Brands Venturing into the World of Entertainment

More and more brands are exploring ways to add entertainment to their marketing approach. Mark and Lorraine share their thoughts on how brands like Chick-fil-A and Duolingo are testing out games, podcasts, apps, and even animated shows to entertain their audiences. 

Join Mark and Lorraine for 30-ish as they discuss all things marketing, advertising, and of course … positioning!

Transcript

Mark Vandegrift
Welcome to another episode of the Brand Shorthand Podcast. I'm your host, Mark Vandegrift, and with me today is our positioning powerhouse, Lorraine Kessler. Lorraine, before we jump into today's topic, I want to start off with a recall experiment because we're still in the month of the Super Bowl, and we're close enough that I want to see how much recall you have before we do our big experiment next week with getting our panelists to do some recall exercise. So I'm gonna name some, let's call them thematics or some characters from some of the Super Bowl ads and you tell me if you can name the brand associated with it. And then the second part will be, I'm gonna name a few of the celebrities that were used and you tell me if you can recall the brand that was associated with the celebrity. Sound good?

Lorraine Kessler
Okay, that sounds like I'm gonna fail miserably.

Mark Vandegrift 
That's okay. That's the point. It's a recall experiment. And you pay attention more than most people. So that'll tell you. Okay, you ready?

Lorraine Kessler
Although not this year as we already covered, it was my Eagles and it was my birthday and like I and you thankfully let me off the hook to have to review the commercials. So.

Mark Vandegrift 
Yes, I did. Yep. Well, you'll be a better test candidate than most because you didn't pay too much attention. So. OK, I have five here that I think you'll probably get two of them, I'm going to guess. Maybe. I don't know. And the others were so bad that I don't even know what to call that because it wasn't advertising. OK, ready? First one.

Lorraine Kessler
Yeah.

Mark Vandegrift
Fleshy cowboy hat. Name the brand.

Lorraine Kessler
I have no idea. I wish I had a comeback, I don't. But Fleshy Cowboy Hat is...

Mark Vandegrift 
Yeah, was like kind of gross and perverted all at once. It was Tubi. Okay.

Lorraine Kessler
Yeah. Okay. Remember it now. Unaided. I do not remember it. Excuse me a second. But aided, I do.

Mark Vandegrift 
Yeah, so was the kid that was born with the shape of a cowboy hat and he was being bullied because some other people had some like supposedly fancy party hat they were born with. But this whole thing of your head being shaped weirdly, everyone just thought, that's weird. Okay, you ready for the next one? Pickleball matches.

Lorraine Kessler
Oh that's ultra. Michelob. Yeah.

Mark Vandegrift 
Very good. I figure you'd get that one. 

Lorraine Kessler
That was a good land connection.

Mark Vandegrift 
Well, what about the Muppets?

Lorraine Kessler
Ohhh and I even saw this watch this one. No, no.

Mark Vandegrift 
They were having bad vacation and good vacation experiences. Does that help?

Lorraine Kessler
what was it? What was the brand?

Mark Vandegrift 
Booking.com.

Okay, the next one, flying eyebrows.

Lorraine Kessler
the flying eyebrows was Little Caesar's. I almost got it. Yeah, I almost got confused with the Pringles flying mustache.

Mark Vandegrift 
So what were the, who's were the flying eyebrows? Do you remember the celebrity? And what was he advertising?

Lorraine Kessler
Yeah, Eugene Levy

Little Caesars. They're a new product. This little like cheese cup thing or whatever. Yeah.

Mark Vandegrift 
Okay, well good. You have better recall on that one than what I thought. Okay, this last one is there's a boxer child or a kid getting out of a hospital after recovering from cancer. What was the brand?

Lorraine Kessler
I don't know, was that an uplifting spot?

Mark Vandegrift 
Yeah, it actually ranked pretty highly on AdMeter, but I don't think anybody's gonna recall it, because even shortly after the commercial, I asked people, they were thinking it was a hospital that treated cancer.

