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We have an update on the viral Snoop Dogg commercial from earlier this year.
Fresh off his Olympics hosting duties, Snoop Dogg has teamed up with Solo Brands again for a new campaign called Blunt Marketing. (See what they did there? In case you didn't know, Snoop is the world's most famous marijuana fan.)
Is this campaign different from the one that led to the CEO's departure in 2024? Yes, it is.
Solo says the company has learned its lesson and is focusing on the right thing: selling.
But has Solo really opened a new chapter?
We asked Robert Rose, CMI's chief strategy consultant, what he thinks and what you can learn from these book campaigns as you plan your next marketing initiatives. Check out his take or read on.
Great campaign influences CEO departure
In January, I opened my video about Snoop Dogg and Solo with a quote from my good friend Michael Brenner: “Behind every bad piece of content is a manager who asked for it.”
Of course, the opposite is also largely true.
This time, executives seem to have asked for the right content (or at least they have a better feeling about it).
But I'm getting ahead of myself. To bring you back up to speed, let me explain the first campaign. Late last year, Solo Brands launched an influencer campaign with Snoop Dogg. It began with a tweet from Snoop Dogg saying, “After careful consideration and discussions with my family, I have decided to quit smoking. Please respect my privacy at this time.”
This was followed by a viral campaign to promote the brand for Solo's new smokeless stove. In the explainer video, Snoop says he's sick of coughing and that his clothes smell bad. The camera pans further to show him standing in front of a Solo Stove smokeless fire pit.
Cool, right? What an incredible influencer and brand awareness campaign. It garnered 30 million likes, comments and shares on social media. Ad Age ranked it 18th on the 40 best ads of 2023.
What could possibly go wrong?
When the CEO left the company, Solo stated in the announcement statement that one of the reasons for his dismissal was the Snoop Dogg campaign.
In my opinion, Solo is saying with a straight face that the brand awareness campaign launched in November 2023 failed because it didn't generate an increase in sales within six weeks. Six. Weeks. Solo probably hadn't even paid the agency's invoice yet.
Solo brings Snoop Dogg back
Cut to August 2024: The Martin Agency has launched a new Snoop Dogg promotion – Blunt Marketing – with a completely different approach.
The new Snoop ad is a blunt ad that seems to be inspired by the creativity of Ryan Reynolds. Snoop literally says this is an ad for solo herds, you should buy one, and the reason is because he's an influencer.
Got it? This is blatant marketing.
It's a funny spot. Will it go viral like the last one, which hid the product and focused on the humorous part? Almost certainly not. Will it make Ad Age's top spot list? That remains to be seen. Will it help sell the product, unlike the viral spot that was cited as the reason for the CEO's departure? That's the most important thing for Solo Brands.
Interestingly, part of that last question is no longer accurate. Solo Brands now says something along the lines of, “Well, we actually made a promise in our press release. We did actually see an increase in sales from the viral Snoop ad.” But, it says, “maybe it wasn't as intentional as it could have been.”
Private lessons for all marketers
What can you learn from this Snoop solo brands marketing?
In January, I said that Solo Brands had a brilliant concept and an amazing, unique story told by an extraordinary influencer that had nothing to do with anything in the customer journey. Yet all the links in the campaign took viewers to Solo Brands' boring e-commerce store. That worked well if you wanted to buy a stove, but not so well for understanding why you would want to buy a stove. I regretted that the company removed Snoop Dogg from the rest of the story to create a connected experience.
Of course they didn't listen to me. It was just common sense from the beginning. But now it seems they have.
The call to action in the new video leads to a specially designed part of Solo Brands' website that uses creativity, tone and everything else to drive sales. They even created the fire pit in the Snoop edition.
And the best part? The first thing you'll see is a registration form that will send you more information via email.
It's like I said earlier this year. After you've captured their attention through an ad, social media post, video, etc., what is the next best action you want the customer to take? I don't mean “next best” in the sense of not as good, but rather the best experience you want a person to have next. Then you need to tie that into your content. After all, you have the audience in your theater; you should keep them there.
Solo Brands has taken this into account in its new campaign. In hindsight, it would have been great to tie Snoop's innovative viral campaign directly into a “best next” promotion, such as a “stay tuned for the next episode” campaign like this one.
But overall, I want to be honest: Solo Brands seems to finally be taking off with its marketing.
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Cover photo by Joseph Kalinowski/Content Marketing Institute
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