In john st.’s World, Fear is Key to Great Brand Experiences

WPP-owned, Toronto-based john st. continues in its great annual tradition of taking the piss out of the industry as part of its pitch for Strategy‘s Agency of the Year awards (we covered fellow Toronto agency Lowe Roche’s entry earlier today). In its follow-up to last year’s introduction of a “professional clicking service” called Buyral, john st. gets more aggressive, scaring the bejeezus out of total strangers (well, at least let’s play along) as part of the a new marketing strategy that the agency’s christened “exFEARiential.”

It’s just as absurd/amusing, if not more so, than previous john st. AOY videos including Buyral as well as predecessors, Catvertising and Pink Ponies. It looks like we aren’t the only ones that get a kick out of “exFEARiential” as it picked up Best Agency Video at the Strategy awards, where john st. also took home gold for Agency of the Year and bronze for Digital Agency of the Year. FYI, if you stick around til the end of the clip, you can click on separate videos of the stress tests featured above (or if you’re just unwilling to wait, go here and here). Credits after the jump.

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john st. Revives ‘Wiserhood’ Campaign, with Covertly Dickish Boyfriend Theme Intact

Back in 2011, john st. unveiled this spot for Corby Distilleries Limited, part of their “Wiserhood” campaign promoting Wiser’s Whisky brand, in which a dickish guy makes a big deal over holding his girlfriend’s purse for a minute. He drops the bag on the ground, potentially damaging the contents within, and uses a plastic bag to pick it up, which he then turns inside out — as if the purse was, in fact, a steaming dog turd. Now john st. has resurrected the somewhat sexist “Wiserhood” campaign with a new spot featuring another boyfriend of the year.

In “Swan Song,” a couple are at the movies when the guy sees a display ad for a new action movie called “Swan Song” that contains the tagline “Death is back for an encore.” When his significant other returns (presumably from the bathroom or something) she asks if he’s picked a movie for them. They look at the movie titles currently showing and the woman says “Hmm…’Swan Song,’ sounds romantic.” The guy enthusiastically agrees, in all likelihood knowing fully well that his significant other is going to utterly hate the movie for the next couple of hours. What a dick.

Here’s my problem with this spot, putting the sexism aside for a moment: Who goes to the movies these days without knowing what they’re going to see? Going to the movies is freaking expensive. Too expensive to go into all willy-nilly “I’ll see whatever” and just walk into a terrible movie. Plus, people tend to know what’s playing from advertising and the Internet. If they don’t know what’s playing, they look it up and pick something out before going to the theater. It’s not 1994. While I understand that this is a short ad, and isn’t all that considered with verisimilitude, this still bothered me. It makes the spot seem like it’s from a different time, which I would guess is not what they were going for. Credits after the jump. continued…

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Toronto’s john st. Unveils New Mitsubishi Mirage

Mitsubishi Motor Sales of Canada and john st. have launched a campaign for the brand new Mitsubishi Mirage.

The spot “Commute” plays the whole music that you thought was extra-diegetic but turns out to be diegetic card while touting the subcompact cars’ features. (We don’t like being toyed with like that, Mitsubishi.) These are good selling points, especially the best-in-class 64 mpg and the $12,498 starting price. “We know that we’re giving Canadian drivers what they value in a subcompact car, great fuel efficiency at an even better price,” explains Peter Renz, Director of National Marketing at Mitsubishi Motor Sales of Canada.

The whole “you can do what you want with all the money you save” thing and the diegetic music trick are a little tired, but the spot keeps it short and simple. Plus the fuel economy and low price do a fine job selling the car on their own. You’ve got to be envious of that gas mileage. Credits after the jump.

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