Best & Worst Marketing Stories Of 2021

Episode 368 – December 5, 2021

During episode 368, BL and David discuss the top ten best marketing stories they covered in 2021 as well as the top ten worst marketing stories. Those stories included Alien Oreos, a handgun unboxing PSA, 2020 hooks up with Satan in Match.com Commercials, Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs Launch, Weinermobile Lyft Rides, New York Times’ interactive historical reporting of the Tulsa Race Masacre, Snapchat Millionaires, Sleep Number’s advertorial TV commercials, Nerf Hires Fan As Chief Tik Tok Otticer, an Italian Mafia Fugitive Cooked By YouTube, Facebook’s January 6 Fail, a working gun disguised as a Lego toy, LinkedIn Knocks TikTok, the Milk Crate Challenge, Facebook renames, Twitter disses Alan Page, Mars Bar’s pesterbot, Nike’s Satan Shoes, Fired By Bot At Amazon, and Dancing Middle Aged Guys.

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The 10 Best Marketing Stories Of 2021

10. Oreo Welcomes Aliens

Oreo created limited-edition cookie packs that serve as a peace offering for potential extraterrestrial visitors.

• Oreo turns cookie packs into extraterrestrial peace offering ahead of congressional UFO report
• Oreo, The Offering

👽 THIS IS NOT A DRILL 👽 They made their visit and took the #OREOOffering! Mission “Bring-All-Lifeforms-Together” complete ☑️ pic.twitter.com/nbSaq8ckbX— OREO Cookie (@Oreo) June 3, 2021

9. Unboxing Guns

This PSA from States United to Prevent Gun Violence aims to highlight the fact that 4.6 million children live in homes with unlocked guns.

• A Child Unboxes His Parents’ Unlocked Handgun in This Unnerving PSA

8. A Match.com Made In Hell

Match.com commercials created by Ryan Reynold’s Maximum Effort production company imagines what the perfect match with the year 2020 would be.

7. Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs Launch

Lots of people are changing their avatars to cartoons of apes. They’re buying them as NFTs from the Bored Ape Yacht Club.

• Why Bored Ape Avatars Are Taking Over Twitter

6. Lyft Offers Wienermobile Rides

The ride-sharing brand partners with Oscar Mayer in select cities.

• Lyft Offers Rides In Wienermobile

5. New York Times’ Interactive Storytelling Of The Tulsa Race Massacre

Media coverage of the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921 has brougth this chapter of American history to white consciousness, 100 years after the fact.

• What The 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre Destroyed

4. Snapchat Millionaires

Snapchat is paying out $1M a day to ppl who post viral videos to it’s new TikTok-like feature, Spotlight. Top performers are earning millions.

• Snapchat Wants You to Post. They’re Willing to Pay Millions.

3. Sleep Number’s Content Marketing Television Commercials

• Sleep Number’s content marketing TV advertising campaign.

2. Nerf Hires Fan As Chief TikTok Officer

Sophie Jamison, who has more than 1.8 million followers, beat out over 1,000 other applicants for the $10,000-a-month position of chief TikTok officer at Nerf.

• Nerf Introduces Its New Chief TikTok Officer
• Fred Cox, Vikings Kicker and an Inventor of Nerf Football, Dies at 80

@sophie.lightning

@nerf #Nerfapplication It’s Nerf or Nothin!

♬ Best Day Of My Life – American Authors

1. YouTube Snags Mafioso

Stanley Tucci isn’t the only one who loves Italian cooking.

• Italian Mob Fugitive Caught In Caribbean After Posting Cooking Videos Online

🚨Arrested in the Dominican Republic and extradited to Italy: #Ndrangheta fugitive Marc Feren Claude Biart, wanted on drug trafficking charges since 2014, lands in Italy to face justice.

Authorities located him after recognising his tattoos in a YouTube video.#StopNDrangheta pic.twitter.com/26ITHSZFW7— INTERPOL (@INTERPOL_HQ) March 30, 2021

The 10 Worst Marketing Stories Of 2021

10. Facebook Fails

After BuzzFeed News reported on an internal document that examined Facebook’s failings leading up to the Capitol riot, many of Facebook’s employees were prevented from accessing it. BuzzFeed published the report so everyone can read it.

• Facebook Stopped Employees From Reading An Internal Report About Its Role In The Insurrection. You Can Read It Here.

9. Unbelievable: Gun Kit Makes Glock Look Like A Toy

Culper Precision’s custom design for a Glock handgun arrived at a time when gun violence is soaring and little is being done to keep lethal weapons out of the hands of children, who wind up shooting themselves or others.

• ‘SUPER FUN’: A gun covered in Legos to look like a toy sets off a furor
• Sales Of Lego-Covered Gun Halted

This "Lego Glock" is an actual thing you can buy, build and shoot: "…honestly what childhood toy is more welcoming than a big ole pile of blocks:” https://t.co/wBXl5GP6an

Unintentional shootings among children have risen by 30% in the past year. pic.twitter.com/ZmQXiefOE7— Shannon Watts (@shannonrwatts) July 8, 2021

8. LinkedIn Shades TikTok

LinkedIn is running an ad campaign saying companies shouldn’t advertise on platforms like TikTok.

• LinkedIn tells advertisers that business marketing doesn’t belong near pictures of dogs in costumes
• Don’t Be A Fish Out of Water, Do Business Where Business is Done
• How 7 brands Are Using TikTok
• TikTok Revenue and Usage Statistics 2021

7. The Milk Crate Challenge

After scores of people broke their bones falling 10 feet or more from the top of a pile of milk crates in the Milk Crate Challenge, TikTok banned it.

• TikTok Bans Milk Crate Challenge After Reports of, You Guessed It, Milk Crate-Induced Injuries

Whoa!! The Indianapolis Colts mascot crushes the Milk Crate Challenge! 👀 ~Philly, Joe & Kirby pic.twitter.com/Y5KKakRh7d— Power97 (@power97wpg) August 25, 2021

6. Facebook By Another Name

Would Facebook by another name smell as rank?

• Facebook Can’t Hide Its Problems Behind a New Name

5. No Justice For Justice Page

Alan Page is not notable enough for Twitter.

• Twitter rejects blue check mark verification for former Viking, Minnesota Supreme Court Justice Alan Page
• Alan Page’s Hall of Fame Profile
• Page Education Foundation

Not notable! Hmmm.! #notnotable ⁦@Twitter⁩ pic.twitter.com/NcfdzUglEN— Alan Page (@ACPage_77) August 26, 2021

4. Pesterbot

Mars Wrigley has created an autonomous robot that roams stores and tempts shoppers long before they reach the point of sale.

• This Mars Bar Rover Will Chase You Around a Store and Tempt You to Buy Candy

3. Satan’s Shoes

Pegged to the release of rapper Lil Nas X’s new single, “Montero (Call Me By Your Name),” the Nike shoes are adorned with a pentagram and the number 666, the sneakers’ soles supposedly contained: a drop of human blood.

• A prank company and Lil Nas X are selling ‘Satan Shoes’ containing a drop of human blood. Nike is suing.
• Satan’s Shoes
• MSCHF Agency website
• Lil Nas X Apologizes for Satan Shoe

2. Fired By Bot

Stephen Normandin spent almost four years racing around Phoenix delivering packages as a contract driver for Amazon.com Inc.

• Fired by bot at Amazon: ‘It’s you against the machine’.

1. Enough With The Dancing Middle-Aged Guys!

Advertising is such a copycat industry.

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• The Effect Of Apple Mail Privacy on Black Friday/Cyber Monday

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