Tubi’s New Brand Campaign Is Proving Popular

Just like the Land of Oz’s resident good witch, Glinda, Tubi knows about popular. And a new brand campaign is quantifying the Fox-owned FAST (free ad-supported streaming television) service’s increasing popularity with some eye-catching numbers.

With 75 million to 80 million monthly active users in the U.S., Tubi can officially boast about outranking popular things such as pickleball, water fountains, small dogs and even babies.

“We wanted to put the focus on the size and scale of our audience,” Tubi chief marketing officer Nicole Parlapiano tells ADWEEK about the knowingly irreverent campaign’s origins. “Everyone’s always shocked when they see how big we are, so we wanted to contextualize that number with other popular things.”

Co-created with the streamer’s regular creative agency, Mischief @ No Fixed Address, the “Tubi is More Popular Than” launch encompasses billboards, commercials and social collaborations with viral content creators like Girl on Couch and Taha Arshad.

Although some might be surprised to learn about the size and scope of Tubi’s popularity, Parlapiano says the campaign offers confirmation for fans that they have been part of the cool club all along.  

“Our fans have been singing our praises for years,” she notes. “It’s gotten to the point where they’re feeling validated that so many other people are discovering us. For them, these ads are about creating some FOMO (fear of missing out) and inviting newcomers to jump down the rabbit hole with us.”

But the Tubi team was also conscious of keeping its increasingly popular rabbit hole a mean-free zone. That’s why the campaign specifically avoids taking aim at any streaming rivals that it has surpassed—a list that includes Max, Paramount+ and Peacock.

Parlapiano confirms that a “more chippy” approach to Tubi’s competitors hit the proverbial cutting room floor early on. “We didn’t want to do that as a brand,” she adds. “In sales pitches, you’ll see how we rank against our competition.”

Instead, Tubi and Mischief looked for popular things that would be “creatively interesting” to pit the service against, using legally vetted and validated sources like census reports to secure reliable numbers.

For the record, popular didn’t necessarily have to mean well-liked. That’s why the campaign favorably ranks Tubi above such unfavorable counterpoints as divorce, dating applications and even France. (That’s the claim one billboard makes, comparing France’s 68 million residents to Tubi’s 75 million MAU audience.)

“Americans still like a good France joke,” Parlapiano says with a chuckle, noting that the galling Gallic dig won’t be part of any presentations that Tubi might do internationally. “We did talk about whether we should extend the campaign to Cannes when all of the advertisers are there but decided to keep it to the U.S. A fun poke at France is what unites us as Americans.”   

More popular than babies

Poking fun at babies and divorce is certainly less likely to start any international incidents. Still, it’s worth noting that those specific ads have attracted some raised eyebrows on YouTube. “This is insanely creepy,” one commentator wrote in response to the “Babies” spot. “This ad is just plain sad,” another person opined about the “Divorce” commercial.

But Parlapiano isn’t sweating that kind of response.

More popular than divorce

“We are a polarizing brand,” she says matter-of-factly. “I’ve always kind of known not to play it safe. Some people are going to hate what we put out there, but it elicited a response, which is better than watering down the creative and no one comments at all. If you see our ads and you don’t remember it or comment on it, that’s a missed opportunity for us.”

Parlapiano noted that indifference is the “challenge” in the streaming category.

“Most of our content has very little brand recognition. You might remember the title, but you have no idea where to stream it,” Parlapiano said. “We want you to know our name and remember where you saw something. That recall is pretty much our goal.”

More popular than Old Faithful

To further assist consumers’ and advertisers’ total recall, Tubi and Mischief got hyper-specific with the placement of each individual campaign spot. For example, billboards that compared the size of Tubi’s audiences to the number of New Yorkers (75 million vs. 8 million) mainly appeared in Manhattan during TV upfronts week when advertisers were in town.

“That was really more for trade recognition than consumers,” Parlapiano notes.

On the other hand, a starring role in one of Girl on Couch’s TikTok videos was a consumer play all the way.

“She did a little bit about how Tubi is more popular than all the finance guys in her DMs,” Parlapiano explains. “I don’t think the trade audience knows who Girl on Couch is or that she has a song about finance guys. But consumer audiences that love her and are on TikTok get it. That’s what’s cool about this campaign—we can make everybody feel seen and validated instead of having to go with one message at all times.”

More popular than water fountains

As Tubi’s MAU numbers continue to grow, so will the list of things less popular than Tubi. However, Parlapiano is waiting to see how popular the campaign proves with audiences before greenlighting a second wave of spots.

“We’ll see how it’s being received, and then we can iterate on it over the summer,” she muses. “I’m really excited about this campaign, and there are so many ways for how it evolves. But there are also other priorities that we have over the next six to nine months; after we validate this message, let’s see how it lands.”