Wednesday, October 5, 2011

If this is real.. Nerf need to really drop their PR company..

Dodgy. 
Several emails and msgs to us this morning have prompted us to post a response to this "promo" spotted on the Nerf Nation Facebook page but only in the uploaded photos area. Personally, I don't think it's the real deal.

If it IS, it's riddled with dodgy all over it and you have to wonder what's going on with Nerf's PR peeps.

Here's the break down.

From a design perspective:
  • The ad uses a poor text layout and is lacking in right justification. 
  • The "Nerf" text at the beginning has an odd font that isn't associated with any of the branding. 
  • The rest of the text is using a bolded arial font which is not easy to read and quite amateurish to look at. 
  • The orange is not an official Nerf branded orange. 

This doesn't look like the work of a professional graphic designer. It could have been done in MS Paint.

From a copy/text perspective:

  • The first sentence is poorly written and makes no sense. 
  • In official promos, Nerf tend to refer to their blasters as the full name "Maverick REV-6" not just 'Maverick'.
  • The "Liking" us uses a capital 'L' and quotes which is off. 
  • What is "march on"?- there's no context behind the use of this term. 
  • The term "tons of.." is rarely used in marketing promo as it can be taken literally and a company can be considered to be misleading the public if they DON'T give away "tons" (by weight) of product.

It's also a very odd way for Nerf to promote something; they normally make an official announcement on the page- which I don't see.

All and all, it's pretty woeful. Just sayin:)



7 comments:

  1. Not to mention the ambiguity of the "Limited Edition" prize. "Like a"? and "Golden"? To quote trolls around the world, FAKE!

    Coop

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  2. Now that's why it's nice to have a graphic designer as the leader of your blog. :D Nice work, Master Pocket!

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  3. You gotta wonder what the hell Nerf are doing, even LETTING this be posted on the page in the first place. Golden Maverick? WTF

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  4. I personally think Nerf just wants to compete with orange mod works, I mean if you think about it orange mod works makes metal nerf internals now Nerf wants to compete with them so they giveaway a metal nerf gun. genius.

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  5. true this is really dodgy and the nerf page is not actually run by hasbro, just a nerf fanatic

    ps. @ cooper cristian, are you coop772, from youtube?

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  6. Not that I think it's legit, but do folks down under not use the phrase "on the march?" It's a pretty common idiom in the U.S.

    And the "Liking" term is pretty common for folks talking about completing the actual action of using the "Like" button on Facebook, of course.

    The Nerf logo looks similar to the font used in the Nerf N-Strike products as far as the serifs are concerned, but the text is a bit too squished and pudgy ... like someone just Google'd "Nerf Font" and then ran with whatever look-a-like they found. Definitely doesn't look professional.

    On the other hand, I've worked with "professional" graphics designers before and gotten results that looked so crappy I wouldn't have even expected them to have made it into an MS Office Templates gallery, so ya never know!

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  7. You know, you don't really need any of those reasons to say that it's fake, Pocket; the guy koldng the Stampede has a moustache. It must be a lie!

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