pure essentials : what went wrong

here is what went wrong in the pure essentials relaunch ad campaign - i wonder if they realize it, but based on the print ads, intentionally or unintentionally, they are operating on two very different strategies.

it's possible they only have one strategy but they are probably unaware that they are coming out with ads that are written very differently from each other. another possibility is that the strategy was so poorly written, too complicated and didn't have focus that there are two ways to interpret it. there is even no attempt to achieve some kind of focus on sameness or put enough common denominators in the two print ads.

the mother strategy is about attacking skin dryness for the family. their support or reason why has two components - the celebrity mother who is concerned about her children's skin and the medical professional who is concerned about harsh ingredients in soaps.

the first print ad, a teaser ad that featured the doctor was single-minded on being anti-safeguard and product-centric. while the second, which features maricel laxa as the celebrity endorser-mother who is concerned about her children's skin.

both is supposed to tackle dry skin (it's in the headline) which makes it appear it's a focused strategy, but it really isn't. that can be seen at the end result, the two print ad's contents and brand personality come out very differently.

there is an obvious confusion in these ads. i wonder if it's being caused by a poorly written copy strategy or a very poor interpretation of the copy strategy by the ad agency. one more thing, the advertorial format of the ads is not helping them. an advertorial format allows you to write many paragraphs, theoretically, you can put everything and anything into the ad. and that is exactly what the creatives did. if this was a typical intro or brandsell print ad, you certainly cannot put everything into the ad. the space limitation forces the creatives to be selective and give focus to their writing. don't get me wrong, focus and being on strategy can be achieved even in an advertorial, it's just in this case, weak understanding of the strategy and sloppy writing did them in. i get the feeling the creative director did not clear this ad.

pure essential's anti-safeguard soap war is a dud. and a WAWAM!

pure essential - another wimp print ad!

what a disappointment, again! this is now a 2nd execution of their "anti-safeguard" strategy and all the aggressiveness from the teaser ad is still gone. it looks like they did get a CDO on their previous teaser ad that featured the doctor, but in this one, even a semblance of the competitiveness in the teaser ad is not here. you can get a CDO, but there are ways to deliver the same kind of punch and competitiveness but staying within the AdBoard (its different now?) guidelines. reading this ad, they did not even make an attempt to do so!

also, could not understand what's the point of doing an advertorial approach. sure, an advertorial approach allows you to say a lot of things, but the many things they said here does not carry a punch. so, what's the point? too much on laxa, not much on the product, not even enough sale.

i thought the skin dryness as caused by too much use of anti-bacterial soap story is best delivered in the traditional brandsell advertising format. it has excellent news value and will strongly call attention.

i liked the teaser ad approach because it was very product-centric which was the core strategy of pure essentials. but this was too much celebrity/personality, very little product. the teaser ad featured a doctor and that can explain why there was a lot of product and efficacy talk (actually, scare tactics), and laxa is not from the medical field. that can also explain the "softness" of this ad compared to the teaser doctor ad. but this ad is not just softer, it's empty.

nowhere in the ad do they talk about the dangers of using bacterial soaps and its dry skin effect. there is no mention of safeguard's two anti-bacterial active ingredients. they do say "harsh ingredients" in soap but that was not linked to safeguard or anti-bacterial AIs. (they could have just said something like "i now realize the soap i have been using for many years may bne causing dry skin". that's a freebie for the pure essential creatives.) even in laxa's "hygiene guidelines" (last paragraph) they just mention "use the right soap", no mention or allusion to safeguard. they simply gave up on the strong points they raised in their teaser ad.

i would even say this laxa ad is off strategy. they can still deliver the same product-centric and efficacy strategy of the doctor teaser ad, but in the words and experiences of laxa. it can still be competitive and still sounding like laxa said them. no attempt, even feeble ones, were done along the line.

i wonder if this laxa print ad is the sustaining brandsell ad campaign of pure essentials. i think it's worthless. as predicted, this ad confirms what i said previously - J&J and it's pure essentials ad agency do not have the brains or balls to wage battle with safeguard.

