What B2B Brands Can Learn From Adidas’ Backyard Legends Storytelling Masterclass

In this episode of Predictable B2B Growth, Javier breaks down Adidas’ Backyard Legends World Cup campaign and explains why this 5-minute ad is a masterclass in storytelling, positioning, attention, and brand-building.

The campaign features Timothée Chalamet, Lionel Messi, Bad Bunny, Lamine Yamal, Jude Bellingham, Trinity Rodman, David Beckham, Zinedine Zidane, and Alessandro Del Piero. But the reason it works is not because Adidas stacked the ad with celebrities.

It works because Adidas built a legend.

• A rumor.
• An undefeated local crew.
• A guide.
• A challenger team.
• Nostalgia.
• Stakes.
• Cultural relevance.
• And a story people immediately want to repeat.

Javier connects the Adidas campaign back to a bigger problem in B2B marketing: too many companies position themselves as the hero. They talk about their product, their website, their team, their features, and their company updates — while the customer gets pushed to the side.

The best brands do the opposite.

• They make the customer the hero.
• They become the guide.
• They create stakes.
• They build belief.
• They tell a story the market wants to carry for them.

In this episode, Javier covers:

• How Adidas used rumors and folklore to create instant attention
• Why Timothée Chalamet works as the guide, not the hero
• How the local crew became more interesting than the global celebrities
• Why nostalgia only works when it serves the story
• What B2B brands can learn from Adidas about positioning and narrative
• Why long-form content works when the story earns the audience’s time
• How to make your product feel natural inside the customer’s world
• Why the strongest brands create belief, not just awareness

If you’re a founder, marketer, revenue leader, or B2B executive trying to build a brand people remember, this episode is a reminder that great marketing still comes down to one thing:

A great story, told well.

Thanks for listening to Predictable B2B Growth.

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Transcript

Javier Lozano, Jr. (00:01.614)
What's going on everybody? Welcome to another episode of Predictable B2B Growth. As you know, I'm your host, Javier. So this is probably gonna be coming out maybe, I don't know, it might come out today. It might come out in the next couple days. So what I wanna talk about is dive in. I'm looking at my notes over here. I wanna dive in on this Adidas ad. So I'm a big fan of storytelling. I love when companies, brands,

people tell these stories that are like pulling you on, you're like, tell me more. And you're leaned in and you're like, okay. And you're questioning, you're questioning, you know, the validity of this story and like, who's talking about this? Is this true? Like, you can't just tell me that you heard this from somebody else. Like, everyone on how they react when it comes to stories. And there's people that are just arguably some of the best storytellers out there.

There's companies, there's brands out there that do a very good job pulling in their audience and really just capturing their attention and you're just like, you're wanting more. Screenwriters for TV shows, for movies, for series like on Disney Plus or whatever, like those people are amazing. Like where they leave cliffhangers. Like storytelling is a skill. It's something that it can be learned.

but it's a skill and it's really, really hard to really do. And this is one of the reasons where as a fractional CMO, I really lean into knowing, like getting the messaging down, getting the positioning down, telling the right story, creating an enemy, like all of these things. And a lot of brands, a of companies don't understand the importance of this. And now you don't have to tell a story like,

is like what Adidas did, and we'll cover that here in just a little bit, but you need to take the time to tell a story that people are like, are not only gonna listen, but they're then gonna try to tell that same story the same way that you told it to everybody else, who then become your people that are selling for you, that are gonna promote your brand or your product. And so,

Javier Lozano, Jr. (02:19.848)
I'm selling the stage, I'm sorry, I'm setting the stage here so that you understand where I'm coming from about story. And this is something that a lot of BDB brands do a horrible job at doing. It's all about look at me. I've created this. I have this new website. I did this, I did that. And my company does this. All of this stuff. Things that no one gives a shit about.

and you're like, well, it's kind of rude, Javier. No, no, it's not rude, it's the truth. No one gives a shit about your new website. No one gives a shit about who you hired. Nobody cares. One person that cares is like you, probably a couple of internal team members, that's about it. And this is not to crap on what you've built. This is to simply say that you've gotta change how you're being.

how you're positioning your brand on the marketplace. And this is what I mean, is that there are so many brands that position themselves, their company, as the hero. I had a previous role that I was in-house, and I was sharing this, and they kept putting themselves as the hero. And I'm like, nah, it's not, I'd bring it up, but they wanted to be the hero. The challenge is that your customer is the hero and you're the guide. You need to position yourself as that guide, like Yoda.

