Male grooming company Old Spice has developed quite the reputation over the years. The brand’s stunts include campaigns such as “The Man Your Man Could Smell Like”, releasing a full length film known as The Invisible World, as well as the time Terry Crews played a set of drums using just his muscles.
Previous Old Spice ads have demonstrated the brand’s flair for creativity
In Old Spice’s portfolio of well received ads, the brand has shown time and time again the importance of placing a strong emphasis on entertaining content as a method of driving brand awareness, and capturing the attention of prospective customers.
In more recent times, Old Spice continues to add to their long line of content marketing efforts with the release of a brand new fully playable class for classic Role Playing Game – Dungeons & Dragons.
The new class, known as “The Gentleman”, is based loosely off of the over-the-top persona embodied in the Old Spice ads by Isaiah Mustafa.
Equipped with comedic abilities such as the power to heal allies with the mysteriously pleasing scent of Old Spice products, the class is also able to magically make a horse appear underneath the user at will – just like in the ads.
Announced via Twitter, the rules for the new class can be downloaded here, in a highly-detailed, well illustrated, four-sheet PDF file.
The classes description reads “[The Gentleman] is able to rise above any challenge and inspire their companions to greater feats, all in the name of selling more Old Spice deodorant than Old Spice is already selling.”
Equipped with a dapper suit that allows the user to dodge attacks, the Gentlemen is a fun to play class that is based around subverting the rules of the game and undermining the DM’s decisions to the players enjoyment.
Now there may be some of you who are wondering – why is a deodorant brand such as Old Spice dabbling in D&D?
Well, simply put, there is lot of crossover between the audiences of the two brands, who both seem to attract a young, predominantly male audience and based on this fact, it makes perfect sense for Old Spice to cross over into the tabletop realm.
Furthermore, there are also links within this campaign to the work of rival deodorant brand, Lynx/Axe, who in the past have tapped into the male sex drive, by positioning their product as one that can take an average man and turn him into one that will be desired by women.
As marketing guru Seth Godin explains, “don’t find customers for your products, find products for your customers” going on to add “people do not buy products and services, they buy relations, stories and magic”.
And in terms of story, you have to hand it to Old Spice, there isn’t another deodorant company out there willing to market themselves by creating a feature length film, or a new D&D class.
It has been proven by competitors such as Lynx/Axe, that selling ‘the ability to appeal to the opposite sex’ is in as high a demand as ever. And selling sexuality is exactly what Old Spice does well.
By creating Dungeons & Dragons content, Old Spice is showing a deep understanding of the evolving market place, which allows the brand to hone in on hyper niche segments of their predominantly male demographic.
As the current zeitgeist evolves going forward, expect to see brands from all industries changing up their marketing tactics to maximise sales and brand relevance.
Do you know of any other examples of a company embracing new, niche audiences? If so, we’d love to hear it. Leave us a comment down below and get the conversation started!
