Talking horses and breakfast cereal

Nod of hat to my buddy Mr J Willshire of Feedingthepuppy for tipping me off about a new ad / video from breakfast cereal Weetabix.  Ok, it stretches the boundaries of credibility a bit but it's an engaging piece of story telling and it doesn't hammer you over the head with branding / product  messaging upfront.  It doesn't need to, everyone in the UK knows what Weetabix is, and the agency / brand team have clearly grasped this, so I have no hesitation in applauding.

 

There's a time and a place for product benefit messages and there's a time and a place for brand activity that engenders conversation and positive sentiment.  Lots of brands are having a hard time getting their heads around this as it goes against years of TV-lead brand building advertising, known GRP's and ad decay curves.

Moving forward in the conversation space is not about throwing the brand baby out with the bathwater nor abandoning brand building altogether, it's about understanding how to balance brand equity activity that delivers recall, awareness, goodwill and conversation currency with activity that delivers sales.