K.C. and Mr. ME AT THE Ads

Cable World,  July 21, 2003  

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Meanwhile, operators must grapple with the notion of having to sell everything on their shelves and still make an impact with consumers. They must convince consumers that despite a history of poor reliability and bad service, they can outperform and undercut the phone companies with their data and local telephone offerings and do a better job of offering video services than DBS and other wireline competitors. And they have to push their brands so that all those messages are easy to communicate.

"The industry is learning how to accomplish this mission," Mr. ME says. "It continues to learn and evolve. The issues they have aren't tactical in terms of execution. It's their ability to define and communicate what their business has become. That is the challenge."

Here's what Mr. ME had to say about each of the MSO Mark Award finalists:

BRAND IMAGE CATEGORY

COGECO CABLE: KEEPING YOU TURNED ON

The ad features several men talking about all the neat things (i.e. video-on-demand, high-speed data, etc.) Cogeco offers its customers in a slick, fast-paced package.

"The message in this ad gets a bit lost. It looks good. But you can't really determine what it is the ad is trying to tell you. And there are no women in this spot. Cogeco has to have women customers. In this day and age, it's not a good idea to skip one of your most important demographics."

COX COMMUNICATIONS: YOUR FRIEND IN THE DIGITAL AGE

The spot showcases all the ways cable can connect you to your friends, and reminds you that Cox is your friend, too.

"This is a great touchy-feely ad. It's a terrific image campaign. It showcases all the products Cox offers but also reassures customers that Cox is a good service provider, too."

CUSTOMER ACQUISITION

COX COMMUNICATIONS: FEEL THIS WAY

A golfer in a cart scurries through his game so he can rush home and use all the services Cox provides.

"I liked this ad. The message was clear - 'Go all-digital with Cox.' Yet for an acquisition campaign, it was unusual to not have an offer tagged at the end of the spot. Still, it used humor effectively to sell the service."

CABLEVISION SYSTEMS: DANCER

The spot shows an elderly gentleman being a wallflower at a local dance while other couples cut a rug. He's dying to dance but doesn't know how. He turns to his high-speed data service to teach him all the moves.

"I hope this ad was targeted toward an older demographic, because it's going to get lost on the younger generation. It does have an offer at the end, but without a voice-over to keep you on topic, it's easy to get lost. You see more dance steps from this guy than you do the computer screen. The ad never really talked about the benefits of high speed. And it didn't do much to sell Optimum Online. He could've been using any online service to learn those steps."

COX COMMUNICATIONS: PROPOSAL

A man walks around his house showing his girlfriend all the cool services he has in his house - digital video with hundreds of channels and high-speed data with speeds up to 50 times faster than dial-up. In the end, the girlfriend agrees to marry the man.