this pure essential laxa ad is another WIMP ad. again, did the creatives become lazy? its WAWAM!

safeguard soap - time for change

what pure essentials did is open a pandora's box for safeguard. it has unwittingly launched what potentially can be the achilles heel of safeguard.

unfortunately for pure essentials and fortunately for safeguard, pure essential's ad campaign missed the target with their wimp ad. well, at least based on this intro print ad. we are yet to see the tv ad and other sustaining ad materials.

j&j and its ad agency doesn't really know how to fight a bruising fight, so i don't think this will affect safeguard that much. j&j does not know how to fight battles like these. BUT uni-lever for sure will be watching this. uni-lever will be a much more formidable opponent than j&j for safeguard. and uni-lever has the guts and brain to dip into that open pandora's box.

i saw this whole development in a very good light, even for safeguard. if i was in safeguard's place, i would prepare a whole slew of ad campaigns to defend safeguard. i would prepare at least 3 ad campaigns with varying degrees of defensive and offensive tactics. i'd air one immediately and have the other 2 ready to produce in a moment's notice. in this kind of advertising war, being out there in the market in a moment's notice will be very much key.

i would also immediately do a tracking study to get a quick read of consumer sentiments as they evolve. and part of the research program is to search for better ad ideas for safeguard both looking into new positioning ideas and strengthening the current one.

i will certainly take this development very seriously. as i have said in the earlier post, i think pure essential's approach from a strategy standpoint is a real threat to safeguard, specially if done right. too much is at stake for safeguard not to be in a panic mode now.

i also think it's time for safeguard to look for a new ad campaign. this brand has been on this strategy and execution for decades and now is good time to rethink it.

this is one of latest tv spots of safeguard and as you can see not much has changed from it's previous ad campaign.

i know the saying - "it's hard to argue with success" but i think it's wise to add to that - being ahead of competition guarantees further success. and i will also add this for safeguard - it's best for them to not just look at the usual, but i will expand this way beyond it, to look at what is not the usual.





view safeguard's old tv spot in this post : http://the-wawam-file.blogspot.com/2008/04/safeguard-soap-under-attack-start-of.html

anti-safeguard soap revealed - johnson's Pure Essentials but disappoints!

last week, talked about a new product launch that was obviously anti-safeguard. this brand released teaser print ads in the Philippine Star that was very hard-hitting and highly competitive. because of the tone and content of the print ads, i thought it was going to be a start of the soap war in philippine advertising.

see the posts here :

http://the-wawam-file.blogspot.com/2008/04/safeguard-soap-under-attack-start-of.html

http://the-wawam-file.blogspot.com/2008/04/what-safeguard-should-do-get-adboard.html


today they published the intro ad in the same newspaper - it's JOHNSON'S PURE ESSENTIALS. and what a disappointment their intro ad is. view it here (double click the image to get a larger view):




this ad wimped out from what they had in the teaser ads. it's still on the non-drying strategy but it did not contain the aggressive anti-safeguard stance and content of the teaser ads. thy missed out on what could be a breakthrough idea in bringing down the dominant market leader safeguard.

it's very possible that safeguard did go to the adboard against the teaser ads and that can explain why we see a watered down intor ad. if CDO (cease and desist order) was issued against j&j, then they should have re-written that ad to contain the same strategy and copy points in words that meet the adboard guidelines.

it's still too early though. maybe pure essentials have other brandsell/intro advertising in the can and are just waiting to be released. maybe they have something better in tv. it's worth a wait.

it's very close to it, but this intro print ad is not a WAWAM!, it's just a WIMP ad.

is the safeguard ad agency at the adboard office now?

it's 8:00 am, the adboard office is now open. the safeguard ad agency right at this moment should be entering the adboard office and handing over the complaint against that print ad.

are they there?

what safeguard should do - get an AdBoard CDO!

this is the first of 2 ads that appeared in the Philippine Star today. it was placed on page 4 and on the opposite page 5, they had this print ad which was about the same size as the first one. they are teaser ads for the launch of new toilet soap.