Okay, my family and I watched all of the Hunger Games over like, I don't know, two, three weeks. They loved it. And so Katniss is the hero. And then who's the other dude that plays Woody Harrelson? I forgot his character's name, but he's the guide. That's how you're supposed to set it all up. And so a lot of B2B brands and companies don't do this. They don't take the time to put themselves as the guide.

The guide gets a ton of credit, but the hero looks like they are meant for this, they were born for this. Luke was not a hero, okay? I'm sorry, Luke was, he was a hero, but he was not like a hero until he met his guide that got him there. I'm laying this, sitting this stage, okay? So.

Javier Lozano, Jr. (04:38.73)
Adidas comes out with this new ad. If you don't know, the World Cup's coming to North America, so it's gonna be played in the US, in Canada, and Mexico. Three countries, I don't know, a dozen cities, two dozen cities over three months, I'm sorry, over three weeks, three and a half weeks, like that. It's insane. This is one of the greatest spectacles on Earth in my opinion when it comes to sporting events. It is watched by more people all over the world than the Super Bowl.

I wanna say like the last World Cup was like 1.5 billion people watched it. 1.5, think about that, okay? There's eight billion people on this earth, all right? Nearly one quarter of the world's population watched the World Cup finals, okay? Like, that's insane, okay? So, to just understand like Adidas went all out, but they did something a little different.

Okay, and the comments that I'm seeing on social media, people are like, after they saw this five minute video, five minute ad, five minutes, like when was the last time you watched a five minute ad? Like never. People are like, I need a 12 part series, 40 minutes long on this.

Okay, this was an ad, we're not gonna make this into a mini series. I need to have a movie and a cliffhanger and a sequel to this. That wasn't the plan. Or like, I need to see the next part of this commercial so I can see how the game ends. We stopped here. That's what's going on. Like people are wanting more. They're wanting more. And why? How? It's easy.

It's because of how the story was layered in. And so Adidas didn't just make a World Cup ad, they made a five minute legend, okay? Five minute legend. So the campaign's called Backyard Legends. Go to Instagram, go to maybe X or go to Twitter, I'm sorry, not Twitter, TikTok, go to Facebook. Instagram is probably the best one. And just...

Javier Lozano, Jr. (06:50.722)
go to Adidas' handle and it's already pinned, this is the first one. Watch that, five minutes, it's five minutes and four seconds. And I mean, Adidas basically blew it up. It's for the FIFA World Cup that's going on this year. They've got characters there that, I mean, there are soccer stars, there's retired stars, and then there's a movie star.

So Timothy Chalamet is the main character and he's the one that's putting together this team. And he essentially is partnered up with Messi, arguably the greatest player ever to ever exist in football, in soccer. You got Bad Bunny, like him or hate him, he's on there.

You've got Lamine Yamal who is one of the greatest up and coming stars coming out of Spain. You've got Jude Bellingham who plays for the opposing team, club team that Lamine Yamal plays for. And so there's a little beef there. You get Trinity Rodman who's a female soccer star in her own right. Has already won a World Cup I believe. You got Zidane. He's a former player played for France.

some other big club teams. You've got David Beckham. mean everyone knows who Beckham is. He owns now the Miami, what's their club team, but the team in Miami, he owns that one. You got Del Piero who is an Italian soccer star back in the 90s and 2000s. And then just a bunch of other athletes. And they're basically, there's a story that's around this local crew, this local soccer crew.

That has been playing for decades. And so where I'm coming from with all this, I've got notes here and I'm looking at my notes and stuff, but it's like you've got some pretty cool stars and you typically think, all right, you're gonna be putting together this ad, you have these stars, the stars are the stars. No, Adidas changed it. They made their local crew, the kids, the stars.

Javier Lozano, Jr. (09:10.22)
all these folk lores and all these stories and the legends are all, like I'm getting goosebumps just like talking about this, like are all coming through, like people are talking about this and that and the other, like there's one little like a 30 second clip where these stars are talking about they're like.

They haven't lost in 30 years, since 1996. They haven't lost since CDs were in play. They haven't lost since the landline was in existence. haven't, like, and people are like, I don't believe it. Or like, I believe it, I believe it. Like, the legends are true. And you've got Messi, who's like, like, going to see this for himself as well, too. Like, you have all these stories that are getting created. And people are buying into it. And like,

It reminds me of Braveheart, okay? If you've not seen Braveheart, or if you have, go back and watch it again. But Braveheart, amazing flick, Mel Gibson, and how when Mel Gibson is conquering different parts of England, because he's fighting for Scotland, there's people at these different villages all telling these stories about Mel Gibson. And they're all saying, the legend says that, you know, that you're this and you're that and whatever.

