The end of Gio Compario?
Funny thing coincidence, eh? On the day when the following search query directed someone to AdTurds:
when are they going to get rid of that annoying go compare advert. it has been driving my wife mad for the last 2 years?
...it was announced that Go Compare is to review its advertising account, quite possibly spelling the end for the fat opera bell-end.
Go Compare has, for me, just become a kind of buzzing noise that is faintly irritating but I've managed to push into my subconscious. Not so AdTurds readers, who are still driven to spitting fury by the seemingly never-ending production line of utterly terrible adverts.
In the face of the seemingly unconquerable meerkat, Confused.com's determination to push the bounds of gynaecology and MoneySupermarket virtually throwing money at people to use its services, time may be called on Gio Compario and his rather boring antics.
Here's what The Drum has to say on the subject:
It is believed that a pitch process is being planned for next month at which three agencies will compete for the work, alongside Go Compare’s own in-house marketing team – which produces the notorious TV ads.
It also suggests that Gio – or, more likely, singer Wynne Evans – is contracted to Go Compare for another year.
So, the question is, can we stomach it for another year? AdTurds readers voted it their least favourite in my wholly scientific price-comparison advert poll last year.
I'd say we were at the end of our collective wicks a long time ago, but I don't think that will affect Go Compare's decision. Go Compare, perhaps more than any other ad, has shown agencies that annoyance is a powerful weapon when it comes to financial services ads. Ads that have nothing more interesting to offer than the unmitigated thrill of typing our personal details into web-page fields that may offer us slightly cheaper home insurance.
What I'm saying here, what I'm getting at is this: Go Compare may not be the end, it may be the beginning.
September 2011 keywords: Can Paul Whitehouse tapdance?
For the record I doubt very much that Paul Whitehouse learned to tapdance for the sake of a five-second spot in a baffling insurance advert - but who knows eh?
If Aviva's intention with its series of unloved Paul Whitehouse adverts has been to encourage lots of bemused viewers trying to ascertain the twinkle-toed abilities of everyone's favourite cockney comic then it's certainly succeeded.
14 people typed the exact phrase 'can Paul Whitehouse tapdance' into their search engines and navigated to AdTurds last month - and there were plenty more besides. Perhaps a more valuable question may have been 'what does Avivia do again?' because, for the life of me, I can't work it out from their ads.
What else caught my eye among the AdTurds Google Analytics keyword data this month? Well, 'complain about gocompare advert psychological damage' had a certain ring to it. Could we ever see an advertiser sued for just being incredibly bleeding annoying? I'd like to think so - the streets of Soho would be lined with flattened creatives by lunchtime.
BMW's apparently-pulled Lund brothers advert has taken a hell of a lot of stick - I hope the Lunds thought their 12-month loans were worth it.
Elsewhere, someone appears to be of the opinion that the new Haribo advert - sample lyric: "Oh so smooth; love them soft; squidgy, squidy baby!" - is plagiarising John Lennon. This might, on the face of it, seem unlikely - at least to anyone who hasn't heard Double Fantasy.
The Toyota 'gadget master' ad seems to be universally disliked. Despite the fact that I think it's fairly odd - and very niche - I don't mind it, and at least Toyota is trying to lower its target demographic from somewhere around the late-50s at last.
Elsewhere it's the usual roll call of bewilderment, irritation and lust. Who'd have thought Cheryl Baker would have so many admiring fans? Has an advert every inspired such a gamut of negative emotions as the current Haribo effort? Why do so many people have it in for Louise Redknapp?
Tune in next month....
September 2011 keywords
jenson button head and shoulders awful - 23 instances
can paul whitehouse tap dance - 14 instances
gillette fusion proglide challenge guy is a twat - 13 instances
apple adverts patronising
bulmers advert plan b fuck off
compare the meerkat haters
latest haribo advert plagiarism john lennon - no idea on this one
lund brothers bmw twats
paddy power ginger twat
what the fuck is up with the haribo ad? - a heck of a good question
when are they going to get rid of that fat get on the go compare advert
"the jellied eel gazette"
advert where woman leaves her poop on the table
adverts for ants - do any exist?
adverts of haribo are retarted - the irony of this one amused me
anyone noticed confused.com advert is quite sexual? - safe to say they have
big fat pussy cat do in a cadbury egg commercial
bmw advert brothers cunts
bmw what is a latte without milk - a very good question - the Lund brothers don't seem to know
cambodia febreze
cannon and ball are fucking shit
complain about gocompare advert psychological damage
dishwashing ad where lady is looking at wine glass - there are some queries that stump even Google
doubleglazing cunts
gadget master- new toyota advert fucking sucks
gillette advert whooping volume - much too loud, though I'm unable to give a figure in decibels
ginger anger go compare ad
halifax adverts make me want to switch away from halifax - in a nutshell perhaps the whole point of this website
haribo advert very uncomfortable
has anybody got a meerkat from moneysupermarket?
