Character Reference

So I’ve been thinking about brands creating and associating themselves with fictional characters. The cereal sector is a prime example of character use in marketing. The majority of cereal brands aimed at children use characters as a way crafting some point of differentiation within what is a relatively homogenous product category. Utter the name Frosties and you’d be hard pushed to find many people that don’t have a ginger feline muscling his way into their psyche. Obviously characters within this sector are created primarily to prompt interest from children and form some sort of ongoing bond, but what about those used by brands in which children do not represent the core target audience?

Although I’ve never found the use of a Meerkat within advertising remotely amusing or endearing, its unquestionable success in terms of consumer recognition, media coverage and spurning of ‘me-too’ attempts from competitors suggests there is still a strong case for associating characters with products that are difficult to differentiate on their actual features alone. Over the past few months Movement have been working on a campaign to bring ring back tones to life. Ring back tones are a product type that hasn’t enjoyed much success in the UK to date despite triumphing in other parts of the globe. So what do you do when you have a product that has features that are hard to convey? I'm stumped. Oh no wait.




I’ve also been lucky enough to work with some very talented individuals over the last few months that have created some other characters that I’m particularly fond of. Check these out.

Dog Judo

Leigh Pearce