And he goes to these different villages like, yeah, I've heard, I've heard that. He's like, but that's not true. Like this is who I am and this is what I do and that's the feel of this. so it's like the ad basically starts off like with rumors and.

Like the ad doesn't start off with like, know, soccer cleats or boots, however you want to call them, jerseys or kits, you know, balls or like giant logos, none of that stuff. It all just starts off with just rumors, all right? Local crew hasn't lost since 96. You're like, whatever man, that's not, how do you make a story up like that? Well, they sold it really well. And that instantly just kind of creates a lot of intrigue. They're like, wait a second, haven't lost since 1996?

Javier Lozano, Jr. (11:14.764)
And so people are like, well, who are they? And are they actually really that good? And who have they beaten? And can anyone take them down? And so at one point, you hear all this stuff, you're like, well, there's gotta be some pros that are willing to take a mound. And so they almost did, and it just didn't happen. So the ad really just does a good job just like.

really compounding these rumors. And they start by explaining just how this stuff kinda got built up, how it all got started. And so Adidas starts by making you just really curious. so, rumors, one of the most underrated storytelling devices in marketing, in my opinion. A rumor creates tension before the brand ever has to explain anything. And so,

This is kind of why there's a lot of PR companies that represent either people or represent brands or companies or whatever, where they will sometimes start a rumor. You see this in professional sports, where they'll start rumors on purpose to kind of build things up. Like they did this with, what's that kid, Johnny Manziel. Rumors got started about...

them being a wealthy family and all this other stuff. If you haven't watched one of the Netflix series about Johnny Manziel, insane. But rumors, it's an amazing tool to use. Now I'm not saying start rumors and make them false, leverage it correctly. Think about that, all right? And then I love how the ad starts, is that it goes, based on a true story, probably.

So it's one of those of like, this is based on a true story and you're like, no. And then it's like, probably. And on top of that, Timothee Chalamet also uses that same line in the ad. He goes, this is all true, probably. Okay, and now kind of probably fudged a little bit of the exact line, but he uses that as he's telling the story to the crew that he put together, his dream team, okay? If you're wondering, his dream team is Trinity Rodman,

Javier Lozano, Jr. (13:30.703)
Jude Beckham, I'm sorry, Jude Bellingham, and then Lamin Yamal. Okay, so these are amazing stars in their own right, okay? And so what I want us to kind of understand is that this line, like the whole like probably piece, it's genius, okay? It gives the viewer permission to be suspended with disbelief. They're like, wait, what?

Because we all get kind of like, when we see these movies, they're like based on a true story. Or you kind of get worked up like, oh wow, this is based on a true story. Now we all know that all those stuff, all the things that happen in the movie isn't really true, it's cinematic. And the way they ended, put it, probably, like genius, okay?

That line just kind of creates mystery. It signals a little bit of humor, okay? little joking in there. And it makes the story feel passed down and not manufactured. And that's really important. It's like a powerful story is easy to pass down. And it's like, no, no, no. Don't argue with this. This is what it is. There's a scene in there where...

Timothee Chalamet, goes, so starts 1996 and this night he's like, some people say it's 95, I say it's 96, I'm not here to argue, I'm here to tell you the story. Like that's what he says. And like, genius. So the word probably is just really doing an elite level of brand work, okay? It makes the whole thing feel like a story you heard from somebody's cousin who swears they were there.

Okay, so you get this like, this is the power of story. This is why B2B companies, if you could leverage story and just model what some of these B2C companies like what Adidas is doing, it could be great. as you're listening to this, might be like, have your like, I sell manufacturing, you know, products or I am a service based company, like I do commercial this or whatever it is.

Javier Lozano, Jr. (15:41.495)
you can still tell a good story. just gotta model things. You gotta pull elements. You gotta pull nuggets out of all these other things, all right? What I also love is that the real heroes in this commercial are the kids. This is brilliant. It's not the soccer stars, okay? And everyone is wearing like retro type Adidas outerwear. Like the stuff that I grew up,

wearing back in the 90s and early 2000s or I saw I'm like dude I remember seeing that man I had a shirt like that I had some of those shoes back then that kind of stuff and I mean and I told you like this cast had like Messi, David Beckham, Zidane, Jude Bellingham, Yamau, Trinity Robbins, Bad Bunny, obviously Timothee Chalamet like all these people.

