Campaign Trail is our evaluation of a few of the perfect latest creative efforts from the marketing world. View past columns within the archives here.
In the nearly 200 days since OpenAI launched ChatGPT, the marketing world has develop into overrun with advertisers, agencies and tech firms rushing to embrace generative artificial intelligence (AI) in all its forms. Yet with few exceptions, brands have yet to publicly embrace AI as an element of their ad campaign creative.
For Waterloo Sparkling Water, utilizing AI to jazz up the newest iteration of its “Water Down Nothing” campaign was a natural evolution consistent with a brand positioning that brings together its product, company culture and consumer base.
“AI was perfect to bring to life the thought of full-flavor artistry,” said CMO Kathy Maurella. “Numerous the weather you see within the video dovetail into plenty of insight we’ve on our consumers.”
The campaign, a “2.0” expression of an effort that began last 12 months, launched last month within the U.S. across paid and organic social, video and display ads, connected TV, billboards, in-store shopper marketing programs and retail displays. At the center of the campaign is a 30-second spot that includes a most important character amid a crowd of office staff whose styling and appearance changes each time he sips from a can of Waterloo, morphing him — with help from AI — into a trendy jet setter, race automotive driver, soccer player, chef and rock star.
Andrew Donoho, the ad’s director, explained in a press release that the “flickering effects” created by AI are meant to mirror the carbonation of Waterloo’s sparkling water. Physical props and the video’s color scheme were also enhanced by the technology.
“We wanted to visually communicate how flavor can ignite the senses — to break you out of your reality and to elevate and heighten it,” said Donoho in a press release. “It made sense for us to use AI to create this world for Waterloo because we could translate each the complete flavor and textured experience you possibly can expect from the product itself.”
Doho added: “With different flavors from Waterloo, you possibly can wear them like an outfit — allowing us to express the inner narrative that all of us have after we try something latest.”
Consumer insights and agency trust
Ad agency Agent A helped Waterloo launch “Water Down Nothing” last 12 months. When it was time to iterate on the campaign, the agency brought the thought of using AI to the brand.
“We didn’t actually set out to use AI,” Maurella said. “It fit with the thought of the campaign and the brand positioning, nevertheless it also fit with the thought of [how] we actually pride ourselves on the innovation we bring to the category and doing things slightly different.”
For Agent A, AI provided each a level of creative control and the suitable amount of surprise that kept the creative consistent with the brand positioning and with a way of “joyous, unexpected personal discovery,” said Alex Rodriguez, the agency’s founder and lead strategist, in emailed comments. The approach also helped level up the agency’s output.
“In our case, we were able to create animation for our business and pictures for our [out-of-home] campaign in a fraction of the time it will take with traditional CGI methods,” Rodriguez said. “This freed us up to explore and present a wider range of creative options and truly deliver on the creative vision.”
Speeding up the method worked for Waterloo, a challenger brand whose quick work rate will not be at all times for the faint of heart, Maurella explained. While it wasn’t the everyday storyboard and shooting process that the marketer was used to, having the ability to see the AI elements in rough cuts demonstrated that the ultimate product would come together easily.
“There was plenty of trust and faith within the partnership from start to finish,” Maurella said. “It fit with us trying to lean in on innovation, it fit with quick timelines and we could see that transformation happening right in front of our eyes.”
For Waterloo, the newest leg of “Water Down Nothing” is a component of a major marketing investment that’s up 46% year-over-year, according to Maurella. The brand outperformed the dollar sales growth of the category by 10 times and is pushing “all levers down” because it moves into the summer season, a busy period for beverage marketers, the manager added. That spend will likely put Waterloo — and AI-assisted creative — in front of more consumers.
“AI generally is a gimmick or an indispensable tool,” Rodriguez said. “I’m excited that we had a probability to show what the present technology can do together with more established animation and image creation techniques. I really like the mixture of approaches that allowed us to create something truly unique and compelling.”
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