telecom

Dish TV Animates Its Hopper

Satellite TV service Dish brings its Hopper DVR product to life through an animated kangaroo (voiced by Australian actress Rebel Wilson) via a new television campaign that uses March Madness viewing to its advantage. 

In a new television commercial, an office worker is distracted by a co-worker’s insistence on watching the NCAA basketball tournament on her tablet, which she calls a TV because she can watch all her live TV thanks to the Hopper TV service. As the boss walks by, she hides the tablet in her pouch, so she won’t get caught loafing at work. 

“We want the Hopper to celebrate that only Dish and the Hopper can bring [the games] anywhere,” Dish chief marketing officer James Moorhead tells Marketing Daily

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The company had previously promoted its Hopper feature with a trio of Boston-accented men (who pronounced it “the Hoppah"). The trio may appear in some future advertising, but for now, the kangaroo will be taking the center stage. “You can imagine her in many more settings, and the voice of Rebel, with her Australian accent, fits with this character,” Moorhead says. 

Indeed, a digital ad features the kangaroo dancing along to a song done in the style of a school fight song as images of college basketball takes place in the background.

Corresponding to the new campaign, the company is also publicly encouraging its employees to take “bracket breaks” to watch the NCAA tournament during work hours without punishment. “We’re encouraging employees to evangelize and use our products,” Moorhead says. “I think the rest of corporate America needs to get on board with this.”

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