The Old Spice Man: A Traditional Triumph

The viral success of The Old Spice Man campaign prompted Craig Reiss to parse its success factors and explain how companies of any size can apply them.  His dissection offers breadth and many practical insights.  Here’s the link: http://blog.entrepreneur.com/2010/07/lessons-from-the-old-spice-man.php

There’s a “meta” lesson, too.  Created by ad agency Weiden + Kennedy, the campaign was conceived as entertainment.  It handled the Web accordingly—as TV but in near real-time and two-way—and the work itself was genuinely entertaining.

Entertainment is not a core competency in interaction design.  Its prevailing paradigm assumes a purposeful user with her own intentions the fulfillment of which drives her further interaction.  Assuming a purposeful user doesn’t rule out but does militate against entertainment.  The prevailing paradigm also assumes optimization: a steady stream of user data informs ongoing redesign that in turn yields continually improving results.  Optimization and entertainment are not antithetical but they are apples and oranges. 

My somewhat ironic take-away is that the type of talent capable of creating a campaign like The Old Spice Man may more likely be found among the creative staffs of ad agencies where entertainment is the prevailing paradigm than among digital experts.