Years back, GGT was Cadburys biggest agency.
The CEO wanted to use the last 3 seconds of every commercial to deliver a common Cadburymessage.
It made sense, Cadburys were spending a lot of money advertising lots of different brands: Flake, Wispa, Curly Wurly, Dairy Milk, Boost, Whole Nut, Crème Eggs, Fruit & Nut, Crunchie, Double-Decker, etc.
Using the last 3 seconds for a common corporate link would be ‘free’ advertising for the overall Cadbury brand, which would not only reassure the consumers it would also benefit the share-price by making the company look massive.
So every ad would be 27 seconds of individual product and 3 seconds of Cadbury brand.
As I say it all made sense, except for the line the CEO wanted to use.
At the end of every ad he wanted the line: “The chocolate. The taste.”
This is where we parted company, if the brief was to do a job for Cadbury this didn’t do it.
Advertising is very simple if you’ll let it be.
In the middle of a break of around 15 ads, and on for just 3 seconds, “The chocolate. The taste” could be for anybody.
Mars could have said it, Rowntree could have said it, Fry’s, Hershey, Nestle, Terry’s, Suchard, any of Cadbury’s competitors could have said it.
How does that make sense?
The brief was to use the end of every commercial to specify the Cadbury brand, not to put a message that was market growth for chocolate.
I knew the line “The chocolate. The taste” flattered Cadbury’s ego, but the brief was to separate Cadbury off from other brands.
The brief was to own the position of superior chocolate in a way that can’t be confused with anyone else.
So we recommended, at the end of every ad writing the name Cadbury in the Script style of the logo with the line: “Chocolate with a capital C”.
The line says we’re not just average chocolate, we’re “Chocolate with a capital C”.
It gives us a unique mnemonic because it doesn’t work for anyone else.
You can’t say “Chocolate with a capital C” for Mars, or for Rowntree, or for Fry’s, or Hershey, or Nestle, or Terry’s, or Suchard, or any of Cadbury’s competitors.
So that line stakes a place in the consumer’s mind for our brand alone.
But the CEO didn’t want to hear it.
He said “So you’re telling me what makes that line good is just that our name has the same first letter as the word ‘chocolate’?”
And I wanted to yell down the phone “Yes, for fuck’s sake, it’s that simple if you let it be”.
But of course this was a client CEO so I didn’t say that.
I explained that viewers have a lot on their minds beside chocolate and for us to get our brand registered we have to use a simple, powerful mnemonic.
But the CEO was wedded to his line because, inside the Cadbury marketing team, the line:“The chocolate. The taste” conveyed the superiority and confidence that Cadbury’s felt.
And inside the marketing team it no doubt works.
But the Cadbury marketing team isn’t the market.
And the market isn’t thinking about chocolate 24/7 like the marketing team is.
Which is why you need an expert, not in marketing but in advertising cut-through.
It’s no good saying something the client likes if it never gets heard.
That’s why marketing and advertising are different jobs.
When it works properly, advertising is the voice of marketing.