There is no doubt that Volkswagen's THE FORCE ad, aired during the 2011 Super Bowl, is cute, entertaining, and fun. Trouble is, the ad's theme, content, and hook are applicable to MANY products and services. The ad leaves the product in the dust. As one Tweeter said, it is likely that more kids Darth Vader costumes will sell than Passats.
In my estimation, the agency and client took their eyes off the ball. The GOAL is not to make cute commercials, it is to sell product - or to build brand/image.
When creating your B2B promotional materials, be sure to emphatically keep all eyes on the ball - focus on the GOAL.
FINAL NOTE: I absolutely LOVE the acting in this ad. Spot on!
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This was one of my favorite spots during the game. I too thought it was more effective at entertaining than selling product (I didn't even remember it was for VW til I saw your post, just that it was an ad for a car).
I do think though that maybe SuperBowl spots have become vehicles (no pun intended) for brands to entertain rather than do the hard sell (rightly or wrongly). We expect to be entertained rather than sold to during the game. After all, we never talk about spots that do the hard sell, but rather the ones that are funny or that strike a chord. But then again, those spots may not have a measurable impact on product sales.
Great post as always - made me think.
Is the spot more entertaining than selling product? Absolutely. But will the spot eventually sell product based on, what I like to call, the cool factor. Right now, i bet you could ask a handful of people
what product were they selling in that commercials and i think you would struggle to get 50% to get it right. But ask them in a few weeks or months after that commercial has been running, after people talk about it at the water cooler, after people have posted it a thousand times online. Then will it lend toward the coolness of the brand of VW?
My point is that each year the super bowl commercials compute for that one spot everyone will talk about the next day. I think this one was the clear winner. Everyone is talking about it today, and a lot are asking "who's commercial was that again? Searching for the answer.
Anyway, it's definitely a risky business for them to gamble on a return on such an investment. Will it work? Who knows, but I did love the commercial!