Have you seen the Paris Hilton ad for Carl Jr’s Too Hot BBQ $6.00 burger? I have and I received it as a link in an email from my brother. Did I watch it? Yes and in addition to the very nice visuals I noticed there is a link for a screen saver, photos you can save, coupons for $1.00 off the burger (nice tracking device) and an easy to use link for forwarding the commercial to anyone you want. That commercial is already speeding around the Internet getting more exposure than if the networks ran it. Plus the fact it is being banned on commercial TV makes the ad that much hotter.
There are many lessons to take from this campaign and no you don’t need to produce something near pornographic.
Now look at the sales results of their advertising strategy: a 40% increase in sales and 25 consecutive quarters of same store sales increases.
Here are several excerpts from the news story:
CKE Restaurants, which has a reputation for politically incorrect advertising, tapped the sexy socialite for a new Carl’s Jr. TV spot. The problem, according to a source, is the spot is meeting with some resistance from network executives. “It couldn’t be more pornographic,” said the source. “It’s about as racy as I’ve seen.” …..
Set to the song “I Love Paris in the Springtime,” the 30-second spot, via Mendelsohn/Zien in Los Angeles, shows Hilton washing a car “with hoses shooting everywhere and her soaping everything up,” said the source. Touting the BBQ Six Dollar Burger, it plays off her catch phrase, “That’s hot.”
“We liken our advertising to more of what the beer brands do,” said Brad Haley, evp of marketing at Carl’s Jr. (which targets men 18-34) in an interview with Brandweek earlier this year. “There’s a lot of male attitude, personality and edge. Sometimes sex appeal enters into it on occasion. It’s something younger guys are interested in.”
The strategy appears to be working. The 959-unit chain rang up $1.4 billion in sales last year, up from $1 billion, per Technomic, Chicago. It also has reported 25 consecutive months of same-store sales increases.
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Aricle Comments and Compilation by Steve Pohlit www.stevepohlit.com This article may be republished in its entirety with the inclusion of all information to this point.
