Five months after the coronavirus derailed Coldwell Banker’s plans for a big March Madness ad campaign, the company is coming back to the airwaves with a new pandemic-themed commercial filled with crowdsourced video.
David Marine
The new ad is called “All We have Is Home” and is set to begin airing on cable and Hulu today during NBA games. David Marine, Coldwell Banker’s chief marketing officer, told Inman the ad is filled with video that Coldwell Banker solicited from its agent and broker network, as well as footage sourced from social media platforms such as Instagram and TikTok.
As the crowdsourced videos play, the narrator acknowledges that “home is a place we’ve all seen a little to much of these past few months” — a reference to isolation mandates during the pandemic. Moments later, the narrator concludes that “when home is all you have, you certainly have a whole lot.”
Marine explained that the point of the ad was to “have a message that speaks to the current environment.”
The ad has been in the works since May, but its genesis really lies in March. At that time, Coldwell Banker was planning on running a big ad campaign called “Guiding You Home.” The campaign was supposed to air during March Madness and was part of the company’s publicity push surrounding its rebranding.
But those plans were scuttled when the coronavirus forced the cancelation of March Madness. Coldwell Banker ended up airing some of the Guiding You Home content in the ensuing months, but the big splashy debut never happened.
Marine said that ever since Coldwell Banker has been working to figure out when it should return to the airwaves with something new. He ultimately concluded that “we’re not sitting back and waiting 2020 out,” adding that “if we wait until there’s a recovery to do something we’ll never know when the moment is right.”
“We know when a downturn comes you don’t stop advertising,” Marine added.
The return of NBA games, which first happened Thursday and continues this week, proved to be just that moment.
Marine said the NBA’s audience fits well with both real estate professionals and consumers. And he added that the ad itself represents a kind of “ah ha” moment where the company realized that even if people are sick of being cooped up, “there’s still this appreciation for the fact that our homes are now more important than ever.”
Watch the new ad here:
