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Blurrt’s Advert Calendar – Door Five

December 5, 2017 — by

Becca gets us in the Christmas spirit with a rundown of the top TV adverts starting to air on our screens.

Today it’s the final door of our Advert Calendar, and what better way to end it than with our top 3 ‘best of the rest’? We’ll be looking at the top 3 adverts that featured in our sample data, who may not be in the same league as John Lewis or Aldi but are stand-alone adverts in their own right. So who’s up first?

Up first is Coca-Cola, who, because of their relentless promotion and use of Father Christmas in previous advertising, have become synonymous with Christmas itself. Coca-Cola was the top-talked about advert in the rest of our sample data, taking 31% of the conversation. Before the advert’s official release on the 17th, there was a largely positive conversation about Coca-Cola, with 72% positive sentiment between the 1st and the 17th of November (0% Negative, 28% Neutral). 41% of the conversation took place before the advert aired on Channel 4, with the top hashtag being #HolidaysAreComing mentioned in 47% of our sample data. Tweets commonly mentioned ‘waiting’ and ‘not officially Christmas’, giving Coca Cola’s Christmas advert a lot of anticipation.

Once the advert was released, conversation jumped by 42%, with happiness being the top emotion. #HolidaysAreComing continued to be the top hashtag, and conversation became less positive at 35% Negative and 59% Positive (6% Neutral). November 17th was the day volume peaked in our sample data, however, 66% of that conversation was taken by tweets mentioning Greenpeace UK. Greenpeace UK released an advert the same day as Coca-Cola, calling them out for the amount of recyclable plastic bottles dumped into the ocean each year.

Second in our list is Marks and Spencer, who have been regarded in the past as a contender to John Lewis’ Christmas Advert Crown. Last year’s advert featured Mrs Claus receiving a letter from a little boy who wants the perfect present for his big sister. The advert was heartwarming and meant many people looked forward to 2017’s offering. This year, M&S announced a partnership with Paddington Bear, in time for the movie release of ‘Paddington 2’. The advert shows the bear helping a burglar return all the presents he stole and teaching the sentiment of giving, not receiving. The advert made up 22% of conversation over our sample data. There was some controversy surrounding the advert, where the burglar seems to say something other than “thank you little bear”. We’ll let you decide what was said here…

Despite the controversy, M&S had a fairly good reception with love being the top emotion, taking 59% of all the emotion bearing tweets. The word ‘love’ was mentioned in 16% of the tweets, whereas ‘adorable’ was in 7% of the tweets. #LoveTheBear, the official hashtag for the campaign, was mentioned in 47% of the sample tweets.

The third and final advert on our list today captured 17% of the conversation in our sample data and in the past have been known to create adverts that tug at the heartstrings of viewers. In 2014, Sainsbury’s brought us the story of World War One soldiers, who stopped fighting around the Christmas period in 1914. 2015’s advert was Mog’s Christmas Calamity, telling of a heroically clumsy cat who ruins Christmas Day. This year’s advert was released on the 12th of November at 7.45pm and features a sing-a-long about a typical Christmas. The advert involves members of the public, Sainsbury’s workers, celebrities and Kermit the Frog – and is this writer’s favourite Christmas advert.

Before the advert release, there was a 71% positive reaction for Sainsbury’s, with most tweets asking when this year’s advert was going to air and discussing previous adverts. When the advert was released, sentiment spiked in negativity and decreased in positivity, showing a 43% Positive and 29% Negative (28% Neutral) reaction. Users claimed that this year’s advert didn’t live up to previous ones, with hashtags like #BringBackMog trending. Negative reaction increased as time went on after the release, rising to 33%, with disgust being the highest emotion in our sample data, featuring in 27% of all emotion-bearing tweets. This was followed by Anger and Happiness both featuring in 20% of emotion-bearing tweets.

So how do these adverts compare against each other, and against the previous adverts we’ve covered? The most talked about advert in this list was definitely Coca-Cola, with 41% more conversation than M&S and 82% more than Sainsbury’s. It seemed to have the least negative reaction, with only 6% negativity versus Sainsbury’s 29%. It also beats John Lewis, Tesco and Aldi in negative reaction, narrowly missing out on that top spot held by Debenhams, at 5%.

Who was the winner of the #BattleOfTheXmasAds? Coca-Cola had the earliest possible tweet, as there were Twitter users talking about the Coca-Cola Advert as early as March 2017. This beats both Debenhams and M&S in the ‘earliest tweet’ category.

Our sample data suggests that the anticipation in terms of volume was won by Coca-Cola again, as 41% of their tweets came in before the advert was released. This beats Sainsbury’s 17% and John Lewis’ 13%. Anticipation in terms of positive reaction was won by Sainsbury’s with 83% positive conversation before the advert release. This beats Coca-Cola at 65% and outshines the closest supermarket-competitor Tesco at 33%.

Who won the battle to be the most talked about? It can only be John Lewis, taking up 35% of our sample data. This beats Tesco’s 19% and Debenhams’ 8% respectively. The final category, positive overall reaction, is won by Debenhams with a whopping 84% of positive conversation, beating Aldi’s 71% and Coca Cola’s 59%.

With these statistics in mind, in third place is John Lewis, for being the most talked about advert, and having an advert sure to enable conversation all year round. In second place is Debenhams, with the largest positive reaction overall and a high anticipation reaction. In first place, it can only be Coca-Cola. Combining the ability to ensure customers are always talking about their adverts all year round with a very high positive reaction before and after an advert release, Coca-Cola snatch the prize, the title and the glory of being this year’s winner of the #BattleOfTheXmasAds!

To find out more about how our incredible social media analytics could help you analyse the success of a marketing campaign or product launch, contact Becca at becca@blurrt.co.uk