ソフトバンク | ブラッド・ピット&キャメロン・ディアス シリーズ | 2006
No Explanation at All. The Answer Is "=SoftBank" / SoftBank Brad Pitt & Cameron Diaz Campaign
I remember the first time I saw this on TV, I actually said "whoa" out loud. You could feel the sense that SoftBank had bought Vodafone and was coming out swinging at the market, and then boom, there's Brad Pitt and Cameron Diaz. It's a commercial that's purely about looking cool, nothing else. And it taught me that sometimes just being cool is enough.
The problem
In October 2006, SoftBank acquired Vodafone's Japanese subsidiary and made its full entry into the mobile phone business. President Masayoshi Son declared he would build in one year what normally takes ten years to establish as a brand. As a newcomer, SoftBank needed to create an image where owning its phones was something to be proud of, something cool. At the time the mobile market was dominated by NTT Docomo and au, and SoftBank was starting from zero in both recognition and brand power. Cameron Diaz appeared in commercials starting October 1, and Brad Pitt starting November 30 (11/30), with the strategy of borrowing the power of Hollywood stars to express "the ultimate in coolness."
The insight
The core of this campaign was building everything around SoftBank's new "=" logo. The commercials simply showed the two stars walking casually while talking on their phones, set to nostalgic Western pop/rock music (like Aerosmith's "Walk This Way"). There was no narration, no tagline at all—just "=SoftBank" at the end. Even the print graphics showed nothing but the "=SoftBank" logo next to the people or products. This simple, decisive approach strongly planted the idea that mobile phones equal SoftBank, that everything connects to SoftBank, and that SoftBank is the one providing the answer. The structure is similar to other celebrity-driven ads, but what's amazing is that SoftBank communicated using nothing but the "=" mark, with zero copy, stripping away every explanatory element from the footage.
The idea
They cast two of the world's top film stars, Brad Pitt and Cameron Diaz, and showed nothing but them walking through the city talking on their phones. Filmed across various locations—New York, an Asian market, a parking lot—the series had no dialogue and no product explanation whatsoever. All that remained on screen at the end was the "=SoftBank" logo. The commercials, print graphics, and even in-store displays were all made consistently, with the whole brand pushing "coolness." As a commercial using Hollywood stars, it's said to have achieved the impact of three or four ordinary commercials, contributing greatly to establishing the image SoftBank was aiming for.
What happened
This campaign dramatically boosted SoftBank's brand recognition and also scored highly in commercial likability rankings. Later, by casting SMAP (from 2009 onward), SoftBank expressed the brand feeling of "no longer being a newcomer," and commercial likability hit its highest level ever. This led into the "Shirato Family" series (from 2007 onward), which laid the groundwork for seven consecutive years at the top of the commercial likability rankings. In the October 2016 issue of Brain magazine, one art director reportedly said, "Everything I wanted to do was expressed perfectly here—I felt like there was nothing left for me to do, and I seriously considered quitting as an art director."
Afterthought
It made me recall that the similarly super-cool George Clooney ad came the following year (Nespresso). But this SoftBank series was overwhelming in its boldness—saying everything with just the "=" mark and cutting out all explanation. It's a commercial that taught me there are moments when advertising can win purely on coolness alone.
