The EE TV ads that BillC intro'd at eBay Live are now available online here.
The general idea is there's a "straight" version of the ad with a basic pitch of EE and then many many wacky versions (pitch interrupted by guy that jumps in car that explodes is my personal favorite). The site has 22 ads, and I thought BC said there are 30 or so.
In any case, this should provide at least 11 minutes of entertainment for you!
P.S. There's also a fancy new Advanced selling guide here.
The only interesting one is with the scammer stealing the "It" , starting a vintage car chase.
Its a sublime post-modern marketing depiction of a great deal of eBay transactions that include the pathos of being scammed , the flight for easy riches by the scammer , the quest for nostalgia and the ultimate existential eBay dilema that its all been a fuitless endeavour that ultimately has no winners.Four Stars.
Is that the best marketing image or even a good marketing idea to show eBay as lawless Mad Max forbidden zone full of scammers and immolation. Heck No ! Yet consider for a moment thats by far the best advert of the bunch and you can't beat the chase tunes.
Posted by: JK | September 14, 2006 at 09:38 PM
I thought the one where they guy steals IT and then blows up in a car crash was a little strange.
What was the intended message there?
Posted by: Garth | September 12, 2006 at 10:58 AM
Wow.....I am speechless. The guy in the commercials will be hanging with the verizon "can you hear me know guy" any day now. IT IT IT! What demographic is that aimed at? Drunk college kids?
Posted by: J-dog | September 07, 2006 at 05:58 AM
eBay has no imagination at all. If they did we would have a dynamic site to sell on. The adds I saw at live were horrible. At least were I was standing a large number of people were booing them. A number of them looked like something that was made up by a bunch of people who brains were discombobulated by a number of bad acid trips back in the early '70's and are trying to look hip today.
Bill
Posted by: Bill | September 06, 2006 at 08:59 PM
Thanks for the link. I found those to be pretty much uniformly awful spots.
I thought the most entertaining was the one with the thief stealing the 'it', with ensuing 60's stock footage car chase. But that may be due to the inherent irony of an eBay promo that advertises the site as a place to get ripped off.
But I sure won't be pausing the tivo to see them again, and find myself wondering why eBay and BBDO are clinging to that boring "it" concept one moment longer than necessary. Who would be enticed to visit express after seeing boring TV spots populated by boring middle-aged white guys holding that tired old "it" thing? Geez, must be a boring website, let's go check it out!
Not that there's anything wrong with boring middle-aged white guys, but are they really eBay's target demographic?
Where are the women, the people of color? Where's the imagination?
Nowhere in sight.
Posted by: dimes | September 06, 2006 at 08:15 PM