In the 1990s, McCann–Erickson developed a television ad for Coke to kick off that year’s summer
campaign. The ad was trying to convey a father and son from another planet, with the father
explaining that, in the summer, earthlings worship something called the “sun.” The camera zoomed
in on a beach as though the two were flying in from outer space when the picture showed a
beautiful, young woman drinking a refreshing Coke in front of a Coke vending machine on the
beach, and the son asked his father, “Is that the sun?” The agency struggled with the commercial to
get the message across that they wanted Coke to be perceived as the center of our universe,
eventually coming up with a new editing technique to convey the meaning they wanted. According
to a McCann–Erickson professional working on the campaign, they wanted to do it because “it had
never been done before.” In spite of these creative efforts and the highly professional execution, the
ad was not effective and ran for only a short time on television. In terms of the four fundamental
concepts that must work in concert for an ad to be truly effective, which one was deficient in this
campaign that caused it to be ineffective?