Published on
October 8, 2024
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Welcome to the Breakdown, a weekly roundup of the best real-life marketing examples, created for marketers and agency folk that want to create work that actually works.
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In this Breakdown, we're looking at ✨ brand ambassadors ✨ - a niche of influencer / social marketing where a celebrity becomes the face / voice of a brand.
Hip hop’s closest thing to a hippy is flogging soda.
I cannot believe that I have read the words “personal soda story” this week. But Post Malone has one. He gave up ordinary sodas since they were so sugary, and has been a bit vocal about the health benefits he’s seen.
So poppi, a very on-trend pre-biotic, low-sugar low-calorie soda brand, couldn’t have picked a better brand ambassador than Post Malone.
(He’s also an investor in the company. Do with that info what you will).
This is one of those partnerships that just makes good sense. Posty talked about his soda story on the Joe Rogan podcast - which, besides all the insanity, is often a source or propagator for health and fitness trends. And while there is a growing list of soda brands similar to poppi out there, for many people Post Malone could well be the accidental face of healthy soda. And now he’s the face of one of those brands.
One thing to note - Post Malone also reduced his alcohol consumption. While he was on tour, he said that he was drinking a lot of sugary soda - and he was also the face of Bud Lite. And this is really what I wanted to dive into this week.
Post Malone also partnered with UGG only a few days ago. A pop-up sensory experience in LA, a launch of UGG’s Weather Hybrid range, and a history with the brand (he’s been wearing them since he was 15).
Famous celebs will always be in demand. Millions of fans who want to talk, act, sing, chill and buy like their idols. Even if it is a nightmare to measure, brands continue to see famous faces as an effective way to reach more customers and convert. My question - is the effect diluted when the same face is used to represent many brands? Can a celeb ever be a distinctive brand asset, and is that even the right way to view these campaigns?
And skincare, and shampoo, and shoes, and more
Dr Squatch, who I can best describe as an online soap retailer (there is something drop-shippy about their TikTok ads…), have launched a new campaign called “Men only want one thing” featuring actor Sydney Sweeney. There are some… crude jokes about the desirability of ‘natural’, which I guess fit in to the brand’s overall tone of voice. Innuendos and noughties-style ‘dude humour’ about having clean balls* etc. feature a lot across their social pages.
On the one hand, it’s pretty easy to dislike the work. It brings back a not-too-distant part of advertising history whose playbook was: put an attractive woman next to the product, sell to men. Regardless of effectiveness, it seemed like most people were pretty happy to see the back of that “trend”.
On the other hand, the work is a bit funny. The ads are deliberately… pointed, let’s say, and if, at a very simplistic level, the aim is to trigger a very simple part of people’s brains to get them to buy a product, then the work works.
Besides all that, Sydney has been getting that bag over the last few years. She’s featured in campaigns for Kerastase, Laneige, Miu Miu, Levi’s, Heydude, Ford. As her career has grown and grown, so has her ability to make money from brands, and apparently so has her willingness to do so. It’s really hard to hate on that.
The split in these campaigns is interesting, too. Plenty are aimed at women, with Sydney being an aspirational symbol. Others are aimed at straight men, with Sydney being a sex symbol. She’s an archetypal pretty cool girl - and that means she’s a prime face for nearly any brand that wants to sell to anyone under the age of 35. But again, I can’t help but wonder - does the effect dilute?
* For the funniest of ‘clean balls’ humour, this campaign that was recco’d to me by my flatmate easily takes the cake:
Beyoncé stars in the recreation of the vintage laundromat ad.
Before we go on, here’s the original:
The cult tale is that with this ad, BBH “invented” boxer shorts. Ad standards authorities wouldn’t allow them to have a person in their underwear (which, at that point, meant Y-fronts). So they stuck him in boxers, which weren’t really common, and soon after, everyone was wearing boxers. Plenty were also wearing Levi’s 501s.
After several days of teasing the collab on social media, Levi’s launched the reimagined campaign by placing Beyoncé in the starring role in an updated version of its iconic 1985 ad. The campaign includes TV, out-of-home, digital, social media and brand activations around the globe.
Oh, and Beyoncé and Post Malone (…!) provided the music.
I think this collab does what perhaps the others don’t. And it might just be because Levi’s is a bigger, or at least better-known, brand.
Beyoncé would never be outshone by any brand she chose to work with. She is too iconic, and has too many adoring fans for that to happen. But Levi’s has its own very rich history, and is also iconic and blessed with millions of ardent fans.
And that’s why this works so well. Beyoncé has been retelling stories since Renaissance - updating and reimagining them through her own lens. Levi’s have a great story, with this one stretching back to the 80s. This ad feels like a piece of Americana all by itself.