Marketing a Fallen Athlete

When Lebron James entered the NBA he did it with a 13 million dollar contract from the Cavs and a 93 million dollar contract from Nike. Obviously Nike, with no rules on how much they could pay him, believed that his once in a lifetime talent combined with his charisma would leave them with a marketing monster. Fast forward 7 years and Lebron, for lack of a better term, made a big whoopsies.

Nike was not new to marketing for a fallen athlete and has in their past created many redemptive advertisements that attempted to restore an image. In the following four commercials, Nike stuck to a theme of individuality while adding a personal twist for each athlete.

Charles Barkley: "I'm Not a Role Model" Ad

This was the original villain ad. Charles didn't really make a big mistake. He was only guilty of being Charles Barkley and saying loud outlandish things that people tended to wag their fingers at. This reputation for not caring about what he said led to criticisms that he was a poor role model. Nike capitalized on this and made a commercial where Charles bluntly stated that he was in fact not a role model. Nike emphasized that Charles was a cavalier and individual, whose job was to play basketball, and that Charles was very good at his job. The ad was simple, strong, and effective.

Kobe Bryant "Hate Me" Ad

Living in Southern California makes it really easy to dislike Kobe Bryant. If I run away to another country and lose contact with everyone it's probably because a Laker fan drove me insane. In 2003 when Kobe was accused of rape he had a lot more hatred to deal with. The case was settled, but an already embattled Bryant needed to make a mark for Nike and himself. In his commercial, Nike emphasized Kobe's legendary work ethic and his obvious success as a basketball player. Kobe speaks directly to his "haters" and leaves them having acknowledged that its his success that breeds the hatred.

Tiger Woods "Earl and Tiger" Ad

Unless you are an alien or an infant you probably heard that Tiger Woods had a tough go at it recently. Nike, who had hung their hat on his consistent marketability, needed to push forward in order to restore his brand. Where the previous two commercials highlighted the athlete's workmanlike attitudes and successes, Nike painted a picture of Tiger as a man, not a golfer, who needed to reflect. They didn't make the past go away but instead showed Tiger attempting to harness what he had done so that he could become a better person. The ad received its fair share of criticism, especially for using the voice of Tiger's deceased father, but it garnered at ton of attention and paved the road back for Tiger's public perception.

Lebron James "What Should I Do" Ad

I am one of approximately six Lebron James supporters outside of the city of Miami. When Nike took this ad public I was amped. It's a very well made commercial and it addressed many of the issues people had with him. Looking back on it now, I realize that Nike missed big time, and the ad fed the fire of the people that turned on Lebron. Instead of sticking with a theme of showing Lebron as a basketball player, he became a caricature of a tragic hero. Lebron asked us a rhetorical question that we had answers to. We knew that the way he did what he did was wrong, and by asking us what he should do facetiously he was putting down our intelligence. Like the Charles and Kobe ads, in his ad Lebron should have been playing basketball and not feeling sorry for himself. Nike sure got a lot of attention, but the commercial became the cherry on top of the poop sundae that Lebron James made that summer.

Subliminal Advertising

It has always been obvious to me that psychology is a major part of advertising, but until this past semester none of my classes had really delved into the intricacies and relations between the two. My social psychology professor spent a class period on the subject, and nothing surprised me until he got to the subject of subliminal messaging. It turns out that shockingly, subliminal messaging does, to a certain extent, work.

Check out this old George Bush campaign advertisement. On the surface, it seems fairly straightforward, but after watching it one time go back and press 8 repeatedly. The Bush crew decided that when the word bureaucrat flashed onto the screen in reference to Al Gore, the word "rat" would be emphasized for a split second. They believed that the viewer would subconsciously think of Al Gore as a rat after seeing this. Turn out, despite what we may have thought, they may have been onto something, but only if the rest of the commercial was effective in priming the viewer to think of rats, or more likely Al Gore, in a negative light.

In a 2001 study at Waterloo college researchers performed three experiments surrounding the idea of subliminal messaging. In each of the experiments the researchers checked to see that the students were unaware that there was subliminal messaging. In the first study researchers wanted to see if priming individuals subliminally would effect behavior when there was motivation surrounding a task. They did this by getting the participants thirsty and flashing thirst related subliminal messages on a computer screen. The results (graph below) show that thirsty individuals who received subliminal messages drank more water than thirsty individuals who were not shown subliminal messages and non-thirsty individuals who received the subliminal cues. If people were shown subliminal cues and motivated to drink water they drank more than those that did not receive the cues and were not thirsty. Motivation + Subliminal message= behavior.

In the second experiment, researchers tested whether the persuasiveness of an advertisement could grow with a subliminal message. They followed the template of the last experiment for the most part, but showed the participants two ads for very similar energy drinks. One energy drink had subliminal messages that emphasized how thirst quenching the drink was, while the other drink used subliminal messages with words referencing how many electrolytes it had. At the conclusion of the experiment participants who were thirsty and got the subliminal primes were more likely to choose the drink with the subliminal cues emphasizing thirst than the other drink. This was not the case for thirsty individuals who were not subliminally primed as well as non thirsty individuals who were, as they chose the two drinks equally.

The third study looked to see if the results carried over for something other than thirst. Researchers primed participants subliminally by flashing a sad face on the computer screen and then showed them an advertisement for a CD that wold hypothetically make them happier. Individuals who were primed with the sad face were more likely to believe the CD would be effective in raising happiness, probably because the subliminal message had put them in a sad mood subconsciously and they needed the attitude raising effects of the CD.

Based on these findings, the Bush ad should have worked, but only for people who were already motivated to find Al Gore's flaws or think of him as a rat. It is scary to think that our subconscious can be toyed with to a certain extent by advertisers, but if nothing else there results show that the worst thing that will happen is we will confirm or act on our original disposition.