Author: Jessie Milligan

Creative Services Manager

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Winning Ad Themes from the Super Bowl

The 2022 Super Bowl featured two unexpected teams that reinvented themselves and evolved throughout the season to get to the big game. Similar to the Los Angeles Rams and Cincinnati Bengals, businesses looking to take advantage of the hype around this perennial celebration of broadcast advertising prowess approached this year a little differently, operating with a greater level of intentionality to make sure their message reached their target audience. And with the price for a :30 spot crescendoing this year at a cool $6.5 million, it’s no wonder big brands took the time to ensure they were leveraging their media dollars in the most strategic and effective ways.

Below, we have outlined some of the most prevalent themes and highlighted an ad or two that we feel did an exemplary job of following through on the execution of each.

Not Joining the Party

Sometimes the best move is not to play at all. That’s what Hyundai thought at least. Given timing uncertainty around whether the Ioniq 5 would be on the market in time for the game, the longtime Super Bowl advertiser opted to stretch beyond the edges of the nearly 4-hour telecast with several smart tactical moves. While it still produced two smart (and epic) spots – check out History of Evolution – with familiar brand spokesman Jason Bateman, it was able to leverage the NFL playoffs and consumer focus on ads during the big game to its advantage.

In the weeks leading up to the Super Bowl, the brand focused its media relations message about the decision to sit out, citing the need to balance its marketing priorities. Being based in Los Angeles (where the Super Bowl was held) and leveraging its existing sponsorships with both the NFL and SoFi Stadium, the brand opted for OOH (Out of Home) paired with a product placement on the ABC sitcom Black-ish.

Know Your Audience – Part I. Millennials

Although Gen Z commands much of the silver screen these days, there is still a fervor within the advertising world to engage with the juggernaut generation: millennials. No brand capitalized on that opportunity more than Expedia during the big game.

A core value of most millennials is valuing experiences over possessions or purchases, so in Expedia’s Stuff spot, they cast Ewan McGregor to speak specifically to this sentiment. Over the :60 piece, Ewan poses a philosophical question around consumerism and the impact of those items on our legacy…setting the brand up as the hero that can provide its audience with the things that matter.

In addition to speaking directly and effectively to their audience, Expedia also hit the nail on the head by capturing the anguish that many of their prospective clients may be feeling from not being able to travel freely during the pandemic, strengthening an already persuasive message.

Know Your Audience – Part II. Gen X

No, the Super Bowl advertisers haven’t forgotten about you, Gen Xers. In fact, this demographic was the main target in what most are viewing as the best ad of the 2022 Super Bowl. The spot that sits atop this throne is Dream House with Anna Kendrick and Barbie from Rocket Mortgage.

Just as Expedia tapped into a core value for many millennials, Rocket Mortgage crafted a message that struck the nostalgia chord for Generation X and also spoke to a relevant topic most in that demographic are familiar with: how gosh-darn-it to buy a house these days.

As USA Today commented, the brand left “no stone veneer uncovered,” attempting to solidify its top ad position from several angles. By casting Anna Kendrick as a celebrity spokesperson (and having her tweet consistently in the lead-up to and during the game) and pairing her charm with a comedic, yet realistic view of the current housing market, Rocket Mortgage was able to ring the pop culture gong in their :60 spot and keep them talking long after the game had ended. Another lead-up activity included an Easter egg listing on the Rocket Homes site, and then the brand brought it home at the end of its spot with a fixer-upper castle on the Homes sub brand.

Going Beyond

More so than in years past, advertisers focused on how to expand their messaging through third screen experiences. From omnichannel offers to in-app experiences and contests, brands wanted to leverage their audiences’ fractured attention spans to capture engagement in as many places as they could.

No Super Bowl advertiser did that better than Coinbase with their bouncing, multi-colored, screensaver-esque QR code. Also making a nostalgia play that harkened back to prestreaming DVD days, Coinbase’s low production spot (whose simplicity was shocking unto itself) paired the gamification of chasing the moving target with a contest tie-in. And other brands took notice…quickly and comedically playing off the messaging.

(Captain Morgan was one such brand that shortly after tweeted out a black screen with a floating Captain Morgan logo bouncing around and changing colors à la the Coinbase QR code.)

