And with Egypt’s first goal and win in the net, AFCON has officially finally started! But, AFCON’s advertising season and competition was already full-swing from all the way back to the 10th of June, with OPPO leading the charge.
Check out our review ➤ Mo Salah’s trend-setting power used on Mobil’s new ad for AFCON 2019
So, who else has been releasing, and which campaigns or ads are doing great and which are not?
We take a look at this year’s AFCON ads and see who’s scoring and who needs to be taken out to penalties and reshoots.
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The Good, The Pretty, The Bold
There are some great ads already gracing local channels and social media.
Vodafone:
Vodafone continues its supremacy, connecting two well-shot ads that look at the two sides of AFCON fans. Kicking off with fan-favorite and brand ambassador, Mohamed Salah, Vodafone took fans on an emotional ride before launching a traditional “cheer” song.
Etisalat:
Etisalat may have been one of the first ads to launch this AFCON season, finish with a score of 18.4M views but beats out Orange with engagement of over 3.3M. It’s a fun ad, silly in its core but tries so hard to be serious that it somehow balances out, making it more pretty than good.
Coca Cola:
Coca Cola’s campaign is exciting and plays on all sides, as in all of the football club sides. The ad plays on all of the local clubs coming together to cheer on the national team, a mix of everyone’s favorite players. The only real comment we have is, how bias are you to add crowns only to one team? Is it because Ahly is red like Coca Cola? Either way, this may alienate some specific club fans.
While pretty and good execution continue to create great standards in the ad industry, fortune favors the bold.
Burger King:
Burger King breaks through the AFCON crowd with a powerful and unique ad this season, reminding us of Rexona’s great Football alphabet for last year’s World Cup.
The design and aesthetic is completely different from what you’d expect from Burger King, and is so bold that it breaks through all the clutter with a memorable look however nothing much else.
Careem:
Car-hailing app Careem explodes onto the scene with this punchy track that “predicts” the AFCON’s outcome. It’s a bold choice, to try and predict how it will end, but the execution is fun, memorable and impactful or at least the bass is.
https://www.facebook.com/fares.corbani/videos/10157249937976163/
Behind the scenes by freelance cinematographer Fares Corbani mentions Maged Nassar as the film director at Good People Agency.
The Lame:
GLC Paints tried hard to create an emotional connection with football fans by producing a motivational video, it looks like they may have been trying to avoid copyright issues by using graphical elements to use the national team players’ likeness.
GLC Paints are also claiming local AFCON sponsorship, seeking a strong presence in the sports field but unfortunately we were unable to find any credible source that can confirm what the brand calls local sponsorship. There are 3 main categories of AFCON sponsorship; title, official and regional sponsors.
According to the CAF Sponsors and Partners official page, GLC was not mentioned.
The Black Horse:
A surprising brand decided to jump into the AFCON season and create a witty ad copy to showcase the brand history and progress projected along Egypt’s National Team history in previous tournaments.
The effort made to produce such an advert is amazing compared to other local food restaurants, and elevates expectations on what smaller brands can do to jump onto big seasons.
Penalty Box for Orange:
Orange’s fun song is definitely a memorable one, with vintage visuals and a catchy local sound that includes an easy to remember chorus/tag line.
Orange dominates with over 37M views on Facebook and YouTube, but Vodafone wins the score with the most engagements in all of the ads released so far, receiving over 7.3M engagements on both platforms. However, their song has a small historical mistake about AFCON 1974 Semifinal nightmare that many long-time football fans noticed.
The advert mentioned a historical fact is about Egypt’s match against Zaire (Democratic Republic of the Congo) in the Semifinal’s of the 1974 African Cup of Nations (Date: 9 March 1974). While Orange’s advert claims that Egypt scored 2 goals in the first half, the historical fact about the match is that Egypt scored 1 goal in each half.
We hope our review will give you ideas about most of the current running campaigns. As always, our support team is always ready to offer advice for how you can make every digital campaign more successful. Don’t hesitate to ask!