And they could have made those people the stars, but instead they made the local crew, the local kids, the stars out of this. And how the story's kind of layered in there too is really crazy. It's like, you know, there's a scene in there where it says it's like, it's like, they basically started playing soccer and they use football. So we'll go with that. And between two apartment buildings on, you know, on some concrete turf.

or concrete patch of whatever for what the word was. And you're like, dude, this is totally urban. This is like urban football. What you see in England, what you see in Europe, just like pick up soccer, three on three, winner go home. You know, like that kind of stuff. But I the kids, like the heroes here. so, know, Sports Business Journal described that.

I'm gonna read this right here actually, it says right here. Sports Business Journal described the spots as imagining local soccer heroes becoming larger than life figures with reputations spanning generations with Beckham, Zidane, and Del Piero appearing as former challengers who couldn't break the streak. Okay, like that's cool. And so that's what I'm trying to say is like, they're just like these local heroes and they're just playing pickup soccer anytime.

Javier Lozano, Jr. (18:02.272)
always there because that's their turf, because they don't go home, they've only one there, okay? And so that kind of flips the narrative from the celebrity ad formula to just normal look at the famous people. It's just so different. And so the most famous people in the world are not the heroes of the ad, they're proof that the heroes are legit. And so I want you to think about that, okay?

So next one is, Shetalame is the guide.

He's not the hero in here. He is the guy. He assembles this dream team. He is talking and negotiating with Bad Bunny. He is talking to Leo Messi and saying like, this streak ends today. And then he shows up to the game and he's like yelling it like, hey, this is my team. They got next. He's yelling at Messi and saying like, hey, did I show up or did I show up?

He's literally like trying to put together the team. And what's even funnier about this whole thing is even Messi is like, do you think they'll win? He goes, probably not. And he goes, well, if they don't win, I'll come in. He goes, you were my backup plan. That's what Chalamet says. He goes, you were my backup plan. But like.

this is genius in how it's done. Like this is literally a page out of the story brand Instincts from David, from Donald Miller. And so, you know, what I want it kind of like iterate here is, that.

Javier Lozano, Jr. (19:39.343)
Timothy Chalamet isn't really the hero, he's the narrator, he's the scout, he's the recruiter, he's the guide. He pulls us into this world and so he tells us why the local crew matters. Like that's important. And so he assembles the challengers, he puts together this team. And then he creates the right bridge, the perfect bridge between the audience and the mythology, okay? I'm gonna actually read this from my screen here. says,

Design Rush makes a similar point saying that Chalamet is positioned as a fan, not just a face attached to the campaign. So like, he's heard about these stories and he's like, huh, I wanna dethrone them. I wanna be that person that put together this team and took him down.

And so that matters because if we were positioned as that star athlete, it would feel fake, right? But as a guide, it totally works. And so Shalome doesn't need to be believable as the best footballer on the pitch. He needs to be believable as the guy obsessed enough to chase the legend, and he is. So like, another just amazing way of putting a story together. And so...

The stakes are small, but emotionally they're huge. mean, we're just talking pickup soccer. Like as he's telling the story in the car when he gets his team together, they're like, the team, the crew is like, the three players are like, so who are we playing? He's like local crew. And they're like, what? And he's like, hey, he yells at them. And he goes, these guys haven't lost since 1996. This is not a story. It's a legend. Like, like he's, he's trying to get them like, no.

because he doesn't want them to go in there and be all cocky trying to win that game because they're just a local crew. so, this is pretty big because the lesson here is that for all businesses, there's actual stakes and though they're tiny, I know it's a pick-up game, there's no trophies, there's no contracts, there's no world titles, there's no stadium, but emotionally, the stakes feel massive.

Javier Lozano, Jr. (21:52.995)
Because a story makes the reputation the prize. And that's what you're looking for.