While not necessarily a fan favorite, Coinbase’s ad has drummed up a lot of excitement and their success is quantifiable. Curious internet sleuths quickly broke down just how successful the ad was in the first day since it aired.

Ad Cost: $14M

• 117,000,000 people watched the spot

  • 20% scanned the QR code (The site had 20M visits in the first minute)
  • 10% signed up
  • 20% linked their bank account – which equates to ~500K new customers

500K new customers are worth a lot to Coinbase. But exactly how much?

According to their last quarterly report, the average customer generates $90 in revenue per year. If the customers who came from the Super Bowl spot are even 50% as valuable, then we can assume $45 of annual revenue from each. 500,000 new users x $45 = $22.5 million. That certainly covers the cost of the spot, and then some.

Creative Spotlight

In lieu of a fifth theme, we opted to highlight one of our Creative Director’s favorite spots from the Super Bowl, a throwback to his childhood, in Irish Spring’s Welcome to Irish Spring.

Over the decades Irish Spring, a very utilitarian consumer packaged good, has always been unabashedly over-the-top, even stereotypical, with its “Irishness” and laser focus on getting you clean and smelling fresh. Their first foray into Super Bowl advertising is no different. But they’ve taken it one step further. Along with their nod to the Emerald Isle and hyper focus on the importance of smelling fresh, they’ve added a cult, led by a white rabbit, that believes in ridding the world of all things smelly. The result is a twisted and funny touch of spring.

The Bottom Line

While Super Bowl spots are an opportunity for brands to briefly steal the spotlight from one of the nation’s most-watched annual broadcasts, smart advertisers are using the moment to extend beyond :30 or :60, attempting to form authentic connections with their most important audiences and sustain that electricity well past Sunday.

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Dotted Line Rounds Out Executive Leadership Team with Key Hires and a Promotion on the Heels of Record Growth

Dotted Line’s leadership team has grown to include Managing Director of Client Services Marci Schnur and Creative Director Jason Anderson, while Emily Shane has been promoted to Strategy Director. They’re lending 60-plus years of combined marketing experience to help develop highly effective solutions for clients while bringing a clear vision and passion to the agency. 

Continue to AdForum. 

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The Leap Podcast: A Vision Driven Mindset

Lauren Sweeney was recently featured on The Leap podcast with host, Tim May, where she detailed the origin story of Dotted Line and the powerful metamorphosis of her mindset from being singularly goal oriented to being vision driven.

Listen to the full episode here.

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The Art of Crafting a Meaty Media Pitch

By Kyra Newman

How many times have you scanned the aisles during a shopping trip to check out a new product featured on your favorite talk show? Or Googled an innovative startup after hearing its founder weigh in on your favorite news podcast? Or planned to stop by a food festival that a local events magazine plugged?

It’s no secret that the media influences public perception of brands—that’s why so many companies invest in media relations. Media outlets offer unparalleled reach when it comes to disseminating information to targeted, receptive audiences. What’s more, the public places considerable trust in the outlets they choose to follow, so a positive endorsement from a media outlet can lend invaluable credibility to a company and its offerings.

The real secret at the heart of media pitching lies in teasing out the most newsworthy, impactful brand stories and convincing a reputable outlet that whatever you’re plugging—be it a product, service or idea—is worth sharing with their audience. That’s where the art of crafting a media pitch comes in.

What is a media pitch?

To fully understand the role of a media pitch, it’s necessary to first understand the scope of media relations. Not to be confused with “public relations”—which broadly encompasses a company’s external outreach to any stakeholder—“media relations” hinges on outreach to a specific group of stakeholders: reporters and producers. Situated within the context of the fast-paced news cycle, a media pitch is any attempt to convince an outlet to cover your company.

Depending on your industry, resources and promotional goals, the angle of your pitch and the type of media coverage you achieve will vary. A bike-sharing startup might opt to pitch a highly visual story complete with graphics showcasing its new and improved bike-docking locations ahead of National Bike to Work Day, while an environmental nonprofit could offer up an interview with its lead scientist to assist a reporter in teasing out key points from a new, jargon-heavy piece of legislation.

