Welcome to Debate Club! Please be aware that this is a space for respectful debate, and that your ideas will be challenged here. Please remember to critique the argument, not the author.

Peloton ad

13468912

Replies

  • Diatonic12
    Diatonic12 Posts: 32,344 Member
    Consumers don't like staged testimonials and imaginary transformations. Consumers like real transformation.
    "A year ago I didn't realize how much this would change me" but we don't see any change. There's no evidence to support that this machine is for anything other than fitness in the ad. It was a fail and the numbers already reflect that. Someone or a group didn't think this campaign through when they slapped it together. The handwriting is already on the wall. They'll have to start over and try to rebuild consumer trust.
  • RelCanonical
    RelCanonical Posts: 3,882 Member
    Diatonic12 wrote: »
    Consumers don't like staged testimonials and imaginary transformations. Consumers like real transformation.
    "A year ago I didn't realize how much this would change me" but we don't see any change. There's no evidence to support that this machine is for anything other than fitness in the ad. It was a fail and the numbers already reflect that. Someone or a group didn't think this campaign through when they slapped it together. The handwriting is already on the wall. They'll have to start over and try to rebuild consumer trust.

    This is my problem with it too. It’s just a terrible ad. I wonder if people would be so up in arms about it if it actually showed her changing for the better in some way. There are so many ways they could have done this, like showing her winning a bike race or something (and adding a clip of some sort of her admiring her old bike trophies from highschool). I was like “what the *kitten* is she so emotional about”.
  • snickerscharlie
    snickerscharlie Posts: 8,581 Member
    Theoldguy1 wrote: »
    cwolfman13 wrote: »
    Diatonic12 wrote: »
    The group think tank confirmational bias and dynamics of this ad will be studied in boardrooms all across the world for years to come.

    The struggle was real. It was scary. She had to crawl out of bed and walk into her living room and get on her foo foo bike while her husband slept through it all. The ad was about physical fitness but at the end of one year we could see no visible side effects. Bottomline: the authenticity for the branding just wasn't there and you're left holding the bag after one year's time. No visible physical benefits after slapping your hard earned cash on the barrelhead. Consumers are far smarter than thoughtless imaginary ad campaigns but it tanked just the same.

    What visible physical benefits would there be necessarily? It's cycling. I'm an avid cycling enthusiast and started after I lost weight. When I started training and racing there were no visible physical changes in my body from when I started training to racing over the course of a few years. But I could put down more watts and go further and faster. I was a much better rider after three years of training and racing than when I started...but I was 180 Lbs when I started and 180 Lbs when I stopped racing and there weren't any visible physical changes to my body.

    Agree, she's normal weight, so probably minimal apparent physical change. Now look at her VO2 Max, blood markers, etc and see what happened there.

    Also, we don't know the husband is sleeping through her workout. He may be out running 10 miles or at the gym lifting weights.

    Or down at the local bar bragging about his 'hawt' wife.
  • Diatonic12
    Diatonic12 Posts: 32,344 Member
    Diatonic12 wrote: »
    Consumers don't like staged testimonials and imaginary transformations. Consumers like real transformation.
    "A year ago I didn't realize how much this would change me" but we don't see any change. There's no evidence to support that this machine is for anything other than fitness in the ad. It was a fail and the numbers already reflect that. Someone or a group didn't think this campaign through when they slapped it together. The handwriting is already on the wall. They'll have to start over and try to rebuild consumer trust.

    This is my problem with it too. It’s just a terrible ad. I wonder if people would be so up in arms about it if it actually showed her changing for the better in some way. There are so many ways they could have done this, like showing her winning a bike race or something (and adding a clip of some sort of her admiring her old bike trophies from highschool). I was like “what the *kitten* is she so emotional about”.

    It was awkward and outdated from start to finish and that's not been lost on the shareholders and investors. When you try to bring blitz to the masses they want something useful that will improve their lives and they want to see it.
  • Motorsheen
    Motorsheen Posts: 20,493 Member
    nutmegoreo wrote: »
    Motorsheen wrote: »
    Diatonic12 wrote: »
    https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/peloton-stock-price-15-billion-wiped-from-value-in-3-days-amid-backlash-1028743585

    They'd do well to take the ad down and never show it again. Back to the drawing board, they're starting over at square one. A cautionary tale for years to come.


    I can honestly say that I've never been influenced by an advertisement for a fitness product and have always made my purchasing decisions based solely on peer reviewed clinical studies. **



    ** This post has been brought to you by the makers of ShakeWeight.
    ShakeWeight - Now available in designer colors from retailers near you!
    Quantities are limited, so shop early and shop often!!


