OK…you got me. They didn’t really kill their dog…but they might as well have. Taco Bell had to get rid of their incredibly famous dog a few years back. Why?

Most people remember him, but don’t know how long he’s been “dead” as far as a TV actor. You may be wondering why they got rid of him. After all, that dog and the ad campaign has one of the highest recall scores ever! (A recall score is when ad agencies do focus groups, small groups of people they ask things like, “What product does the doggie represent?”, and other stupid, meaningless questions. Focus groups do not work, but we’ll get into that in a future post.)

Anyway, pretty much everyone and their brother could tell you that the Chihuahua was representing Taco Bell…nearly 100%. The ad agency was thrilled! The President and Marketing Director of Taco Bell were thrilled! Only one little problem: From the time the dog ads hit TV…sales of food plummeted! During the dog’s entire reign as the “spokes dog” of the fast food chain, sales kept getting worse and worse. The franchisees were ready to stage an armed revolution!

See, people don’t respond to ads they “remember”, they respond to ads that hit them emotionally. Ads that show people the advertiser can provide EXACTLY WHAT THEY WANT! Ads that hit people’s emotional hotspots and cause them to almost involuntarily respond to buy! People DO NOT BUY because they think an ad is “cute” or “funny” or “memorable”.

Moral of the story? The Chairman of the company that owned Taco Bell told the President to “lose the dog now”, which he refused to do. Well, the Chairman then fired the President, the Marketing Director and the ad agency because he and the franchisees want sales! They don’t give a shit if anyone remembers their ads as long as the ads bring people in to buy food! So, now you know why the doggie was iced.

Can you think of ads you think should be killed as well? It’s fun to watch TV with a new eye, trying to determine if an ad merely tries to get “recall”, or if it actually could make sales! More about this in future posts for sure…
Oh…by the way…if you would like to discover how to make MILLIONS using a jealously guarded secret that only my best customers know about…I’m doing a FREE teleseminar this Thursday…so please click on the link below:

http://internetprofitsnetwork.com/tsm

Jeff Paul
Internet Profits Network

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