notes: (a) click the images to view bigger size to read the copy; (b) these are actual ads that were scanned and the scanner picks up the imperfections of the printing of the ad, including "ghost images" of what's printed at the back of the ads and folds and creases on the print ad.

this is the 2nd ad:

can't wait for the intro and brandsell ad campaign for this new brand. these ads seem to indicate a very aggressive push to take market leadership from safeguard.

it looks like the new toilet soap will take head on safeguard's brand positioning and brand equity, superior anti-germs/bacteria. this new product will most likely cast doubt on safeguard's "health" positioning by saying or at least strongly implying constant use of safeguard causes damage to the skin which is "dry skin", which based on the ad and according to a TNS Research conducted in march 2008 said "dry skin is the most common skin problem experienced by mothers and their families".

that is the core brand equity of safeguard soap. and it will now be under attack!

if i was on the safeguard ad agency account team, tomorrow at 8:00 in the morning, i will be at the AdBoard's offices and will file a complaint asking for a CDO (cease and desist order) action against the first print ad. and i would ask for an immediate cease and desist action on that ad. i will make it my singular mission to disallow the printing of this ad again in philippine newspapers.

there are several provisions in the AdBoard code of ethics that can be used as basis for the CDO. one of this is "disparagement". this ad very aggressively have said "triclosan" and "triclocarban", safeguard's two germicidal ingredients are "harmful chemicals"! whoa! these two ingredients in safeguard are what make safeguard what it is. without these two ingredients, there will be no safeguard.

i would not discuss this further as the safeguard soap account team will need to do their job on this one. but let me say there are a lot more in that print ad that safeguard should question and ask the adboard to have them removed from the ad and future ads of this yet to be launched brand. i think the ad has over-reached itself and have said many things that they cannot defend and will definitely lose on. many of these things are, among other things, definitely disparaging to safeguard. and disparaging in a very major way.

it's a very aggressive and competitive print ad. among many copy lines in the ad, i particularly like the last paragraph, no. 4 on the ad, "Avoid the use of germicidal soaps. Check the active ingredients in your soaps and ensure that they don't contain chemicals like Triclosan or Triclocarban". they are saying stop using safeguard!

i like competitive ads. but this particular ad i find very irresponsible and very unprofessional. but they are very strong points that can harm safeguard's brand image, reputation and market share.

if i was safeguard, i would take this new brand beyond the AdBoard, i would take them to the philippine courts! i will immediately file a case with the AdBoard, literally at 8:00 am when it opens. and i will go to the philippine courts and get a TRO (temporary restraining order) to prevent the ad agency of this new brand from publishing this ad.

that's how serious i think is the threat of this print ad to safeguard's business and how wrong the print ad is.

safeguard soap under attack! the start of a soap war?

saw this pair of print ads in the Philippine Star today - they are teaser ads for an impending launch of new soap brand. it's a blatant attack on safeguard soap, the market leader. and i think this is the start of a soap war in philippine advertising.

safeguard has been the traditional market leader in the personal care category. at it's peak safeguard had 50% to 60% market share of the total philippine personal care category. that has now dwindled with copycat and low priced local products like green cross but safeguard is still the market leader. many have tried to pull down safeguard's market share but few have succeeded, it's superior germicidal positioning has been very formidable.

the launch of this yet to be named brand is quite interesting as i hope it will revitalize and bring some excitement in the toilet soap category, long been boring with very few activities. aside from that, those print ads are quite aggressive - it's a blatant and very direct challenge to safeguard's leadership and positioning.

if i'm right, the direction this new brand is taking in attacking safeguard is something that i have thought is the way to go to take leadership from safeguard. we don't know what the campaign is yet, but if the teaser print ads are an indication, they could be onto to something here.

safeguard will be defended vigorously, that is for sure. if i remember it right, safeguard is an ace-saatchi & saatchi brand, i wonder if this new brand is a uni-lever product. so we are talking of a uni-lever vs p&g and saatchi vs lowe battle here? does the two ad agencies have what it takes to win over the other?

next in WAWAM! what safeguard should do.






this is one of the safeguard soap tv ads aired some years ago when safeguard reached it's highest market share in its history.


to be continued....