The new spot for The Ladders from Fallon US is a bit of a planning and buying train wreck. Sorry, but this ad is definitely making us believe the hype – 2009 is going to suck balls.
The ad above played during The Fiesta Bowl last night, which makes you wonder about the media buy that went down. The Bowl clocked 12M viewers. However, in 2006, the US Census reported that only 5.6 percent of individual income earners made $100+ year. And in this climate with Madoff and mortgages going belly up that number has definitely dropped. Sure, college football rakes in recent college grads as well as die hard, more affluent alums, but one has to wonder how many watchers are bagging the really big dough?
This begs the question – do you really need to shit all over those folks at the middle of the ladder or even, the bottom? Previously, the job site ran an ad that featured a tennis player. It achieved the same message without crapping on the little guy. In tonight’s spot, we see little godzillas who can’t get the attention of a sales clerk. What happened?
How many people were turned off by the message? You could argue it doesn’t matter if 10% (1.2M) now feel badly about the site. They weren’t going to use it anyway, right? But the trick with luxury is to create a feeling of aspiration. Not aversion to your brand.
Hope all that dough you guys coughed up for media time was worth it. Seems like there would be better avenues to tap the folks you want than a straight up media blitz. Silicon Alley Insider estimates the site will generate $60 million in revenue in 2008, up from about $35 million in 2007. The Ladders didn’t start using broadcast campaigns until just this year. They were doing just fine. Hope this turns out to be worth it. According to Alexa, there was no spike in traffic for The Ladders tonight, so perhaps not. Of course, we’ll check back in on these stats in a few hours.
Oh yeah. This commercial also just badly, badly executed. To quote David Ibsen: The ads are lacking “a clear or effective strategy, are not entertaining, nor are they memorable, or seem to tie to the brand promise.”
Total. Fail.
Gotta say though – as far as the monster themed commercials go, I’m generally a fan. I adored Garmin’s take. Check it out below.