This is part where a lot of B2B companies don't do very good job is they don't put the stakes out in front of like, this is what it's gonna feel like if you don't win. This is what it's gonna feel like if you actually succeed doing this. Like the stakes have to be visible. You have to clearly state them as unlike, if you win, this happens. If you lose, this happens. If you make no decisions, this happens, right? And then this case, like if you win,

You're known as the team that took down the local crew that hasn't lost in 30 years and you become legends. If you lose, you're just another person that has lost to this legendary streak that even the greats such as the Beckhams of the world, the Zidanes of the world, the Delperios of the world couldn't even do. And if you do nothing, oh man, were you weak? Were you scared? And so,

Emotionally, the stakes feel massive because the story makes the reputation the prize, and that's what's huge. A lot of the times, reputation is really big. can this crew, so I've got some questions here, like, can this crew keep the streak alive? That's a great question. Can the next generation protect the legend? Can the world's best finally beat the local gods? And this is why this, like, this is just, this works. And so,

Great storytelling doesn't always need world ending stakes. Sometimes the highest stakes are just neighborhood bragging rights. And that's kind of what I mean is like as a B2B brand, like you don't need to be like to save the world. You sometimes just need to be like these guys disrupted the industry. These guys really changed how this is all kind of perceived. And so...

Javier Lozano, Jr. (23:54.287)
you wanna learn a little bit more about how this is done. So just think about that. And then the nostalgia used as a story device is just amazing. All right, the retro uniforms, the music at different eras, amazing. Like when they're talking about 1996, there's like a song playing in the background.

And I'm like, I remember that song back in the 90s. And they're talking about the 2000s. And then there's another song playing and I believe it's, what's his face? Busta Rhymes, Nod Your Head, think, is playing in the background. And again, all hip hop, all urban type music. And I'm just like, this is totally...

I'm being drawn into this. I remember these moments in my life. It's almost as though whenever you have a smell that you remember since you were a child and you smell it again and you basically get rewound back to that point. This is where Adidas just nailed it, man. All of that, the street football feel, the old legends, the analog texture, it all just felt intentional.

Here's a note right here is that, know, Design Rush notes that the film leans heavily into 90 street football culture, including the nostalgic soundtrack choices, the terrorist style, the analog tech, the air specific hair, okay, the CGI and the visual effects. Like there's a part where, where Chalamet is talking about Beckham. goes, he's like, and then Beckham shows up and he's like, it's, he's like, not just Beckham, it's Buzzcut Beckham.

So you're remembering these moments of Beckham having different hairstyles over this 10 year course, right? And then they show Buscup Beckham. then he stops, he's like, no, actually, maybe he was blonde Beckham. And then it goes back to Beckham with blonde hair, long. And he goes, no, was Mohawk Beckham. And so it goes back again to literally Beckham with a Mohawk.

Javier Lozano, Jr. (26:02.478)
It's going back to where you're like, yeah, I remember that Beckham. yeah, I remember that Beckham. It just brings that nostalgia back and it's amazing. And so it does an actual amazing job of how it just like kind of narrates and just leads you into that. like the nostalgia worked when it's helpful to tell the story, but it fails when it's just a costume. And they didn't do that. They didn't make it a costume. It really just, it all built up together.

The other part is that it connects generations without feeling forced. That's amazing. And so like this is hard to do, especially for a brand that's been around for 40 years. If your company has been around since the eighties as an example, you're trying to bridge different generations. That's a very hard thing to do. Adidas crushed this and you might be thinking, like, Adidas is Adidas and that's just what they do. like, we're talking about like...

several decade differences, okay? So this is a huge marketing lesson in my opinion is that the ad past legends of like, know, the Beckhams, the Zidane, the Del Pierros, the current legends right now are icons, know, Messi, got Bad Bunny, got Timothee Chalamet, and the next generation legends, okay? You've got Jude Bellingham.

You've got La Mena Mao, you've got Trinity Rodman. So you've got the past, you've got current icons, and you've got the ones that are gonna be the big ones that are gonna be carrying the torches forward. And then you got this local crew, the unknowns, who become the center of the world. And that's how you make a World Cup campaign feel multi-generational, is that you pick the right types of people.

to hit at different stages. This might be hard for your company, but you gotta sit down and think about that. you're picking out your ICP, as you're figuring out who you're going after, as new people come into your industry that are probably younger, you gotta think about this. You gotta see how can you talk to them and resonate with them and see what can you do to help them.

Javier Lozano, Jr. (28:21.39)
kind of bridge that gap, if you will. And so that's how you make a great marketing strategy, in my opinion. So something else right here says that 442 lays out how Chalamet assembles Yamal, Bellingham, and Rodman to challenge the undefeated trio, while Beckham, Zidane, and Del Pierro appear as former challengers who lost.

Again, these are titans of their time. at the peak are their powers. And that structure kind of gives everyone an entry point. Older fans get the legends, they get it. They're like, I remember him. Younger fans, they get the new up and comers. Then you get the culture fans. Like everyone knows, Shela Mays and a whole bunch of stuff. You got Bad Bunny and a whole bunch of stuff. And then you get your soccer fans, your hardcore football fans.

mean, messy as that dude. Then obviously you're casual fans as well too. So like, this ad works because it doesn't pick one audience, it builds a world with multiple doors into it. It brings a whole bunch of people in. So it doesn't mean that you need to create a product that's like for everybody.