While the content of a pitch depends on a brand’s specific strategy, nearly all successful pitches share a common format. They snag a reporter’s attention with a customized hook, clearly communicate how a brand story will benefit an outlet’s audience, provide any resources (such as product samples and expert interviews) necessary to bring the story to life, and specify a clear directive for the journalist to act on—all while keeping the message digestible and to-the-point.

Most pitching today starts via email, and journalists’ inboxes are flooded with dozens of requests each day. Reporters must sift through the clutter to pursue the most buzzworthy news items. So while the possibilities for companies to leverage media relations are endless, the success of a pitch ultimately hinges on communicating the brand story’s newsworthiness. But how does the media define a newsworthy story?

What journalists are looking for

More often than you’d think, clients make the mistake of pitching their company updates as “news.” But updates that are newsworthy internally—a sleek new website, the appointment of a new CFO—aren’t necessarily stories worth sharing externally. When reporters vet pitches for newsworthiness, they look for three key elements:

#1. Uniqueness

First and foremost, a story needs to be distinctive enough to merit the media’s attention. Launching a copycat product is hardly news, but unveiling a disruptive innovation? That’s much more likely to pique a reporter’s interest. If generating news coverage is essential to your promotional plan, define the points of difference that will break through everyday media clutter. From a never-before-seen feature to an outrageous event activation, pursuing a buzzworthy angle from the outset helps a brand story stand out during the media pitching process.

#2. Relevance

Even the most remarkable story risks falling through the cracks if a pitch doesn’t clearly motivate for its relevance. A generic mass email is destined for the spam folder—a reporter is much more likely to follow up on a thoughtful, tailored pitch that demonstrates familiarity with their outlet and applicability to their target audience. In crafting an initial message, spell out the connections that make your brand story worthy of publication or airtime. Whether plugging a groundbreaking packaging adhesive to a manufacturing trade journal or promoting an upcoming neighborhood wine festival to a local events blog, do your homework to ensure that your pitch resonates with the parties it needs to reach.

#3. Timeliness

Finally, when it comes to pitching a story, the adage about being in the right place at the right time holds true. Even the most unique, relevant stories might not make the news if the initial pitch hits a journalist’s desk too early or too late. And if a story is evergreen and could be covered at any time, a reporter will likely pass it up in favor of a more pressing, urgent piece. As you prepare to pitch your brand story, keep timing in mind. Maybe that entails strategically timing the launch of your pop-up restaurant to coincide with the annual restaurant week or fast-tracking a revolutionary redesign of your app so it’s ready in time for a blockbuster conference. Because the news cycle moves so quickly, time is of the essence in getting eyeballs on your brand story.

If developing your media relations sounds like a nuanced and time-intensive process, that’s because it is! Like any promotional initiative, effective pitching requires some legwork, and tapping an agency makes the process a bit easier. From expertise in pitch strategy and copywriting to extensive knowledge of the media ecosystem to long-standing connections with outlets and journalists, we’re here to help. Click here to reach out.

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Dotted Line Drops Its First Non-Fungible Token

Unless you’ve taken a month-long, off-the-grid vacation, chances are you’ve noticed the massive NFT boom. From coveted “packs” of NBA video clips reminiscent of physical trading cards to a digital collage by graphic artist Beeple that sold for a whopping $69 million, everyone’s eyes (and crypto wallets) are opening to the baffling new world of blockchain-secured digital assets.

What exactly is an NFT?

If you’re still wondering what exactly an NFT is, you’re not alone.

For starters, the acronym stands for “non-fungible token.” “Non-fungible” means that something has unique value and can’t be substituted. For example, a dollar bill is fungible: you can swap one dollar for another and no one will notice the difference. A work of art, on the other hand, is non-fungible: if you swap Van Gogh’s Starry Night with a cheap gift shop replica, you’ll have a huge art heist on your hands.

A “token” refers to a digital asset (like an image, GIF, or video clip) registered on a blockchain. Every NFT corresponds with a unique bit of code, which stores an unalterable public record authenticating the token’s provenance (when it was minted, who bought and sold it, and for how much). This level of traceability is unprecedented for digital files—it enables clear ownership verification and commodification of everything from world-famous memes to iconic tweets, fueling a new market for rare virtual status symbols.

