Burger King’s Google Home commercial won the Direct Grand Prix at this year’s Cannes Festival. Now, you might be thinking: how is that even possible when it was criticized so much?! Think back to the adage “there’s no such thing as bad publicity”. The same is likely in play here. Due to this ad, the world was made aware of their lack of privacy and control when it comes to their smart devices. Yet, it was a pretty innovative hack that brought new meaning to TV ad engagement. Moreover, it garnered a great deal of earned media due to the original and innovative nature. It was likely due to this innovation and this bold move that David Miami (i.e. the marketing agency responsible for the commercial) was awarded the Grand Prix.
Enter the Copycat
At least one other agency views David Miami’s ad so innovative that it’s worth copying. That agency would be the one that makes the Property Brothers commercials. While I was watching HGTV one day, I heard “Hey Siri, show me more Property Brothers”. That sounded vaguely familiar until I noticed, a couple moments later, that it was basically the Burger King concept. As I’m an loyal Android user, nothing happened due to that commercial. However, Google Home and iPhones work on different principles. Because Google Home is made to improve the lives of a household, it is built to understand various voices. IPhones, though, need to be calibrated to the owner’s voice in order to make the voice commands work. As a result, the Property Brothers commercial is unlikely to have as big an impact on personal devices as the Google Home commercial. For this reason, marketers need to understand everything that goes into a campaign. While Property Brothers may have the same target market as Burger King, the marketing agency should have been more aware of the tools that it was using in order to make sure that its ad concept will work. Simply using flashy technology is not a guarantee that your campaign will be successful.
Since the commercial isn’t uploaded online, I could not test it with my roommate’s iPhone to see if it would be activated. That being said, if you came across this commercial, did it activate your phone? Does it bother you or does it make life more convenient?