Fur Goodness Sake

My main worry about the Compare the Meerkat ads was how they would manage to keep the idea going without it becoming annoying. The GoCompare ad lasted 1 viewing, but as of yet the meerkat is still working. (Though people saying 'simples' is a little worn...)

A big part of that for me is the clear care that goes into them, the way that the online takes the TV ad and rounds it into a fully formed world. Take the latest ad:

It's not hilarious, but it keeps the story going nicely. The real star of the show is online, where the ad series is available as a pastiche movie poster, where there are fake reviews and cinema aping visuals. (Meermax... genius)

However my favourite bit is the reference to Aleksandr's papa having to take a second job comparing Muskrats. I searched for Comparethemuskrat.com, and guess what... it's up as a really cheesy porn-esque site, with a warning about 'uncensored muskrats', cheesy porn style music and a 'all muskrats appearing are of legal age' disclaimer.

Just brilliant. If only all ads had this much care put into them.

Now That's Meerkating!

As someone who has criticised some of their work in the past (Coke Zero where are you?!) I feel it is only fair that I take the time to applaud VCCP for creating one of the best campaigns of recent memory for a hard sell product.

I've held back because I hadn't seen results, and wasn't sure how they could sustain the joke... but they have.

Insurance is a meerkat with diabolical advertising. I mean truly Ocean Finance Injury Claim terrible. The sort of ads that scream "Ignore me! I'm a badly acted no budget piece of dross!"

Yet out of this has come a truly brilliant piece of work. Sure it's a little hard sell, but it hides it delightfully behind a silly premise which lets you get the message without it being rammed down your throat like a certain celebrity Dragon might do in another ad.

I'd like to think that someone did some brilliant planning to get this work out, I don't know if that is the case but I hope so. We know what insurance comparison sites are, we know they all save you money, we know they have a wide range of the country's top insu...zzzzzzzz

Sod that, let's just make people remember which of these endless sites to go to first; and give them some entertaining content to make it stick.

Simples. Brilliant.

Not only that but they have brilliantly utilised (")Social media(") to let people communicate with Aleksandr via twitter and facebook groups etc. Creating a pop culture ad icon in an amazingly short time.

1/2 million facebook fans, 20,000 twitter followers. 80% traffic increase.

Credit also to Compare the Market for going with this idea. In these meerkats its always tough to break out of the hard sell 'RAMMED IN YOUR GODDAMN FACE' messaging. To do so in such a way and allow the agency to run with it seems from my view to be intelligent and brave marketing management.