With even the most mundane of NFTs—like an image of a New York Times column about NFTs—racking up substantial press, all the buzz got us thinking. If anyone can make an NFT out of just about anything, why not make our own and put it up for sale?

Introducing Untitled 01 (1/1), an NFT by Dotted Line

Armed with a newfound appreciation for fungibility and inspired by the permanent, unalterable nature of tokenized artworks, we set out to create a digital time capsule for our inaugural NFT. As is our brand promise, we started with strategy. Our team met to discuss the tokenization trend, how Dotted Line could effectively demonstrate our creative capabilities within the NFT medium, and how best to engage the entire agency in the effort. After taking a little time to identify the intersection of the format and our marketing goals, Mitchell Jordan (our Associate Creative Director and digital art mastermind) suggested a digital collage of snapshots from the team.

From there, Account Manager Tom Hinkes gathered nearly 100 images of everyday moments from the Dotted Line team and clients. Mitchell then wove the shots into a collage memorializing where the agency stands at this specific point in time. The colorful brush stroke overlay speaks to both the diverse spectrum of people, interests, and stories at Dotted Line as well as the arts and crafts trend that we see as very “of the moment.” With our digital artwork finalized, we moved on to the critical step (or more literally, the convoluted series of steps) of actually minting the file to transform it into a bona fide NFT. 

The Nitty-Gritty of NFT Registration

Selling an NFT is a bit more complicated than traditional e-commerce since all transactions take place in cryptocurrency, not dollars. An array of different cryptocurrencies can be used to buy and sell tokens since multiple blockchains support NFTs. In an effort to be purists to the process, we selected Ethereum—the predominant blockchain network for NFTs—and its cryptocurrency, ether, to mint our token.

All NFT-related transactions require a digital wallet for storing, sending, and receiving cryptocurrency funds, so before we could acquire any ether, we needed a place to store it. We identified MetaMask as the ideal place to house our digital wallet—it’s a browser-extension that easily integrates with mainstream NFT marketplaces to simplify buying and selling.

With our new cryptocurrency burning a hole in our (digital) pocket, we could finally focus on transforming Mitchell’s digital artwork into a digital token by selecting a marketplace to house the creation. Several marketplaces facilitate NFT minting and trading, each with their own curatorial specializations buying and selling terms. We used Mintable, a free, open platform that streamlines the complex, technical nature of blockchain contracts and makes minting and selling an NFT straightforward and user-friendly. After linking our MetaMask wallet, we uploaded the collage to our agency account, set our selling price, and launched it on the marketplace.

Once we listed our NFT, we realized we couldn’t bear to part with it. To mark this singular milestone for the agency, we purchased Untitled 01 ourselves, adding an authentic, minted, NFT to Dotted Line’s digital portfolio. To buy our creation, we used a credit card to purchase ether through MetaMask and moved it to our digital wallet in the same way you’d transfer money to an external bank account. With enough ether in our wallet to purchase Untitled 01 and cover Mintable’s associated fees, we finally secured Dotted Line’s one-of-one digital collage. But we weren’t completely finished yet. The costs of trading assets on the blockchain aren’t just financial—there are environmental costs stemming from the energy required to generate complex code associated with the minting process. To offset our carbon costs, we purchased carbon credits from Aerial, a startup that distributes funds to forest conservation groups.

In a world of boundless NFTs, why does Dotted Line’s matter?

Everything we do at Dotted Line, from crafting a client’s repositioning strategy to dipping our toes into the digital art market, ladders back to our mission as an agency: to discover possibilities through creativity.

Our mission of discovery is just as embedded in our agency DNA as it is in Mitchell’s NFT design. That key verb—discover—means that we’re constantly on the lookout for groundbreaking innovations and planning ahead for the ways in which they’ll impact our clients’ businesses. To us, “discover” doesn’t simply mean skimming a daily news digest. It means rolling up our sleeves and getting our hands dirty—in this case, setting out on the arduous journey of minting an NFT to get a feel for the process inside and out. Much more than simply creating a digital artwork, Dotted Line’s NFT was all about process. The transaction in and of itself—surveying the NFT market, digging into cryptocurrency, and putting in the grunt work to actually execute the sale and purchase of Untitled 01— became the essence of the creative journey. The artwork itself is just an album cover!

