Hey there!

I hope you don’t mind the clickbait lol, but I’m really uncovering an ad that talks about how not to crash a cruise ship.

This week I want to cover ads in the mushroom coffee space. It’s a highly competitive niche and ever since big players like MUD\WTR and Four Sigmatic started crushing it there have been countless competitors popping up.

So let’s dive into these adaptogenic ads 🍄

MUD\WTR

So I stumbled across this ad in Foreplay when doing research. And I saw the first four seconds and thought WTF is this lol. A cruise ship. What does this have to do with mushroom coffee.

Then they dive into the introduction of the user who is apparently a cruise ship captain who says he cannot perform well drinking coffee which is why he drinks MUD\WTR.

“I can’t be on that caffeine rollercoaster” Is a really good sentence to include when a cruise ship captain says something like how good must this product be?!

Then they go into the product features, it’s able to be mixed with oat milk, honey etc. Then right after that at a quick pace, they dive into the benefits telling the audience it allows him to focus better with no jitters and crash. They very smart talk about how it doesn’t affect his sleep and rest cycle covering one of the most common problems with normal coffee.

They end it off with a bunch of reviews followed up by a CTA saying get $20 off your starter kit now which is quite strong.

Love this ad, try something crazy this week in your ad account! Think outside the box like MUD\WTR did.

Copywriting - 8/10
Visuals - 9/10
Likeliness to convert - 9/10
Overall rating - 8.5/10

Click here to see the full ad.

BlackGold

This is a great example of an ad that targets someone who doesn’t know mushroom coffee, maybe tried it once but isn’t a regular user as it talks about the benefits of it. It doesn’t hone in on one specific problem like gut issues or no jitters it talks about the general benefits of the product.

Obviously, it’s a great awareness level to target, but I wouldn’t see this ad converting super well to an audience that’s already drinking a competing brand as the messaging is totally out of wack towards that audience.

I particularly like the ad copy that goes along with this ad:

It’s playful, it uses all the right keywords to speak to this audience and reads super easy.

The overall imagery used is great as well. Within 2-3 seconds you know the benefits of drinking mushroom coffee, so great job.

Copywriting - 7.5/10
Visuals - 7/10
Likeliness to convert - 67/10
Overall rating - 7.3/10

Click here to see the full ad.

DIRTEA

So out of all the 3 ads this week, this one I think is the worst. The hook is completely out of context with the text on screen as she talks about how she just got a free coffee – like who cares?

The text says “Ditch coffee, get mushroom coffee instead” Rather than saying I got a free coffee this brand should talk about what it solved for the customer and why you should ditch coffee as it’s not clear in the first couple of seconds and misses the mark. A much stronger opening scene would be someone drinking a cup of coffee and right after laying awake in bed with their eyes open being unable to sleep.

I do like the next scene where they go into the main problem people face, they go into the benefits of the products and its features which is cool to get explained.

The thing I am confused about with this ad as well is that they want the audience to ditch coffee and then go on to say their product contains arabica coffee, it’s a bit contradicting.

To be honest, the acting in this video is also quite bad, it doesn’t feel genuine and feels super scripted. Overall I think this is a case of a brand sending out a product to a creator without a proper brief or instructions, I presume this creator didn’t even try the product for a couple of days for her reaction to be a tad bit more genuine.

Copywriting - 5/10
Visuals - 5.5/10
Likeliness to convert - 4/10
Overall rating - 4.5/10

Click here to see the full ad.

All the best,

Dennis 💚

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