E-Trade Wins The Worst Super Bowl Ad
I can?t tell you how much I hated the E-Trade Super Bowl commercials. What was the brand strategy behind the baby? It?s so easy a surfer baby can do it? That?s the brand identity of E-Trade, they?re easy to use?
?
Well here?s a news flash. People loose lots of money because they don?t know how to trade stocks correctly. Because you make it easy for them to do so is like giving an alcoholic a drink. Stocks are serious business and a puking baby talking like a ?surfer dude? is not on target. That?s some really pukey branding!
I actually traded futures and commodities on a regular basis. I can tell you this. I won?t even consider E-Trade after those ridiculous spots. Funny? Maybe to some. Stupid and off target, definitely. E-Trade goes right to the branding blunders of 2008!
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February 6th, 2008 at 9:51 am
This commercial, along with the Careerbuilder “follow your heart” commercial got the vote for most disgusting at my Super Bowl party.
Here’s a question for you though…
How powerful is having the worst Super Bowl commercial? After all, you still have a chance of being water cooler talk the next day and people will remember the ad.
February 6th, 2008 at 10:01 am
It’s only powerful if people who talk about it go to E-Trade and use their service. Otherwise it’s talk that will soon be forgotten. Or it will go like this: “Remember that funny puking baby commercial? That was funny huh? Stock trading and puking babies just don’t mix in my world, but I’m serious about trading. It’s not fun to loose money in the stock market is it?
February 6th, 2008 at 10:22 am
I thought most of them were terrible. One I thought did do well was the Coke ad with Charlie Brown finally getting the football of course disguised as a Coke Bottle.
February 6th, 2008 at 11:19 am
I agree that the baby vomiting was at best sophomoric, but I said it in my guest blog below here and I’ll say it again; the Planters Peanut commercial was offensive in its portrayal of a woman attracting men. I do not consider this a “politically correct” issue, but rather an issue of decency and maturity, and brand messaging – a brand should not be elevated at the expense of an individual or group who do not measure up to another group’s standard of “beauty.” In this case this as is the worst because it taints the brand – Planters, which as the sponsor of the Super Bowl, should have known better.
February 6th, 2008 at 11:38 am
The Career Builder ad using pandas with Chinese dialect: Cringe-inducing. E-trade vomiting baby – just dumb. Here’s a bad ad, though: the guy uses his nipples to charge a car – not only was it uncomfortable, but, without looking, I don’t remember the product. (Some beverage, I imagine.)
I didn’t much care for the Planters’ ad, but people I know liked it. They remembered the brand, they thought it was a wonderful way to rethink traditional beauty, AND they thought it was funny, and at the expense of the guys crashing into everything, not the woman.
February 6th, 2008 at 12:36 pm
Yes that nipple one (I think it was Amp) was HORRIBLE. What were they thinkin?
February 6th, 2008 at 12:55 pm
I thought the Planters commercial was mildly humorous, but not very original. It was very similar to those Axe body spray commercials, where the guy just spritzes some on and the women come running like animals in heat. Same concept, reversed genders.