NFTs are already making their way into the mainstream advertising world as brands experiment with their rich storytelling potential. Taco Bell leveraged an NFT drop to simultaneously promote new menu items, raise funds for charity, and generate a burst of positive press mentions. Even more relevant, the blockchain technology underpinning NFTs has the capacity to revolutionize an endless list of everyday business operations—think buying stock photography, issuing coupons and discount codes, and more.

Whether you’re ready or not, buzzwords like “blockchain” and “non-fungible” will only become more commonplace, so drop us a line if you want to learn more about our NFT journey or explore the possibility of an NFT for your brand.

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Onboarding in a Global Crisis

In 2019, HR tech company Hibob conducted a study that revealed an illuminating fact; 64% of new employees are less likely to feel welcome if they experience a poor onboarding process. Making things even more dire, only 12% of companies are seen as having positive, repeatable onboarding procedures. Having experienced onboarding in a wide swath of industries from financial compliance to specialized polymer sales, I can personally attest to these sentiments. I lead with this data to suggest that Dotted Line had their work cut out for them when bringing me on as an account manager just days before COVID-19 disrupted seemingly every normal business practice.

Onboarding can be a bear for an organization and take an emotional toll on new hires in normal circumstances. In novel and adverse environments like this, the task of joining a new team and assimilating into their culture seems herculean in nature. But with ample compassion, transparency, and vulnerability from Dotted Line, I have been a able to experience a truly complete and accepting onboarding process, while going through one of the most alarming crises my generation has witnessed.

I have now been with Dotted Line for 26 days, only five of which were spent in the office. Luckily, all five took place in the first week and allowed me to have some semblance of normalcy before it was stripped away with the growing severity of the COVID-19 pandemic and the associated closures of out-of-home workplaces. Before my first week was in the books, it was determined that we would work from home for the next two weeks. Our imposed seclusion was then extended to four weeks. Then, upon the Governor’s recommendation, our target date to return to the office moved another 10 weeks, into mid-June. 

It took a great amount of self-regulation and introspection for me to appreciate the difference between adapting to a new work environment and adapting to the new universal constraints of the pandemic. I continued battling these competing thoughts until I allowed myself to fully appreciate Dotted Line’s continued support for its employees and clients. This concept of unity and togetherness sparked a notion that the storm on the horizon presented an opportunity for our growing team, as opposed to an insurmountable problem. It helped me realize I wasn’t the only one trying to find my way in a new environment. Everyone was adopting new practices and learning together how to operate within this “new normal”.

That realization eased my remaining anxiety stemming from being the “new guy”. Accepting that each day was new for everyone, I no longer felt trepidation when suggesting a solution, offering advice, or volunteering to take on work. Where previously I may have tried to avoid stepping on toes, I was now eager to prove that I was willing and able to contribute, however I could.

Not every organization will be as accepting and encouraging as Dotted Line has been during this crisis, but what they were able to orchestrate and manufacture from a genuine care of their employees, clients, and community has been a true blessing for me. Every day since I began this role, I have taken time to appreciate how fortunate I am to have a job that can operate effectively while working from home and that I have a manager and team supportive of both my business practices and my personal and emotional health. The number of “check-ins” and assurances facilitated by management and the operations team at Dotted Line has been as comforting as it was unexpected.

As I look ahead to next week, next month, and even next year, I don’t know how the pandemic will affect our business, others’ businesses, or the world around us, but I know exactly how our team will approach each and every day – together, as a unit that cares deeply for each other, our clients, and our community. For that, I could not be more proud of being part of this great team and am extremely thankful for them and the opportunity they have afforded me amidst a very trying time I otherwise would have had to navigate on my own.

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Why we must sharpen our communication skills during crisis

As marketers, we always talk about the power of words and the need for brands to choose them wisely. But as the world shifts into crisis mode with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, words and their consumer impact are heightened and being felt more intensely. And as operations leaders turn their focus towards implementing organizational shifts to enable remote workers, marketers will need to carry the load creating measured communications to their most important constituents – customers and business partners. But what does that mean for your organization and how should you go about building what is already a nuanced message remotely? We’ve come up with several considerations for marketers.

