Mystery shampoo, aka All New Pantene, and all marketers should have learned three simple, yet important, lessons from the teaser campaign that Dove ambushed from right below its nose.
- Unnecessary statistical claims of superiority invite retaliation
- When you attack, never lower your guard
- Teasers extended to long durations expose the brand to risk
Having drawn attention with ‘A Mystery Shampoo!! 80% women say is better than anything else’ Mystery Shampoo had invited competitors to retaliate; perhaps it got busy engaging users on social media channels like Twitter – which I notice has its first post on 23 July 2010 – and in promotional events with Neha Dupia etc. that it didn’t anticipate Dove coming up with its cracker of a campaign ‘There is no mystery about it, Dove is the No. 1′.
Whoa! Talk about riding someone else’s wave – Dove got it bang on.
Extended teasers are inherently dicey, sometimes you can run out of steam (The Digen Verma phenomenon came a cropper when the brand Frooti, whose relaunch it lead to, couldn’t keep pace with its own campaign), others like the Mystery Shampoo gave Dove ample hints, opportunities and time to prepare its attack, and win.
These two stories nicely sum up what happened (the latter focusing on what ‘might’ have happened in an imaginary account):
- The Economic Times: Ambush marketing-HUL’s last-minute surprise foxes P&G
- Brand Recall.org : Why I would like to work with HUL
26. Dec, 2011 
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