Remember the good ole days of radio jingles that really made you love a brands product? Didn’t think so.

While some brands such as Old Navy have made it their job to create the most annoying ads known to man just so you remember who they are, it would appear State Farm has decided to follow suit with their radio jingles. The radio ads have been around for quite some time.

One has to ask, “Are annoying brand building ads truly effective?” Unfortunately the answer is yes. Just as when you saw the obnoxious talking Old Navy manikins or obnoxious mini-musical ads, they get stuck in the back of your mind. In State Farm’s case these jingles can either become catchy or the queue for the exact time to change the radio station. Let’s take a peak at some tweets based on the phrase “State Farm radio.”

Negative

I’m puzzled why there aren’t any reports of someone trying to kill the guy who does those singing State Farm radio ads.

— Bill Mann (@Newsmann) December 10, 2011

Positive – Sort of

It’s sad when you know the words to the state farm radio commercial

— Chelsey Damalas (@chelseydamalas) December 12, 2011

Missing the Point

One of the radio jingles has a sort of musical Mexican theme, and it really has very little to do with insurance. One may wonder why State Farm has created several segmented jingles that seem to be awkwardly geared towards not genres of music, but rather cultures.

Can’t be the only one that gets hungry for chips-n-queso w/guac when that mariachi-themed State Farm commercial plays on the radio…

— Freddy Cruz (@RadioFreddyCruz) December9, 2011

Weezer?

Oddly enough there also appears to be an actual rock song/jingle for State Farm that was created by Weezer. Their continued use of the annoying jingles surely must be a sign that they have been effective for brand building, because why else would you pass on Weezer?
Weezer – State Farm Jingle by aharms

Have you seen or heard a recent ad that sucks? Share it with us in the comments or @playthis and we will feature it.

American, sometimes I worry about your ability to eat strange fast food products, but Taco bell is taking things to a cheesy new level. The all Dorito taco shell, courtesy of Taco bell.

If you thought they had sloppy tacos before, wait till you add the perpetual cheese dust.

Also you may recall, but KFC was purportedly also developing a new meal called the Skinwich that never seemed to reach the light of day.

Taste Test

Non-profits have one of the most challenging uphill battles to climb when it comes to funding, but it helps when they have creative minds that create effective ads. What reappeared on Reddit today depicted a physical viral campaign by UNICEF that placed stickers in public areas. These stickers would then attach themselves to a persons shoe, with a message depicting concerns about landmines.

Released in June of 2008 by Leo Burnett for UNICEF in Germany. These viral ads were first published on December 17, 2007 and later used a Frankfurt event. The goal was to make people aware of the thousands of innocent people who have been harmed or killed due to landmines from previous conflicts.

Click the above image to see the full size.

Old Spice

Commercials can make or break a brand, and Old Spice has been on a roll, with butter and manliness.

It’s a nice surprise when a brand decides to make a commercial totally impractical; Old Spice did just this, and it rocks. What started off with Bruce Campbell and a piano, evolved into an ADD franctic collection of manliness.

Did I mention there are explosions, the occasional unicorn and talking tigers? That should just about settle it.

Charlie, come to sugar mountain with us Charlie!

Don’t get us wrong when we say Microsoft isn’t the spawn of satan, but abusing Charlie the Unicorn is just wrong.

Microsoft is rolling out the ads for IE8, even with IE9 right around the corner. They are now reaching out to the younger crowd by hiring Charlie the Unicorn on sugar mountain. Sure, use a viral video that everyone knows and loves to sell your product, but don’t remove the best parts Microsoft. Rather than the epic awesomeness attached to what Charlie the Unicorn is, they turned the ad into just the letters singing. For shame Microsoft, for shame!

There are often rather bland or terrible ads that come out of fast food companies, but McNastirs have proved that wrong.

Look, it's my big iPhone.

Check out the promo video for the iPad, pretty sweet ey?

What person on this planet would choose a Mac when Patrick Warburton is selling you a PC. Basically this commercial says that Mac’s never get viruses, which clearly is a lie.  So if you don’t want this voice over celeb to be your salesmen buy this piece of crap that no software runs on. These commercials are still reaching out to people who will never have any use for a Mac. Unless you are editing video, pictures, etc… don’t waste your time.