Know who you are

Organizational branding runs the gamut – anywhere from a light touch with a simple name, logo and mission to a more thoroughly expressed identity with brand guidelines that include set typography, color families and clearly defined values and employee behaviors. Regardless of what your organization has in place, the common thread among organizations that effectively communicate is that they know what they do well, and they have a set of core phrases they use consistently to convey their value. And those descriptors don’t stop at the what – the what is easy and often quite evident. Effective communicators focus on the why.

Think of the why as the roots system for an organization’s communications. When a wild wind (or pandemic) threatens to uproot the tree, its roots ground the message and serve the audience’s needs, reinforcing its value. Conversely, when we stray from what the audience needs and expects, the roots are unearthed and the message is more likely to be lost, because we didn’t provide that value.

Contextualize but Stay True to Who You Are

As COVID-19 expands indiscriminately, we are all feeling its impact. But simply because we’re all experiencing the same event doesn’t make us all experts. As organizations begin to contextualize their brand message for the current crisis and its impact on priority audiences, remember to stick to what you know, the areas where you excel and the information your audience has come to expect from you.

For instance, if you are a consumer brand that produces cleaning supplies, stick to your knowledge of the product and your organization’s why. Straying to related but tangential topics, for instance human tendencies surrounding hoarding of cleaning products in times of crisis, is not part of your wheelhouse and has the potential to fall flat, or even worse disappoint your audience. Preach what you know and lean into that…but try to avoid overstepping. It’s a fine line.

As you begin to find that fine line for your organization, be aware of your consumers’ sensitivity as they work through their own anxiety and figure out their new normal. While humor is oftentimes an incredibly effective tool, at least for the immediate future, it should be used with great care. Also, bear in mind that delivery is central to whether a joke lands or falls flat. It’s hard to show inflection through the written word and that may very well dampen your delivery, or worse yet, offend your audience.

Get Internal Alignment

Once you’ve reexamined your areas of excellence and the expectations of your audience, take the necessary time to socialize your thinking with senior leadership. Various key roles – the CEO, the COO, your people officers – will process this event from a different lens, so it’s helpful to collaborate and understanding the problem and its most affected audiences from various perspectives. After that exercise, develop a simple, focused message that reiterates your why, bridges the gap on how that may change during this crisis and identifies the means by which your audience can communicate with you in this new normal. Circle back with your team to ensure you’ve hit on the key messages, and then you’re ready for an external audience.

Lend a Human Element

There are several funny memes and a piece from the NY Times that talk about how extroverts are struggling with the isolation of social distancing.  And while they’re made in jest to help lighten the mood during these trying times, the message is important.  We will NEED each other in order to get through this mess.  And while that won’t be face to face for quite some time, brands owe it to themselves and their audience to take this time to develop real relationships and create ways in which to connect in meaningful ways.  That can be in the form of humanizing the people from your organization – giving a face to a voice people hear on a regular basis – or creating digital opportunities to operate as a community. Not only will these events strengthen your connection with your customers, but it will provide a real benefit to their peace of mind, something we can all use a little help with.

Organizations are still in the early days of navigating what it means to operate in a COVID-19 era. But as we turn the page on a second week of working from home, and prepare for what could be several more weeks of a digital-first interactions, it’s critical that we spend the time now, if we haven’t already done so, to make sure we communicate with care and lead with the needs of our audience, first and foremost.

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Marketing Agencies Make West End Moves

Dotted Line has set up shop in Henrico County’s Forest Office Park, one of several local marketing agencies to recently migrate to Richmond’s West End. CEO Lauren Sweeney spoke with Richmond BizSense about how the 6,600-square-foot facility (which we share with Spinnaker Consulting Group) perfectly fits the needs of our fast-growing company. 

Continue to Richmond BizSense. 

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Ad Rewind: 2017’s memorable advertising and marketing moments

Earlier this year, Dotted Line partnered with Chesterfield community Magnolia Green to create what Richmond BizSense called one of 2017’s most “memorable” ad and marketing campaigns. With design emulating vintage posters, the campaign showcases the community’s new homes through print and digital ads, as well as a website refresh and other creative marketing methods. 

Continue to Richmond BizSense.