When celebrities get in the way

Peter Daboll came out with an article last week in Ad Age taking celebrity marketing to task.  Daboll’s point comes down to this, Celebrities don’t make an ad good (or bad).  And while plenty of marketers think that throwing out a celebrity= effective marketing, famous faces do not make up for weak and inconsistent messaging, and Subway, thee of the wildly successful, (and margin killing) $5 footlong, were nice enough to show two ads, running concurrently which prove Dabol’s point well. 

Yes, we’ve covered this before.  Celebrity endorsements, when done right can lend legitimacy and “buzz” to a product, but getting the right celebrity is already a tricky proposition.  Aside from the risks for brands when seemingly good famous people go bad (As Caroline’s article about Paris Hilton discussed) ensuring that your celeb matches up well with your product, and core demographic, is not an easy task.  Like, for instance, Danica Patrick (setting the integrity of female racers back) with those awful GoDaddy.com spots.  One has little to do with the other.  The YBIS favorite? Michael Gorbachev selling Luis Vuitton handbags.  Yes, Seriously.  But, uh, no, we don’t get it either.   

Enter Subway.  The restaurant chain decided that well, if one celebrity can raise your brand’s profile, then 8 celebrities would work wonders.  But instead of keeping things fresh, (unlike their actual food—-zing!) by creating an integrated campaign giving each its own spot, they put them all in one commercial.  In 30 seconds we get: Michael Strahan, Justin Tuck, CC Sabathia, Nastia Liukin, Tab Ramos (yes THE Tab Ramos!), Leila Ali, Michael Phelps, and some guy with a goatie (who may or may not be famous) all talking about different things they like to get when they go to Subway.  

So not only do we have a hot mess of mostly famous people, we also have a confusing delivery of what should be a very simple messaging point, customizable orders.  While the idea of showing all the different endorsers was meant to underscore that point, what we’re left with unfortunately is B (and C)-listers randomly naming toppings they like.  We also hear about their $5 footlong deal, “Creating Everyday Value”.  But wait, was the message customizable sandwiches? Or is it value? Does anything stand out about this piece? I mean, besides Tab Ramos of course.  Instead of using smart writing with simple messaging, Subway instead tried to throw lots of star power at us hoping their brand would be able to take advantage of Tab Ramos’ Q rating. 

 ”Unlike many other brands, we don’t use celebrities, we use fans of Subway who happen to be famous…These guys and gals really do eat at Subway, so it’s natural for them to talk about the brand.”  —Subway CMO Tony Pace 

But hey, what do I know, Subway was in fact rated the hottest brand of 2010 in Research Firms Yougov brand Buzz chart.  But I doubt this was the spot that did it, instead I offer you this fantastic, and concurrently running ad:

Remember that the ultimate point of an ad is to break through the clutter, be disruptive, and this spot is funny, inventive, and memorable.  It also plays off of what catapulted Subway into national prominence in the first place, and the inherent advantage Subway has over its other fast food competitors—Healthy.   Though it struck gold with its $5 footlong recession busting special, it also locked itself into the trap of price based value propositions, distracting customers away from the value found in the product, like say “Healthy”, or “Customizable”.  You’ll notice this spot makes no mention of $5 footlongs, “value” or anything cheap.  You’ll also notice that it has no celebrities.  The writing is clever, and consistent with the value proposition of “healthy” which the brand already knows works.  It also fits into the Category Need bucket of branding, differentiating Subway from other fast food chains which cannot match Subway on its healthier menu options.  In the end Subway relied on solid marketing principles, simple messaging and clever disruptive creative work instead of just shoving celebrity endorsers in front of the camera.  

Though according to the Yougov study, Subway is doing a great job of marketing its chain, were they to stop trying to mask bad writing with celebrities and instead leverage the creativity and core messaging of its 1812 overture spot, who knows what heights they could reach. 

—Ben Malki