The Consumerist created the extra info on this photo

editor@playthismag.com/www.playthismag.com

Free Credit Report.com not only is using annoyance as a form to capture it’s audiences’ attention (like the $5 foot long Subway commercials) once you sign up the process can be beyond annoying. Play This signed up to Free Credit Report so that we may tell you why you should avoid it all together and other ways to check your credit report 100 percent free (at bottom of article).

Here is the drill for freecreditreport.com:

You put in all of your very private information, such as credit card information, addresses and worst of all social security. You should never provide anyone with your social security, even the president (I take that back if Bush wants it just throw a shoe at him, he doesn’t even know what they are for). Your SS number can allow people to access details about your life that you may not even remember and can register credit cards under your name so try to avoid giving it out if possible.

After your private information is entered it than allows you access to your credit report, shows you any history on your credit report and if there is currently anything on your public records in the form of collection companies and bankruptcies on your accounts. As these songs are mostly geared to the 20-35 year old range, chances are you won’t see much on the credit report. Unless you are terribly in debt the services that this Web site provides will be more or less worthless to you and signing up for it is just a waste of time.

Here comes the fun part, ending the services before your seven day free trail is up.

Cancelling the account:

There of course would be no way to simply opt of of the service through their Web site, a fully online only service. You must call the number listed in their FAQ section or 1(888)829-6560 and wait through a few boring messages. The fun part is when the foreign person answers and her accent is to thick to understand or she can’t understand your English very well.

Now I have no issue understand people and their accents, but it’s as if they find anyone off the streets in India to give them a job. They ask you for your private information once again, SS number and all to prove who you are, than ask what you are needing of them.

Like many places you call, they have canned scripts that they will read to you based on your response to them. When you say I would like to cancel they will give you 20 bull shit reasons why you should keep the service. The best reason was, you still have six of your seven day trial left, you may as well keep it and cancel it later.

After finally getting through all of the bullshit they finally cancel your account only to say, “You will still have six days of this service and than it will automatically close out and not charge you at all.” That’s right one of the ladies BS reasons to keep you on is still provided after you cancel.

Now that you see Freecreditreport.com is a worthless service and will only cost you time and sadly for those who do not read well, money, you can easily avoid it’s use. Below is listed the proper annual report that our government has put in place and is 100 percent free. You can only check it once a year though as it is an annual report. It does not cost very much to check again in needed as well.

How to get your free annual report:

Going to the following Web address, https://www.annualcreditreport.com will provide you with your actual annual free credit report. Signing up with Web sites like freecreditreport.com is worthless, can incidentally cost you money, cause you a major pain in the ass to cancel and you may very well forget you ever signed up costing you even more money.

Your credit is important because: Helps you get a loan, approval for an apartment, home or even vehicle. Some employers check your credit as well for unknown reasons.

So be sure to pay your credit cards off on time and avoid ads to confuse the masses. You do get a free annual credit report from all three credit providers. Freecreditreport.com makes people think they can only access one but this is incorrect.

This is how Freecreditreport.com had originally advertised it’s Web site, clearly not very effective. With the help of annoying jingles they were back on top.

Frank Caliendo

For those who do not have Direct TV, there is a good chance that you are bombarded by the network based commercials from Direct TV featuring the worst impressionist, Frank Caliendo. His show has not only received some of the worst reviews, TBS refuses to let it go, probably as a result of only paying him in food.

Here is an elongated version of his version of Seinfeld.

Clearly this fat bastard type man, is much to large to pose as any character on that sitcom except for George, but his impression on him is terrible! How can you also pose as Kramer and try to wig out like him while being so fat? It just doesn’t work. These ads from Direct TV show that they only have a terrible choice in humor. The best commercials use elaborate subconscious messages to peak the minds of their customer and consumers. Most of the time if you see something in an ad, unless you really like it you will ignore it, but those subliminal messages stick with you whether you know it or not.

The only thing these commercials make you feel is annoyance and the need to work out. By being so annoying often do things stick or stay in your mind; however, this just makes you want to slap Frank. Nothing great has ever come from MADtv. It’s just a matter of time before they go online and stay there.

Ads that suck is a new feature for Play This magazine, we will be explaining to you what parts of an ad really do have an affect on you and how to avoid getting sucked into them. – Play This magazine staff