    ... batteries not included

    That might not be a ShakeWeight... :open_mouth:

    Oh Dear....

    you just might be right.
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 27,846 Member
    Diatonic12 wrote: »
    Azdak wrote: »
    This was my favorite description of the ad: “ ... a 116 lb woman’s YEARLONG fitness journey to becoming a 112 lb woman”.

    Spot on. This is what gave me the biggest pinch about the ad. Looking scared to death at 116 lbs and basically looking exactly the same one year later while raving on and on about her imaginary positive side effects. I would've looked twice if she'd gained some muscle mass.

    The benefits could have been mental health related. Cardio helps keep my anxiety in check.

    I feel bad for the people who made the ad. It probably was a good ad for the target audience. People just find amusement in mocking. I wonder if they'll ever get hired again. Oh my sensitive heart...

    Yes, regular exercise is crucial for my mental health.
  • Azdak
    Azdak Posts: 8,281 Member
    AnnPT77 wrote: »
    Here's a thought experiment, maybe two.

    As background: Some types of markets segment into high-likelihood or frequent consumers, and routine lower-level/occasional consumers. A common strategy is to go after that first group, the high-likelihood/frequent group. This is sometimes talked about as going after the 20% of consumers that account for 80% of the consumption, though the percentages aren't necessarily that dramatic.

    So:

    If you were creating an advertising campaign designed to go after the market segment that disproportionately consumes new kinds of exercise equipment, how would you structure the ads? Think about who these people are, who they aspire to be, etc. (The marketing organizations will have researched questions like this.)

    More pointedly, assume you were going to structure an advertising campaign to hook people who either are, or are on the slippery slope to being, exercise bulimic (defined as people who feel compelled to exercise, to an excessive/unhealthy degree: Purging food is not inherently involved)**, or who are otherwise a little obsessive in their pursuit of the newest and most transformative exercise modality. How would you structure that advertising campaign?

    Rhetorical questions: Thought experiment, like I said.

    Bonus thought experiment: If you were going after a premium-price consumer (as we assume Peloton is), vs. a more mainstream consumer (maybe the Beachbody on Demand consumer, or something like that), vs. a frugal-budget consumer (advertising-supported fitness channels, say), how would your strategies differ?

    Once again, talking about how advertising/marketing is targeted or could be targeted is not intended as disrespect to anyone who uses any of these products. People do what they do for their own reasons, which is a separate issue from how marketers try to target new consumers (or try to increase consumption by existing ones). If you have a Peloton and enjoy it, or love BOD, or find your Youtube exercise channel fun and effective, I think that's great. I do what I do for reasons that have little to do with how my activity is commonly marketed.

    ** Yes, that's a horrifying thought. Do you think that certain segments of the alcohol industry are not marketing intentionally to the consumer who drinks too much (possibly short of fully dyfunctional alcoholism, because their ideal consumer preferably has ongoing disposable income)?

    I have another post coming as to why I find this so amusing, but, just for fun (because I really don’t care), to me the issue is not they they are going after the market segment that they did. It is an expensive product. What struck me about it (and, again, we are watching tons of bad commercials this time of year, so this one is not particularly egregious), was positioning the Peloton as a product that is essential for happiness and a good life for people whose life is already pretty bleeping good.

    I remember half-watching it (because I am usually at least one other thing when I watch TV), and it really didn’t hit me until the last couple of seconds how off-tone the whole thing was. It’s like an ad for a Lexus where some executive got it as a gift and then went on about how it changed his/her life because now he/she could drive the kids to school.

    They just missed the mark.

    And it goes to show that you never know what goofy thing Americans will latch on to and react to.

  • lauragreenbaum
    lauragreenbaum Posts: 1,017 Member
    Reckoner68 wrote: »
    Maybe I am dead inside as the ad itself triggered no feelings whatsoever within me, I guess I'll have to search elsewhere for something to grant substance to this empty existence

    That was basically my reaction. The search continues....
  • LAT1963
    LAT1963 Posts: 1,375 Member
    edited December 2019
    When I first saw the ad, I was confused because the woman looked skinny to begin with, so I expected, at the end, to see some kind of change such as bulking up a little. The claim of 'life changing' without evidence was the most obvious fail.

    On second viewing I noticed how overly-anxious she was to please her husband by appearing to like his gift--a gift that can be viewed as passive-aggressive way to say she needed to lose weight or something. She seemed desperate for approval in a way that makes the subsequent 'divorce' parody ad and the 'divorce' gin ad the exactly right sequels.

    Kind of wondering how many women were in the focus groups for this ad, and what their demographics are.