Humor and advertising

The Assignment:

At the beginning of the class we got told to pick any company for the final project. I chose Frixion, the erasable pens. For the final project we got told to make a presentation of our idea and to include the following -

Cover Page
Agenda
Product Background
Brand Character
Scenarios
Creative Execution
IMC – PR
IMC – Sales Promotion
Summary

I have put points 3-9 onto this page. You can download the presentation i had created by clicking HERE

Pilot Background:

Japanese naval engineers, Ryosuke Namiki and Masao Wada created the first stainless steel tipped fountain pen to stop the nibs from rusting.
The first PILOT pens were launched in 1918.
They got the name PILOT as a reference to the flagship of their naval fleet

Frixion Background:

Original FriXion Ball was launched in 2007
FriXion Ball Clicker was launched in 2011
The ink disappears with heat and can actually reappear in the cold
Today, the Frixion lineup includes felt-tipped pens, highlighters and stamps. At the end of April, cumulative sales of the revolutionary pen topped 2 billion units. (Article published in 2017)

All Frixion pens and
beyond:

All Frixion pens and beyond:

FriXion Ball
FriXion Light
FriXion Point
FriXion Ball Clicker
FriXion Ball LX
FriXion Light Soft
FriXion Colors
FriXion Fineliner
FriXion Ball +
FriXion Zone
FriXion Point Clicker
FriXion Light Natural
Refills for the Ball and Clicker types

How Frixion Pens Erase:

How Frixion pens erase:

Target Audience & Strategy (CTB):

School/College Students

Mainly targeted to age 15-22

Helps the students take notes and erase mistakes

Convince 15-22 year old students that buying the FriXion Ball Clicker because it will help them take cleaner handwritten notes with the help of the eraseable ink.

Brand Character:

Name – Mrs. Frix (First name will be unknown)
Who is she? – Highschool Teacher, mainly science but can teach anything
Age - 42
Archetype – Ruler
Personality – Angry at everyone, gullible, doesn’t have a sense of humor

Born in New York City 1983
- Has had severe OCD
‘Happily’ married to her highschool sweetheart for 18 years
- Not really happy anymore
Has a set of 16 year old twins who happen to be in her class
- They somehow are the cool kids at school
Obsessed with a time where a computer is only used for work
- Still pulls in a chalkboard and prints everything out for the students
Never thinks she’s wrong, because she never is
- You’ll never guess what pen she uses…
Was never on social media till her students made her accounts and still doesn’t understand it
- Her kids are part of this
- She goes around thinking everyone is stupid on the internet

Character Scenario:

Beginning

Mrs. Frix enters her class with a stack of papers. She begins handing out the test results from last week with a D on all of them.Students claim they deserve more than a D for giving the correct answers. She says she can’t grade what she can’t read. That’s how I was graded that’s how you will be graded.

Middle

Students decide to hatch a plan for next weeks test. They will ask each other if what they write can be read, not whether is correct or not. The students mention they wont be able to erase what they write. The Frix twins have plan.

Mrs. Frix is ready with her tests and the students with their plan. Mrs. Frix gets more and more annoyed giving every student detention. When she asks the students why they keep talking to each other. They say “We’re using these erasable pens to correct our mistakes so we get the grades we deserve.”

Creative Execution:

