Jlo has her own AI?

A month ago, Virgin Voyages launched the "Jen-AI" campaign, a witty twist on “Generative AI”. The campaign featured a video starring Jennifer Lopez as the "Chief Celebration Officer" for Virgin Voyages ships. Lopez's role was to entice 'sailors' to enjoy life's little moments through Virgin Voyages' trips. In an era where AI-generated campaigns are the new buzzword, how did Virgin Voyages set themselves apart? Let’s dive in.

The ad begins with a cinematic view of Jennifer Lopez wearing a striking red outfit on a cruise inviting members to celebrate small wins on Virgin Voyages’ cruise trips, it quickly transitions to a clip where the screen glitches and a man named Kyle is acting as Jennifer Lopez, indicating that Jennifer Lopez is actually a deepfake version of him in the ad and she mimics his movements and tone of voice. This twist maintains the viewer’s interest in the ‘Jen AI’ ad.?

The ad continues with members of the technical team at Virgin Voyages arguing and disagreeing with the team trying to act as Jennifer Lopez. Each member of the team takes turns to make a compelling invite via Jennifer, making the ad funny & hereby engaging. In the end, an uninterested woman on the team takes the seat and says, ‘There are no kids here, that’s all you need to know’, this line made the rounds on social media. This campaign saw a whopping 150% increase in engagement rate for Virgin Voyages, according to an interview with CNBC. The ad further goes on to invite members to test out Jen AI and create custom invites to send to their friend groups or ‘crew members’. The ad ends with a man yelling “It’s not just a yacht, it’s a super yacht” and we see Jennifer Lopez enact the same. The ad created by VMLY&R combines humor, technology, and Jlo’s charismatic personality which makes for a memorable one. The ad took the internet by storm, people commented saying -

However, many were disappointed with the AI of this campaign. Jen AI was said to bring out ‘personalized’ and ‘custom’ invites, and hence the expectation was that the invite will have JLo speaking the name of the invitee and the inviter. However, it leaves the visitors with only an email containing both the inviter and invitee names which need to be input on the website. The custom video invite currently says ‘sailor’ to address the invitees instead of the name of the person. Personalization is only done for the occasion and the service that the visitor would like to book. ?

We evaluated the ad on our Creative Effectiveness Platform, Incivus and the results were predictable. The creative effectiveness score is high, and the recall (memorability of the ad) is medium with a score of 71. The placement of the logo on the cup beside Jennifer Lopez also receives high attention, and since the ad copy was minimal, it leaves room for the other elements of the ad to be highlighted. The story is engaging and keeps the audience hooked to the very end. This is reflected in the ad performance on social media. The ad received 1.2M views on YouTube with an uproar of supportive comments on LinkedIn and Instagram.

In the past two years, we have noticed several ads using AI, either to generate content which could be images or videos or creating personalized messages for the audience. These ads are capturing the attention of large groups of audiences interested in seeing AI’s capabilities. As AI continues to develop, it is likely that the ads in the future will see more of a synergy between technology and creativity. We are eager to see the new wave of innovative ads.

Let us know your thoughts on AI’s use in advertising in the comments below.