Office Humor Eventually Leads To Hot Beverage Consumption

According to Adweek, Ogilvy & Mather’s branded entertainment group is supporting Kraft’s Tassimo hot beverage system with…wait for it…webisodes and a consumer-generated contest.

“Creating original, entertaining content gives Tassimo both cultural currency and permission for further conversations with consumers,” said Joseph Frydl, director of Ogilvy’s branded content and entertainment group. “Purely interruptive marketing simply cannot accomplish that.”

He said each episode has a “Tassimo moment,” a sort of wink to the camera acknowledging to the audience that the Webisodes are a marketing tool. “We’re not going to pretend this isn’t marketing, but we’re going to have some fun with it along the way, and that’s really the spirit of how we handled the integration.”

The Content Is The Commercial

The New York Times looks at American Eagle Outfitter’s journey into branded entertainment.

Last summer, on its Web site, ae.com, American Eagle introduced a dedicated media channel called 77e, which plays music and videos. The idea was to make visitors intrigued enough by what they saw to entice them to click further and buy clothes. Much of the content on the channel has been commissioned specifically as entertainment and used the American Eagle brand almost incidentally.

“Our customers know about media. They are curating their own consumption of media — making their playlists of music, selecting their own video clips,” said Kathy Savitt, chief marketing officer at American Eagle Outfitters. “We thought more could be done than just another 30-second spot on television.”