Lorraine Kessler
yeah, yeah, yeah. remember everybody thinks it's a hospital and it wasn't. Yeah, I, it's Pfizer. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I remember that. And I remember thinking it was for St. Jude's or something. They're not really paying attention. And then then it was like Pfizer and I was kind of like, really? Yeah.

Mark Vandegrift 
Yeah. Okay, I'm name a few celebs and you tell me if you can remember the brand. You ready? Adam Devine.


Lorraine Kessler
No.

Mark Vandegrift 
Cirkul.

Lorraine Kessler
What is Cirkul?

Mark Vandegrift
Water. It's like a, yeah, they went off the theme of hydrating water. That was their whole thing.

Lorraine Kessler
Okay, okay. It's spelled weird, isn't it? It's not spelled like, so it's... Yeah, I remember that I never heard of the brand before. And now I don't remember how to spell it.

Mark Vandegrift 
It's C-I-R-K-U-L.

It's popular with younger people. I'm thinking that one might have hit better with them than it did with us older folks. Okay, you ready for the next one? Gordon Ramsay.

Lorraine Kessler
I didn't even know he did a spot.

Mark Vandegrift 
OK. Well, you won't get it then. It was hexclad. Have you ever heard of that? OK.

Lorraine Kessler
yeah, that's his, he is the spokesperson for Hexclad. It's a wonderful frying pan and set and whatever. And you know, he really gets behind it. I, on the other hand, researched and bought Green Pans, which Stanley Tucci is the sponsor.

Mark Vandegrift 
okay. Interesting. Okay, one more. David Beckham.

Lorraine Kessler
that's the one where he's with, is it Matt Damon? Okay, and that is for...I'm gonna say it's for a beer, Stella Artois. Stella Artois. Okay, okay.

Mark Vandegrift
It is a beer. it's...There you go. You got it. That was the other David where he learns he has a long lost brother.

Lorraine Kessler
I only remember that because I think he's really handsome. David Beckham. And I like Matt Damon, but so if he's in it, I'm paying attention.

Mark Vandegrift
Okay, well, how that went, I don't know. That's for our viewers to decide if they could even remember any of those, but that...

Lorraine Kessler
But also, wasn't Matt Damon, didn't he do a thing with Stella Artois and kind of a charitable thing with them? Wasn't he involved in the past? I seem to think there's some association with Matt Damon and Stella Artois. That's, I carry you.

Mark Vandegrift 
Well, and going back to our previous episode last week about the Ziegarnik effect, all the teasers on that were, who's this other David? Do you remember that? Did you see the teasers? Well, you know, people got excited about that. Then they found out it was Matt Damon and the whole script kind of fell apart. And now that it's been, you know, it's like, eh, I don't know if they're going to use the spot much more. Cause honestly, If I saw it again, I'd be like, well, this is very uninspiring. The CGI was bad. David Beckham's not an actor. So like Matt Damon had to carry it. And I think it was just an awkward interchange and I don't know. So we'll see.

Lorraine Kessler
I know. I wish Innis Maggiore had a client who would hand them $8 million to place the media just and then another $2 million to make the spot. And it'd be interesting to see what we would come up

Mark Vandegrift
Well, I wish they would publish something that had to do with the total amount it costs to produce the spot, because I was saying on our Super Bowl ad episodes that I wouldn't be surprised if something like Hellman's cost the most because you're bringing back Meg Ryan, Billy Crystal, you added Sidney Sweeney, but on top of that, you're paying for the rights to use that scene, right?

Lorraine Kessler
That's right. Yeah.

Mark Vandegrift 
And who knows what that would cost. I don't know. I mean, there were much more highly produced ones like Reese's with the lava spot. lot of CGI and stuff in that big cast, all of that. You know, maybe that costs more, but I'm thinking the talent fees on something like Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan just had to be exorbitant.

Lorraine Kessler
Well, when I used to write these articles in the past, the production values easily exceed a million to even, I think, more of an average. And this was a few years ago, three or four million. So, I mean, that's on top of the media buy. And then you have more Hollywood producers and Hollywood directors making some of these spots. Now, one thing I didn't notice this year, maybe I just missed it. In past years, there seemed to be a lot of car commercials like Toyota, Kia, yeah, I'm just like now thinking, I don't remember seeing that. There was a Jeep, the Jeep, the Jeep with Harrison Ford. Yeah, yeah.

