the issue of adpublitizing. I’ve defined adpublitizing as creating an ad that is sure to generate controversial coverage —in turn promoting a brand for a low advertising cost. I wouldn’t be surprised if adpublitizing was also part of CBS’ plan. But in this case, the adpublitizing has backfired, and the coverage will only do damage.
To tell the truth, I for one won’t be unhappy if it does do some damage and discourages this kind of thing from happening again. Only the worst kind of marketing crawls right out of the gutter and into our living rooms and the lives of our kids.
And remember, the business of the arts and the business of media is always easier when you keep marketing and branding in mind.
TODAY'S TANTILLO TAKEAWAY -
Before you think promotion, think core brand characteristics. If your core brand characteristics are not reflected in the promotional idea, then don’t do the promotion —no matter how exciting or clever it might seem.
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