A while back, I was leafing through a magazine in a dentist’s office when I saw a cute photo of a woman with a child on her shoulders to emphasize the headline: “You carry the world on your shoulders.” Below was a bright orange color block, some support copy and the MetLife logo. Not worth noting, except …
When I turned to page 73 of the same magazine, I experienced a severe case of déjà vu looking at a Verizon ad. The same woman and child took up the page but were now facing the other direction. The headline had changed to a similar, “We know there’s a lot riding on you” in a bright red color block.
And suddenly, neither ad was about connecting with a mom’s heroic efforts at all. My only take-away was that one of the marketing teams suffered unfortunate luck, got lazy, or worse, copied. Not exactly what either brand was going for.