Mark Vandegrift 
And Ram, Ram was with, goodness. I can't even recall who it was now, but they did this thing where he was driving it everywhere and basically trying to be destroyed by forces. And of course it was Ram truck and Ram tough. so from that standpoint, it did great. I don't remember who the celebrity was, but it was a celebrity that was driving it around. So.

Lorraine Kessler
Yeah, we didn't have the gerbils, Kia thing or the Hyundai or the Toyota or all of whom have been really consistent advertisers for many years. So that was kind of interesting.

Mark Vandegrift 
Yeah. Well, speaking of celebrities for today's episode, we're going to focus on how brands are exploring entertainment. So it's not about celebrities, but actual entertainment as a way to appeal to their customers. In more recent years, the use of entertainment as a strategy for brands to engage with people has been a growing trend. OK, now, Lorraine, I'm going to take us way back to one that was a miserable failure, but we still remember it. Do you remember the Burger King chicken?

Lorraine Kessler
yeah, subservient chicken.

Mark Vandegrift 
Yeah, the subservient chicken. See, I didn't even have to say subservient. You remembered it. And they tried to gamify that where they created it and it just did not go over. And as we know, they're back to have it your way and you rule it. They've tagged onto it. So we're glad to see they're back doing good advertising. But there are more and more brands now that are using entertainment as a way to dip their toe into extending their brand fascination, going beyond traditional advertising. You have podcasts, games, streaming services, apps, anything to boost engagement. One brand that's doing a lot of this, and it's kind of one that I personally like, is Chick-fil-A. On November 18th, so maybe, what is that, three months ago?

Chick-fil-A launched its new Chick-fil-A play app and it was to encourage parents and their children to spend time together by providing a bunch of content and entertainment. It has recipes, it has crafts, it has animated shows, and it has an original scripted podcast. So looking at that and separating it from typical advertising, What's your initial impression on either Chick-fil-A or any brand integrating its brand into entertainment activities?

Lorraine Kessler
Well, of course, think integrating into adjunct entertainment vehicles versus using entertaining commercials, I want to make that distinction, is relevant to the category, to the product, to the company, and to what it stands for. And know, Chick-fil-A to me is a mystery because they definitely have a secret sauce and I don't get it completely. But you see even here. They're stores and they have like three bays deep on their drive-through and they're packed. Can't even get into the plaza. I mean, they're like five or six times more crowded than McDonald's and Wendy's, which are adjacent. you know, does this fit Chick-fil-A what they're doing? And I'd have to say again, being relevant to who they are. There's something, their secret sauce I think comes from their mission and their mission is Christian based family values about honesty and integrity. And I think their mission is actually to glorify God by being a faithful servant Yeah, entrusted to us and have a positive influence on all who come into contact with Chick-fil-A. And they try to create a workplace that they're very successful creating a workplace that people want to work in, that they're honored and respected, et cetera. So I think that...

You know, Simon Sinek says that people don't buy what you do, right? They buy why you do it or what you believe. And so I think Chick-fil-A has a very deep well of belief that people respond to. They're a core customer and mainly families, being a big part of that core customer segment
respond to and so to now provide in a time when a lot of entertainment for kids is off the rails, there's no guardrails, providing entertainment for children and families that reinforces its values and ideals I think fits. think it really it's almost like they become the replacement for Disney since Disney abandoned this to be kind of the woke Disney and it's like they're they're kind of filling a hole that's been left and so it fits and I don't think they're trying to make money on this or what have you. I think it's just as deepening the brand connection so it's more qualitative perhaps and quantitative.

