Last night, Dodge’s “God Made A Farmer” Super Bowl ad rocked me, and likely, millions of other people with its poignant message and eloquent deliver by Paul Harvey.
Today, according the Hulu, it’s the highest rated ad that ran last night. Why? The ad was stunningly effective because it was authentic, pulled on our values and deceptively simple. The grainy sound was from a tape (yes, a cassette recording) of Paul Harvey’s keynote address at the 1978 Future Farmers of America annual convention. No clean up, you can hear the hiss and the echo that comes with a tape deck setup at the back of the room (and not being directly fed from a mixing board.)
Instead of fancy effects, the ad features high quality pictures, to keep us tracking with Paul’s narrative. The ad also works because, much like last year’s “It’s Halftime America” ad, it speaks to a crisis in our country that an underdog is facing. For farmers, they face less resources to do their job, at a time we need them more than ever. In the 4-Hour Work Week culture our kids live in, farmers work around the clock and are proud of it.
Former Coke CMO Sergio Zyman once wrote that “good advertising is a service. It adds value when you consider, purchase or use the product.” In this case Dodge hit a home run, even though I’ll never likely buy one of their trucks. Even in non-consideration, my affinity to the brand increased, which likely has it’s own long term value to Dodge.
