Liquid Death’s in-house agency made Boost Mobile’s new ad campaign and gave its own product a hefty supporting role. The results are entertaining, but are they likely to be effective?
The ads promote Boost Mobile’s promise of flexible and transparent contracts by way of a psychotic character called Cellphone Bill — a parody of Buffalo Bill from The Silence of the Lambs — who tortures his victims into accepting price hikes.
Though Liquid Death is never mentioned by the characters in the ads, who stick to discussing wireless service contracts, Cellphone Bill can be clearly seen drinking the canned water, and even dousing a victim with it.
Does putting two brands in a single spot like this make them more memorable, or does it confuse viewers, leaving them less likely to remember either one?
Researchers from the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute for Marketing Science published a paper about the effects of co-branding in 2017. Their experiments showed that participants were no more likely to remember seeing a banner ad if it featured two brands, and that they were less likely to remember which brands were advertised.
On the other hand, a 2020 study found that a travel ad published on Google’s Display Network received 48.1% more clicks when it featured two tourism brands, as opposed to just one.
Brittney Bauer and Clark Johnson have conducted research into how people respond to different types of co-branded advertising. In a study published in the Journal of Advertising earlier this year, they tested joint ads for companies in the same, in complementary and in different industries, and consistently found that those for complementary businesses performed the best at boosting consumer attitudes and positive word of mouth.
‘We find that joint advertisements between brands in complementary industries lead to heightened perceptions of cognitive fit,’ Bauer told MediaCat, ‘and subsequently impact downstream brand-related outcomes.’
Since Boost Mobile and Liquid Death are in different industries, she added, a co-branded campaign between the companies would ‘typically generate weaker perceptions of fit from a consumer perspective.’
But while telecommunications and canned water do not complement each other, the brand personalities of Boost Mobile and Liquid Death do. Both have positioned themselves as category disruptors rebelling against the incumbents — whether that’s for polluting the environment with plastic or ripping off customers with hidden fees.
There’s no research into how brand personality affects co-branding, but Bauer has written a paper on the similarities between endorsers and brands — which is being reviewed for publication in the European Journal of Marketing — that may offer some insight.
‘We find that matching disruptive endorsers who are shocking and extreme to provocative brands with edgy and daring personas yields more favorable consumer evaluations and brand responses,’ said Bauer, adding that, just like with co-branding, ‘we pinpoint perceived cognitive fit as the underlying process driving the impact.’
According to Bauer, brand personality can be another way to generate higher perceptions of fit among viewers, increasing the performance of a joint ad campaign. So, while a partnership between Boost Mobile and Liquid Death may not make much sense from a business perspective, the brands’ shared disdain for their category leaders may compensate for that.
There are, however, two ways that the Cellphone Bill ads differ from those tested in the academic papers. First of all, Liquid Death has a cameo role in the ads, rather than equal billing, although Bauer thinks this situation will still follow the same principles. The second is that all of the ads tested in the academic studies were basic, static ads. None were anything like as dynamic and creative as the Cellphone Bill ads.
So, while there is no clear verdict either way on whether joint advertising can ever be more memorable than a campaign for a single brand, there is some guidance on how to give a collaborative ad the best shot at success. And if you’re going to do it, you could probably do worse than follow the example of Boost Mobile and Liquid Death.
Boost Mobile and Liquid Death did not respond to a request for comment.
