Naked aggression is super corny
why I don't like the Nike Olympics ad
Okay, so Nike is having a hard time right now because they leaned too hard into DTC, chased clicks, and abandoned their narrative.
Brian Morrissey covered the saga brilliantly earlier this week. Yet another example of performance marketing resulting in short-term gains at the cost of long-term resonance. I am so surprised that Nike “OK"-ed this data-driven strategy, considering Nike was one of the few brands that seemed to understand that story should come before all. Brand marketing means atmosphere which means pull which means you don’t have to stress about conversion rates and instead can focus on—I don’t know—saying something meaningful. No one likes a naked sale! Which brings me to the latest Nike ad and its naked aggression.
So, I am trying to put myself into the headspace of the people (key stakeholders blah) who created this ad. What was the insight? This is my suspicion. With this Olympics-timed campaign, the brand tried to play off of the cultural idea that we’re now soft. This is a common refrain among a certain demographic that I am not going to detail out of respect, but I bet you imagine them down to the smell of their cars. This is how they think. We are now a nation of softies handing out participation trophies! Back in the day, there were winners and losers! Things were clear-cut! People were good or bad! And now? All of these pansies have got us PRETENDING that everyone is all that.
The spot, narrated by William DeFoe’s green goblin drawl, begins with a question: “Am I a bad person?” And then goes on to list a bunch of adjectives one might associate with being a “winner.”
“This sounds like a journal entry in Patrick Bateman’s diary,” wrote @dumbnbroke in response to the video. “How shitty do you want your ad? Nike: yes” typed another. The on-the-nose script, Nike likely believed, was provocative, because they were operating (or their agency was operating) under the assumption that this song and dance was counter-culture.
Why oh why some people are so hung up on us being congenial and sweet to kids in this country between the ages of 2-6 is beyond me. Maybe it’s, uh a good thing that we’re not making them into little robotic win-at-all-costs freaks at too young of an age? Maybe we should hand them special signifiers when they graduate first grade? Anyway, I digress.
The thing is, this is a common refrain and people think (FALSELY!) that now everyone is getting patted on the back at every turn. This is simply not true. America is all about winning. Go to an 11 AM yoga class and the women in the class are trying to win it. Observe the window of a real estate office. Stand in line for a coffee and take too long to order. Go to the airport and watch people sign up for Clear. Everyone, at every moment, is trying to get ahead, in ways that are small, superficial, meaningless and in ways that are big, important, and significant. Though, all of it all adds up to the same vibe. We feel it. We see it. If anything, we are optimizing too much. We are too focused on the endpoint instead of the process. Have you gone to dinner with people and listened to them swap “I went here” and “I went there” vacation stories? What a bore.
So, Nike built this ad out of a false insight. Which led to, I believe, work that could have been better. Bottomline: You don’t build great advertising through basic cultural observation. This is to say, Nike’s ad is not confrontational, or illuminating, or unfamiliar. The naked aggression is corny, nothing more. It’s not going to make people (in our nation of ‘softies’) gasp. This is not distinct from American culture, this is American culture. You don’t build an awe-inspiring work by being a mirror.
“Great Athletes Remind the World There's Nothing Wrong With Wanting to Win,” Nike said in the campaign’s press release.
Believe us, no one thinks there is. All we hear is the opposite. No matter where we are or what we’re doing.