Mark Vandegrift 
Well, Dustin Britt is their executive director of Brand Strategy. And he said that hospitality and fun have always been at the core of Chick-fil-A. And, you know, they have their play centers in there, much like McDonald's used to. I don't know that there's many that have that anymore. And they have done good, wholesome content. They have coloring books, I think, for kids. I don't know if they still do that, but they used to when our girls were growing up. You go in there and it had good messages for it and the kids could color it. And I think the Chick-fil-A Play app is just a digital extension of that experience. so instead of always being physical in nature, there's now that digital way to do it. And the kids want to be on digital anyhow. So if this is bringing them together as a family to do it together, because that's what it sounds like it's encouraging, then like you said, they're really fulfilling that brand promise. you know, their customer service, they always say they iconic my pleasure. And if you don't hear it, you're almost shocked anymore. So overall, I think you would agree this aligns to the brand, don't you?

Lorraine Kessler
It aligns with the brand and I do think it's, you know, I don't know how they're gonna measure success with this. There's 2.8 million apps in the world. So talk about confusion and competition and just complexity and proliferation. I mean, trying to get your app downloaded today is not easy. So I don't know how they're going to measure success and I hope it isn't downloads of the app. But I will say, I will say that looking at what they've done, the branding is just so consistent and so clean and beautiful.

Mark Vandegrift 
Good. Well, let's contrast this next brand Lorraine against Chick-fil-A. I think it's a more direct application of entertainment. Have you heard of Duolingo?

Lorraine Kessler
No, not until you mentioned it to me and said, hey, we might talk about this.

Mark Vandegrift 
Yeah, well, that's why I sent over the information. Duolingo is using entertainment in its learning process. So it's a free language learning platform that makes learning fun, right? I mean, who doesn't like to learn with fun in it? And in September last year, Duolingo kicked up their lessons by introducing their newest learning experience called Adventures. And it's a gaming experience that allows your character to practice interacting in real life scenarios and then putting those language lessons to test, right? So what do you think about this gamified experience that Duolingo is using?

Lorraine Kessler
Well, I think it's extremely ingenious. think it comes down to is the execution of this something that people can conceive or conceptualize in a useful way. But I think it doesn't take a rocket scientist to know that making learning fun makes it very useful. so I think, especially when it comes to language, the idea of making that fun, because most people I think feel daunted by that, and also approaching children, because we know that once your brain gets to a certain age, its ability to learn a new language goes down almost proportionately. So, you know, we've seen this done with math. There's been different apps that have made math easy and fun. So I think the idea is genius. I'm not sure executionally if...there if it's catching on the way they want but that's for them to determine and they can always tweak that.

Mark Vandegrift 
Yeah. Well, there's definitely competition out there. You remember Rosetta Stone for all those years and how they did it. Yeah, it wasn't fun at all. Yeah.

Lorraine Kessler
Yeah, but not fun. I did Rosetta Stone. Now, and what's the other one that's big now? Babel, and I haven't tried Babel, but I bought all the Rosetta Stone stuff and it just wasn't useful. It wasn't easy to learn.

Mark Vandegrift 
babble. Yep.

Mark Vandegrift 
Let me guess, was the language Italian you were going for? What a shock.

Lorraine Kessler
Yeah, I was going for Italian. I have parents who spoke Italian and grandparents on Sunday, that's all they spoke. And I am the least language proficient, able person on the planet. It's just sad that people, my parents being first generation, really didn't want to teach the language. They wanted you to be Americans to a fault. And it's sad that that happened.

Mark Vandegrift 
Yeah. Well, in a surprising, I guess, connection with Duolingo here is how successful their podcasts have been. They have over 300 episodes available for streaming. And here's what I think is going on. And you can comment on this. My daughter, Madison, who is a huge, just loves traveling. And my other daughter does as well, Claire. But Maddie is just all about travel. And I don't know if she's used Duolingo or not, but it's almost a culture of I'm really into seeing the world. And so it makes me think that because Duolingo is talking about people's, I guess, travel experiences, but even more specifically, their language barriers that have kind of created fun stories. I think that's what's making the podcast successful because I wouldn't necessarily go to a language tool, even though it's fun to use, and then automatically go, oh, I'm going to listen to all their podcasts too. But they've created kind of a group, I don't even know the word to use, a club, if you want to call it that, of interest around travel and the language associated with that. What's your perspective on that?

