Practically everyone on Earth likes ice cream. (If you don’t, feel free to close this tab and reevaluate your tastes.)
But for advertisers, reaching “practically everyone” is a challenge. It’s the classic “my customer is anyone with a mouth” conundrum.
According to Rachel Jaiven, head of marketing at Häagen-Dazs, its audience is anyone who loves ice cream and wants to indulge in well-made products – which is a lot of people.
So, where does a brand go when it wants to reach a lot of people? To start off, the Big Game.
To kick off its “Slow” campaign earlier this year – as in, slow down and savor the small moments – Häagen-Dazs ran an ad during the Super Bowl featuring “Fast & Furious” stars Vin Diesel and Michelle Rodriguez opting out of a car chase to delight in a little ice cream.
The ad ran on Fox, of course, which televised the Super Bowl, and also on streaming platforms, including Tubi and Fubo.
In the slow lane
For all the shade thrown at linear TV lately, there’s still a time and place for it. Häagen-Dazs invests in both linear and streaming, and Jaiven emphasized the importance of linear TV for live sports in particular – from the Super Bowl to the NBA Playoffs.
Häagen-Dazs focuses on linear TV to target audiences who tune in to specific shows at specific times, whereas it has dedicated buys in the streaming world to target viewers of certain shows whenever they happen to watch.
While the “Slow” campaign is being activated in a variety of channels – Häagen-Dazs launched two new products in April and promoted them with an emphasis on out-of-home and streaming – the ad creative itself is mostly consistent across platforms.
But the brand spices (or sweetens?) things up a bit for digital channels, according to Nicole LeLacheur, creative director at nice&frank, the creative agency behind the “Slow” campaign.
Digital placements are easier to scroll past and miss, said LeLacheur. So, for those ads, nice&frank focused on product beauty shots and what she referred to as “enjoyment moments.”
You know, those ads where you see someone eating an ice cream cone so hedonistically that you feel like you’re intruding a little.
But maybe they’re aiming for a little risqué.
Häagen-Dazs is trying to remind its audience that this isn’t “your grandma’s ice cream,” LeLacheur said.
It’s “not a new brand by any means,” she said – Häagen-Dazs was founded more than 60 years ago – and it’s often viewed as more of a “luxury” than other brands based on its longevity and emphasis on premium ingredients.
But 95% of US households have ice cream in the freezer, said Jaiven, so ice cream brands need to keep up with the latest trends and social platforms in order to stay relevant alongside their competitors.
Häagen-Dazs’ “Slow” campaign, for example, aims to target millennial and Gen Z consumers, in particular, by reaching them in media that targets younger viewers, such as the show “Hot Ones” and the podcast “Call Her Daddy.”
So far, the strategy is working. According to Häagen-Dazs, the brand is seeing steady lifts in ad recall and consideration on YouTube among its 25-to-34-year-old target audience.
“Steady” is promising verbiage for a campaign rooted in slowness.