Audio/Visual Side-by-side for TV

Video	Audio
OTS of Mrs. Frix handing out papers to her students	Mrs. Frix: I have corrected the tests from last weeks class
Overhead of her handing out papers	Mrs. Frix: And I have to say I was not surprised
MCU of students looking at their papers confused	Students whispering at each other
LS facing a blackboard with Mrs. Frix written on it as Mrs. Frix covers it	(Angrily Shouts) Mrs. Frix: What are you all whispering about!
Wide shot of the enter class silent as 2 students raise their hands up
Mcu of twins sitting next to each other revealed as Mrs. Frix's children
Cut back to Mrs. Frix	What now my children?
One of the twins starts to explain what happened	Twin 1: Ma I just wante…
Cut back to Mrs. Frix Angry
Cut back to twin 1	Twin 1: Sorry! Mrs. Frix I just wanted to know why my answer for the second question was marked as 0 when it was correct and I should have gotten the whole 2 marks.
Cut to Twin 2	Yea and what was wrong with my answer to question 7
Cut back to Wide	Whole Class arguing about their test results
Cut back to Mrs. Frix	Mrs. Frix: (Shouts) Quiet! (Speaking normally) Can you all read what you have written?
Montage of students reading their papers	Mrs: Frix: You all have gotten D's because I couldn’t understand what you all have written
Cut back to Mrs. Frix	Mrs: Frix: Back in my day we had to run a mile for every mistake we made. You all are lucky to have such a nice teacher like myself. We can try this again in our next class to see if you all do any better.
Cut to establishing shot of a house with the text "The Frix's Home"
Alternating shots of the twins texting on their phones while just the 2 of them are at the dinner table	Twin 1: (Reading a message to Twin 2) Can you convince your mom to be more resonable? (Begins typing and speaking at the same time) Have you met her before?? (Message sent sound effect) Twin 2: (Typing and speaking at the same time) Guys I have an idea (Message sent Sound Effect)
Cut to Mrs. Frix serving them dinner	Mrs. Frix: There you guys go. (Begins to get angry) Can you both put things things away… you know the rules.
Cut to Twin 2	Twin 2: Yea ma we know… just one sec. Message sent sound effect
Close up of the phone with a link to by the FriXion Ball Clicker sent to a groupchat
Black screen with the title saying "Test Day with Mrs. Frix"	School Bell Sound
Twins begin to execute their plan	Twin 2: Hey! Can you read this? Twin 2: They S looks a little too much like a 5 Twin 1: Okay Thanks. (Erases Pen Markings and fixes it) There we go.
MCU of Mrs. Frix noticing people in the class talking and tells the to be quiet	Mrs. Frix: (Shouts) Everyone, Finish the test in silence!
Montage starting off with a wide shot of the entire class going into chaos	Student 1 to Student 2: Can you read this? Student 3 to Student 4: Is this Legible
Montage continues with MCU 2 shots of students asking each other if they can read whats written and erasing any mistakes they make and closeups of them erasing their mistakes and rewriting it to be 'more legible'	Student 5 to Student 6: Hey is this more like an O because its supposed to be an A Student 7 to Student 8: Does Argon look too much like Carbon to you Student 8 to 7: Nah but just re write it anyways just to be safe.
Slow Dolley Zoom shot of Mrs. Frix watching this chaos as she's slowly losing control of the class	(Background) Student 2 to 1: Yea I can, see if you can read this 1 to 2: Ok lets see Student 4 to 3: Ok maybe you did deserve the D in the last one because I have no idea what you were even trying to spell (Foreground) Mrs. Frix: No wait… Stop this madness... WHY ARE YOU ALL TALKING TO EACH OTHER!
Wide Shot of the class as they all go silent as the twins stand up explain what they are doing	Twin 1: Oh mother dearest, we all just wanted to make sure you could understand what we are writing Twin 2: Yea exactly how dare my lowercase L look even remotely similar to my uppercase I. These are ridiculously minor mistakes to make so we decided to fix them. Twin 1: If you have a problem with the way we are doing this, give us the grades you know we deserve.
Cut back to Mrs. Frix	How are you all erasing your mistakes? These tests aren't written in pencil
Cuts back to all of the students holding up their FriXion Ball Clicker Pens	Twin 1: Yea were still using pens Twin 2: Were using the (Clicks pen)
Pilot and FriXion Ball Clicker logos appear as the class goes out of focus	(Click sound echos)

Excel file of the table

Integrated Marketing Campaign (PR):

'U for Umm what?'

Have students submit a prewritten paragraph about a certain topic. The best handwriting gets turned into a font that will be used on limited edition pens and the worst gets a supply of FriXion Ball Clickers for as long as they continue their education.
Photograph of the worst handwritting featured on the back of packaging
Winner would also get a % cut of the sales from the limited edition pen
Gets as many students to participate as possible. The best get featured as part of the product, and the worst get the product itself.
Entrees accepted from January to March
Additional rules – Must be somewhat legible so it cant just be wavy lines. No intentional sabotage. 1 submission per person

Integrated Marketing Campaign (Promotion):

Limited Edition FriXion Ball Clickers featuring the handwritting from the winners.
Will come with 3 pens, black, blue, winners choice, and 6 refills (2 each color)
Release around August, Back to School timing.
Potential to collaborate with other stationary/school equipment products or even the other types of pens that Pilot makes.

Summary:

Mrs. Frix as a character seems either relatable or comedic to students. Especially in her future using social media to react to students online
The other scenario, while a lot simpler, could also end up working well since around 15-17 is when students wish they had the freedom to do whatever and could even make the 18-22 year olds feel nostalgic about when their problems were because mom said no.
The ‘U for Umm What?’ encourages participation from all students and has a reasonable rewards for both ‘winners’ involved.