Can negative image advertising be successful?

It’s okay to admit that there are people who hate your product as long as all the cool people like it. “Loud and tangy” are in, and so is Amy Sedaris. Also, the add contains seven positive responses, four negative responses, and two ambiguous responses (by my count, at least). It’s still a majority in favor of the product.

I think that they are a mistake. (But then I hate Miracle Whip too.)

When I watch it, the cool “Amy Sedaris likes it in the bedroom” doesn’t stand out nearly as much as “Who wants a sweet lotion sandwich?”

I don’t like the stuff either and this approach doesn’t make me likely to give it another chance.

@Blueroses I actually had to watch the advertisement a second time to catch that line. As someone who has never tried Miracle Whip, and who doesn’t own a television, it doesn’t seem any worse than what I remember of TV commercials.

It makes the product look controversial. In reality, nobody thinks at all about Miracle Whip, but the ad makes it look like it’s something that people—even important people—actually think about enough to have strong opinions on it has, apparently, even spawned a question on the trend-setting Q&A site Fluther. It challenges the viewer to take a side in a debate that didn’t even exist before the ad came along. If getting the product out into the popular consciousness is the goal, it does work.

Great point @thorninmud. I guess it is a successful advertisement since I noticed it but does successful advertisement = successful product promotion? I can remember a few hilarious commercials that didn’t make me remember what was being advertised. This particular approach only reminds me “Oh yeah. Miracle Whip. I hate that nasty goop.”

All I have to say is: Blech!

It’s the same thing as politics, except mayo & miracle whip have less confusing ingredients.

I actually think it’s kind of brilliant, and has a good chance of scoring among the younger set. You know, those who think of themselves as rebels, who may have never tried (or even thought about) Miracle Whip.

FWIW, I freaking hate Miracle Whip, and my husband loves it. We are a house divided.

I don’t think it works. There used to be televised commercials about, _“this is your brain on drugs (egg cracks and frys in pan)”, there are the mugshots of crack/meth abusers “before and after”. Horrible movies about car crashes and venereal disease were shown school kids but I don’t think it made much impact.

I will not eat Miracle Whip, but I love the ads.

Everyone I have ever known to mention mayo v Miracle Whip has a very strong opinion one way or the other. These commercials do nothing to convince the mayo people to give it another try.

I honestly don’t know, Roses. It does seem like it wouldn’t convert anyone. But then again, I also don’t get product placement where the only people to recognize it are the fans who don’t need obvious branding (and thus also don’t need much advertising to buy the product), or when a company takes an otherwise non-gendered product and genders it, thus alienating 50% of their consumer base. So I often wonder about how effective most ads are. And, Marmite’s been doing the “love it or hate it” thing for quite some time (though, I have no idea how effective that campaign has been).

@thorninmud Actually, I think most people have a strong opinion one way or the other. They might never think about it until it comes up, but most people aren’t “yeah, sure, whatever” about if they can have Miracle Whip on their crappy, nondescript turkey sandwich because they can’t afford anything else for lunch.

@Aethelflaed Exactly. It’s not that people don’t already know whether or not they like it. The problem, from the point of view of Kraft, is that it’s such a settled matter that nobody even thinks about the stuff anymore. The advertiser’s task is to get people thinking about the product, even if it just means, as in this case, reconfirming their likes or dislikes.

So it’s a matter of “No such thing as bad publicity”. I see how sparking debate and household wars might work to keep the product name awareness but it still runs contrary to everything I learned when I was in the advertising game.

I just found an interesting breakdown of this ad by a marketing pro.

I also discovered that the similar British “Love it or Hate it” Marmite ads that @Aethelflaed mentioned raised Marmite sales from flat to +5%/year for the following 5 years.

That is interesting @thorninmud Thanks.
Sidenote: Can you think of anything more revolting than a Marmite/Miracle Whip sandwich?

@Blueroses Yes: pure Marmite without the bread to soften the blow or the Miracle Whip to confuse your tongue about which thing is disgusting it.