We would love to hear from you. Click on the ‘Contact Us’ link to the right and choose your favorite way to reach-out!

wscdsdc

media/speaking contact

Jamie Johnson

business contact

Victoria Peterson

Contact Us

855.ask.wink

Close [x]
pattern

Industry News

Categories

  • Industry Articles (21,155)
  • Industry Conferences (2)
  • Industry Job Openings (35)
  • Moore on the Market (414)
  • Negative Media (144)
  • Positive Media (73)
  • Sheryl's Articles (800)
  • Wink's Articles (353)
  • Wink's Inside Story (274)
  • Wink's Press Releases (123)
  • Blog Archives

  • March 2024
  • February 2024
  • January 2024
  • December 2023
  • November 2023
  • October 2023
  • September 2023
  • August 2023
  • July 2023
  • June 2023
  • May 2023
  • April 2023
  • March 2023
  • February 2023
  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • December 2014
  • November 2014
  • October 2014
  • September 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • February 2014
  • January 2014
  • December 2013
  • November 2013
  • October 2013
  • September 2013
  • August 2013
  • July 2013
  • June 2013
  • May 2013
  • April 2013
  • March 2013
  • February 2013
  • January 2013
  • December 2012
  • November 2012
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • August 2012
  • July 2012
  • June 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • February 2012
  • January 2012
  • December 2011
  • November 2011
  • October 2011
  • September 2011
  • August 2011
  • July 2011
  • June 2011
  • May 2011
  • April 2011
  • March 2011
  • February 2011
  • January 2011
  • December 2010
  • November 2010
  • October 2010
  • September 2010
  • August 2010
  • July 2010
  • June 2010
  • May 2010
  • April 2010
  • March 2010
  • February 2010
  • January 2010
  • December 2009
  • November 2009
  • October 2009
  • August 2009
  • June 2009
  • May 2009
  • April 2009
  • March 2009
  • November 2008
  • September 2008
  • May 2008
  • February 2008
  • August 2006
  • The ‘Mambo No. 5’ Guy Is Back, and He’s Singing the Praises of Annuities

    May 2, 2017 by Robert Klara

    Sometimes, you make a good investment without knowing it. For a struggling songwriter named Lou Bega, it happened in 1998 when he borrowed a few riffs from a long-forgotten tune by Cuban bandleader Dámaso Pérez Prado, reworked the beat, then added some catchy lyrics. The result, as anyone who was around back then will no doubt remember, was “Mambo No. 5,” a monster hit in 1999 that eventually reached the top 10 in 26 countries, including the U.S., and notched gold, platinum or multiplatinum status in all of them.

    But for Bega, “Mambo No. 5” was more than a sudden catapult to fame—it was payday. At the tender age of 24, Bega started getting royalty checks. In fact today, some 18 years after the song got stuck in the heads of millions of people, he’s still getting them.

    Which isn’t just a good thing for Bega—it’s pretty handy for the New York Life Insurance Company, too.

    In an ad breaking today, Bega plays himself—white linen slacks, Panama hat—and uses the example of his chart-topping tune to explain New York Life’s income annuities.

    The textbook definition of an annuity is an insurance product that following a lump-sum deposit pays regular monthly disbursements back to the investor for the rest of his life. But, well, how boring is that? Fortunately, Bega brings it all down to earth—to a white-sand beach in Miami, actually.

    “Retirement can be scary,” Bega says in the spot, sipping an umbrella-topped cocktail out of a pineapple. “Know what makes it less scary? Gettin’ checks on a regular basis.”

    The video is the latest installment of New York Life’s “Be Good at Life” campaign, which has cast celebrities—thus far basketball Hall of Fame forward Rick Barry and renowned chef Dominique Crenn—using their trademark skills to explain the complexities of various financial products. Barry talks about how his funny-looking “granny shot” landed the ball in the hoop consistently just like a New York Life policyholder gets consistent dividends. Crenn bakes a soufflé that keeps growing, just like the cash value of a New York Life whole-life policy.

    When it came to explaining annuities, New York Life decided it needed a successful musician. “We were thinking about the consistency of paying the checks month after month, and this was similar in our minds to royalty checks,” explained New York Life’s head of marketing Kari Axberg. “Musicians receive [them] over the years, and consumers could understand that.”

    Bega, she added, was the company’s first choice.

    For the sake of those too young to remember him, Bega is captioned as “The ‘Mambo No. 5’ Guy” in the ad. But remembering the song is essential when it comes to the punch line. While a cabana boy hands him a series of bank envelopes, Bega bellyaches, “I can’t go anywhere without getting one, two, three-four-five checks!”

    On a call from his home in Germany, Bega explained that it was the writing that cinched the endorsement deal for him. “I was approached by New York Life, [which] sent over the script—and I’ve read a lot of scripts—but that script was so funny and on-point,” he said.

    What’s more, he said, “[with] where I am in my life, [the script] felt like a suit that would fit.”

    Nearly two decades removed from the music video in which he’s a young playboy doing the mambo with curvaceous, scantily clad women—specifically: Monica, Erica, Rita, Tina, Sandra, Mary, Jessica, Angela and Pamela—Bega is now a 42-year-old man with all the family responsibilities and career burdens of middle age.

    Financially, he said, “I take care of many people.” And while he still keeps up with a rigorous touring schedule, he said, “I don’t know how long my body will hold up for 60 gigs a year and traveling and jet lag and all of that. Getting an annuity check provides the peace of mind—so I do recognize the value of it.”

    In other words, Bega’s not just the celebrity pitchman, he’s a customer.

    And that, too, figured big in the strategy of the spot, according to Karina Wilsher, global chief operating officer at Anomaly New York, the shop that produced the “Be Good at Life” work, including the latest video. Not only is Bega the right age to be talking about the merits of retirement planning, his sense of humor, evident financial success and colorful personality all combine to breathe new life into the tired formula of financial-services advertising. If the message is “be good at life,” Wilsher said, “you want your protagonist to exude what being good at life means. It’s having things in perspective and being able to focus on the important things. [There’s] a positivity and optimism he has, naturally.”

    Just for the record, “Mambo No. 5” wasn’t Bega’s only hit—he had eight other songs on the charts around the world—though it was perhaps an unlikely one. While many fans in the late ’90s assumed Bega was a young Latino hunk, he’s in fact the German-born son of an Italian mother and Ugandan father, real name: David Lubega. It took a visit to Miami in his teens to turn Bega on to mambo, a genre that’s been very good to him.

    And so has that hit song. “Mambo No. 5” might not send Bega five checks at a time like the commercial suggests, but it sends them often enough.

    “So, it’s a musical annuity in some way,” Bega said.

    Originally Posted at ADWEEK on May 1st, 2017 by Robert Klara.

    Categories: Industry Articles
    currency