have the breasts in the confused.com advert got larger? - we need to know
i don't get the jenson button head and shoulders advert
i fucking hate the new toyota yaris advert
i fucking hate the new yaris toyota advert
i fucking hate the rap toyota yaris advert
is the uk maltesers advert offensive to gay people
is voyage prive french for stuck up cunt? - I have seen this advert and can only conclude it is, given its contents
jamie oliver advertising basic sausages
lorraine kelly interviews ad star howard brown - now that I know of the existence of this video I MUST see it
my brother freddie is an actor and a model fuck off
paul whitehouse dancing cunt - no manners but what a critic
shouty fucker on t mobile advert
toby carvery stomach cramps
tv adverts with jamie and louise redknapp. as thomas cook promotes family holidays, why does the ad give the impression that they are a couple without children? - why indeed?
who's the lovely girl in the toolstation ad?
why do haribo adverts have germans speaking english
wonga advert is evil - wonga is evil
When you’re in a hole stop digging
You know what the ridiculous thing is? Advertising doesn't seem to have much impact on price comparison websites anyway.
This is unpleasantly ironic, as they're routinely the most awful ads on the telly - burrowing into your psyche like the grub of a parasitic wasp sitting in the belly of a paralysed caterpillar, being slowly consumed from the inside out. At least if there was a point to it, it wouldn't seem so utterly ghastly. Well, perhaps.
The thing is though, Gio and Cara and Aleksandr aren't about making you rush over to the PC to rush through some car insurance quotes, they're about embedding that brand, that name, that URL with the promise of cheaper car insurance, which is why there's always a 'dot com' added to the end of every mention of them.
Think of a Russian meerkat - think of car insurance. Think of an annoying fat tenor - think of cheap car insurance. Think of (recently-replaced) Omid Djalili insulting unlikely celebs - think of cheap car insurance. Think of Cara Confused - think of a dating site run by a slack-jawed tramp with an extra-dimensional clunge. Well, three out of four ain't bad eh?
Someone came on the site the other day to tell me how great the ad was and how it was working cos it's so shit, or something. I saw some figures on Brand Republic (AdTurds is still hanging onto its Brand Republic Top 200 blogs position by the skin of its teeth) that suggested the opposite a few weeks ago so I thought I'd have a look at how Confused.com's £25m ad spend has benefited it.
The unfortunate truth is: not. Confused.com remains last or dead last in a PR Week poll of the four main price comparison sites to determine which were the most memorable, easy to use and cheapest in terms of quotes provided - though it's important to determine which is reality and which perception; in the case of the ad it's the latter that counts (for the record MoneySupermarket came on top in each with CompareTheMarket second).
This poses interesting questions for all the featured sites, but it should focus the mind of Confused.com and GoCompare.com most. For my money the latter at least has the advantage of a clear, unified campaign and regularly features in 'most remembered' lists along with the meerkat.
Confused.com doesn't - people think it's a dating site and are distracted by bizarre gynaecological swerves - and it recently got told off for it's misleading and nonsensical '20-million strong' claim. What's more it recently introduced a advert that's just based around reiterating its name - pretty much an admission that your previous wares weren't really doing their job.
What's more a recent interim report from owner Admiral says that turnover is 'flat' and 'margins remain under pressure' - suggesting no upwards movement since they spunked £20m on multimedia campaigns featuring Cara. Operating profit is down following Cara's debut - from £8.8m in H1 of 2010 to 8.2m in H1 of 2011.
It's hard to see how the ad campaign can be judged to have been a success in light of these metrics, though the obvious response from advertisers is that profits and brand penetration would have suffered even more without the exposure. My rejoinder to that would be that, with a better campaign, Confused.com would be doing better than it is at the moment.
Figuring out what makes a better campaign than your existing one is easier said than done, of course, and who's going to critique your latest campaign when your own management and marketing teams came up with it? Short of sacking themselves there's nowhere to go with Confused.com's current advertising strategy - which means they stick with Cara or perform an embarrassing 'mea culpa' and get some people who know what they're doing to do it. Hell, I'll do it for a flat fee of £10,000.
Confused.com had mixed fortunes with previous agencies, and the existence of this blog shows that getting in the so-called experts can have mixed results - but a lot of the evidence suggests that Confused.com may have made a mistake as big as its mascot's vajayjay.