Lorraine Kessler
Well, I think you're hit on something and we hadn't talked about this. And so I didn't have this perspective because I found their podcast very broad and kind of disjointed from learning the language. And I wasn't quite sure why someone would connect with them because the topics seem to be all over the board, but seem to be unfocused. But I think you hit on it. I think the secret sauce for them is they're playing on people who have a deep interest in traveling. They're saying, okay, people who have an interest in language don't want to sit at home and talk to their family across the table, right? Or go to the office and just blabber on in Taiwanese Mandarin. They're doing it because their purpose is they want to travel and have international experiences or have experiences outside the North. So I think it is interest and then that's why your daughter would be interested in the podcast and find them amusing and find them entertaining. So that becomes part of the brand engagement. it's smart and their focus is very narrow, obviously, right? Because there's only a certain, it's not about demographics, it's about interests. Because you could be, I know a lady in my church, she's near 80. She's traveled to like 43 countries and... you know, seeing every, almost every state and union and planning two trips this year. I'm just, I'm just like blown away. So that's the kind of person who would find this really useful and fun and engaging.

Mark Vandegrift 
Well, and taking that a step further, so you have the entertainment value of Duolingo that's creating an affinity for travel through the podcast. And now what we're seeing is on TikTok, they have 16 million followers. And what they do is they keep up with, you know, popular trends and they have a mascot that they put to it. The mascot's name is Duo it's at the center of all their videos, kind of to strengthen the brand connection, right? And the thing about the TikToks for them are they're often seen as chaotic and unhinged, but they are found to be an effective way to connect with their target audience of Gen Z and millennials. What do you think, at what point do you think the embedded mode of entertainment is a step too far in terms of going to a platform like TikTok, which with 16 million followers, it's obviously working, but where does this eventually fall apart? Is there a point where it does or as long as they stick around their core of the travel affinity, they'll be okay.

Lorraine Kessler
You know, it's hard to tell. I mean, I really can't say. I can comment on the use of the mascot duo, which is kind of a owl. Strengthen brand recognition. We know, of course, that's a solid branding move for something that's a little a service that's less tangible. So, you know, it's like having Mickey Mouse, right? For heaven's sake. And just when we thought we couldn't invent any more phrases. now have unhinged marketing as a term, which I don't quite understand, but I guess it's when you steer from old school advertising into incorporating more of these memes and kind of fun and games and this kind of stuff. But the borrowed interest of the owl, the mascot, the mascot duo, that's solid And we know that works. So I guess the question for me, and it's a $60 million, $64 million question, because we're in a different time than the game show 60 years ago. Is this marketing strategy of using gamification, social media, cultural moments, to engage users and promote language learning and sales revenue? It is that working. And you already said they have 16 million. I don't know what the monetization is. Do you have to pay to be part of this cult? I don't know. But so far, it looks like they've hit on something. Again, all things are relevant. I'm not sure this would work necessarily for GMC, for example. But their app has grown from 40 million users in just 2021 to over 100 million in the last quarter of 2024. So it seems like it's working. And I think there was an article that you sent me, or maybe I found it, called From Daily Ruin. And I just want to quote from it, because I think it says something that is least worth listening to or hearing. Duolingo's memorable unhinged marketing strategy, there's that term has propelled them to the forefront of Gen Z's attention. However, as the novelty fades, the brand's heavy reliance on the initial shock value and attention grabbing tactics might cause them to struggle to keep their audience engaged, raising questions on the sustainability of their current marketing tactics. And I think that's a reasoned risk or warning You can rise. This is what we would call positioning. If you position a brand, you can position a brand around being hot, hotness, right? But guess what? Hotness is short term. It dies fast. So you better have another strategy behind that hotness. And I think that's what the editor of this article was kind of pointing to. Is it going to work forever? Not sure. It seems very novel. And we know things that are very novel have a shorter life. So hopefully they have a way, another strategy already in place, ready to launch behind this one.

Mark Vandegrift 
Yeah, they're going to have to keep that affinity strong around travelers because I know, as I mentioned before, my daughter picks up a lot of places she wants to go, et cetera, from just from social media. Um, it doesn't necessarily have to be Duolingo's because a lot of people travel that are not associated with Duolingo's. So they're going to have to keep a hook in it somehow. I don't know how that it's going to be. Um, but it's a good point. Yeah, it's a good point to bring up. Um, so.

Lorraine Kessler
Yeah, yeah, I don't either. Hey, I have a question for you. I have a question about, you talk about your daughters a lot. And I remember a few years ago, they were all about Snapchat. Are they still about Snapchat? Die, right? And that's right? And now it's TikTok. Right, so, okay, interesting.

Mark Vandegrift 
Yeah, no, that died. I know, Pinterest was popular for long time and that's kind of settled in. It just goes to the point that at some point during the life of any platform, it's going to find its, what do you call it? You say it's going to find its. I think you always say it's going to find its level because, you know, we go back where we can say we remember people indicating that TV would put an end to radio and the internet would put an end to books and, you know, all this, I guess, puffery that ends up. Yeah. So, you know, Snapchat, it's still around. Pinterest, it's still around. They all have their uses. TikTok's the hot thing right now. And I'll tell you when, what was it four weeks, about a month ago when TikTok went dark because of the threat of being shut down in America, there was a indeed a lot of anxiety and consternation by my daughters alone. They were trying to download all of their, I guess you would call it their assets, from TikTok that they use for referral, like from recipes to travel destinations, to everything. Man, you would have thought it was the TikTok ellipse or whatever you want to call it. And they were so happy when things came back on. it's definitely a platform by or in of itself to be reckoned with. That's for sure. anyhow, we talked about two different ways to use entertainment. Duolingo, which is a learning method in my mind, but they've extended it with podcasts and TikTok and being entertaining. And then there's the Chick-fil-A way. Now that we've discussed these two brands use of entertainment, what should we give our listeners and viewers as a takeaway when it comes to the use of entertainment for their brands?

Lorraine Kessler
Well, I think when you, and we're talking about adjunct entertainment, not advertising in an entertaining way. So I want to make sure that that distinction is clear. One, I think you better have resources to support this because the broader you go, the more platforms you use, the more content you create, you can't do that on a shoestring. So this isn't for everyone. This is for someone that either has a lot of investment money behind them. probably like Duolingo or Chick-fil-A that has very sustainable revenue and has already built the 3,000 stores, you know, quite an audience and has a very healthy bottom line. So I think that's first. I think it's great to experiment when you have that luxury and you can do this and anything you can to increase engagement and sustain it is the game and that's the gold to not only create that engagement, but sustain it. And how do you do that? So I think in both cases, Duolingo is combining technology to make language a joy and not a chore. That's pretty smart. And I think as long as they stick to that core and realize that the tactics they're using, they can be shed. They can be changed. That's like changing your clothes. The core idea. The core idea is how do we make learning a language fun and engage people at younger ages to do that and also combine that with the joy of just travel and being able to converse with people of different languages. So as long as they hold on to that, you know, our thing, our sweet spot, what we believe is that technology gives us an advantage in helping people learn the joy of language easily. And so that's...As long as I stick with that, as I said, these other tactics, podcasts, gamifies, apps, that can all come and go, depending on what's happening culturally. And I think Chick-fil-A is very similar. They already have a center. It's a strong center core. I think in good to great, they would be a number one today. If Jim Collins was writing that book today, Chick-fil-A would be a company that he would hold up because they're operating from such a strong core. I think if you overemphasize the means, the tactics versus these kind of mission-driven, positioning-driven ideas, that's when you get in the trouble.

Mark Vandegrift 
Good. Well, there are certainly a lot of other brands we could raise up as examples that are dipping their pose into the entertainment arena. Bless you.

Lorraine Kessler
That was my zygogest.

Mark Vandegrift 
But we need to wrap up today's episode of the Brand Shorthand Podcast. Thank you Lorraine for joining us as always, and thank you to our listeners for joining us again this week. Don't forget to like, subscribe, and tell your friends about the Brand Shorthand Podcast. And until next time, have an amazing day.