Because even then, this is only gonna be good for people that are fans of soccer, people that are fans of football, all right? If you follow World Cup, you're gonna probably know about this. So where I'm coming from with all of this is that I want you to kind of understand that you gotta know your audience, you gotta take the time to understand what resonates with them, you gotta get what's important to them, and then you gotta present that to them.

You can't force, it can't be a if I build it, they'll come kind of approach. This is that field of dreams, okay? And so think about that, all right? So the product is present, but the story, it just, carries it, you know? And this is just, like you could tell everyone's wearing Adidas, everybody. But like Adidas could have made the product painfully obvious. But like this was really well done.

Javier Lozano, Jr. (30:36.878)
The product just lives inside the world. Like the jerseys, they looked retro. The shoes, I'm like, I remember those shoes. Like you definitely have played a few handful of games in those shoes because they looked a little rough on the edges. The ball, like how the ball was looking like, you can tell that it's been kicked around on concrete for a lot of games. A lot of games because it wasn't perfectly shiny. It was like literally like, like this is an old ball. Like the sweaters.

or I'm sorry, the street wear, you know, like, yeah, remember, you know, seeing that like, man, it was perfect. And so it makes the product feel like it was part of the culture, not an interruption to it. And so like the best product placement doesn't feel placed, it feels inevitable. Now I know that this is not really B2B, but what I'm getting to is that

You don't want to force your brand everywhere. You want your brand to just kind of fit into culture, into your audience, into an event, into a conference. If you force it, it feels like it's forced. It's like, why are these companies always forcing this stuff on me? But if it feels like it's just part of it, it's different. And so that's something that you want to think about. Like if you're going to trade shows,

I know you could buy sponsorships and all that other stuff. I'm not saying those are bad ideas, but you wanna find ways to where it just feels natural on how your brand fits with something that you're trying to do. It doesn't mean that don't do sponsorship. It doesn't even mean that you should do sponsorships. What it means is that how can I have my brand feel natural? Maybe I'm gonna have a, I'm not gonna host a conference, but maybe I show up a day early and I invite 10 or 15 influencers, leaders in the industry to a

pre-conference event and we have dinner and we talk about X, Y, and Z, you didn't force your brand there, did you? You created something kind of that was just, felt natural. Do you see what I'm saying? Like, this is what I'm trying to get to, is like, you gotta think about ways and how you can make your brand feel natural to what you're trying to do, okay? And so,

Javier Lozano, Jr. (32:56.546)
you know, the five minutes, it works because it just earns the time. You know, it just, it did an amazing job. They could have probably done all this stuff with the stories in about 30 seconds, but they just built it up. Like the rumors, the legends, the streaks, the past challengers, the new challenging team, like the guide, the villain, the obstacles, the world, the payoff, the cliffhanger, the cliffhanger. mean, goodness. You know, so like.

Design Rice points out that the five minutes format gives Adidas room to build a story pack in cameos and, excuse me, and make the campaign feel bigger than the product push. Like, genius. People don't hate long ads. They don't. I've watched this ad probably over a dozen times now. They hate ads that waste their time. That's the difference, okay? It really turns the World Cup into something local.

That's something else, like biggest event in the world, okay? Probably second to the Olympics maybe? I don't know, like I feel like more people watch the World Cup than they do the Olympics, but I could be wrong. And so it's just, I mean, it's massive. Adidas brings it, you know, this whole thing, this whole backyard feel, the street feel, local pitch, all that stuff, they just bring it together.

Adidas says that the campaign is meant to remind fans that every pitch from backyard to the world's biggest stage can create a legend. And that's cool because like, it's not this whole like overly inclusive kind of thing. It's like, hey, I can create these stories. And so Adidas made the biggest sporting event in the world feel like it started right outside their house. And so like there's things that you can learn from that as you're kind of creating your marketing strategy.

just overall, when it comes to what you're gonna be doing for go-to-market motions, for the quarter, for the year, that sort of stuff. The ad sells belief as well too. Legends can come from anywhere. And so that's really, that's important. The real message is that, not to buy Adidas, and it's not to watch the World Cup, and it's not to look at our athletes.

Javier Lozano, Jr. (35:14.124)
The deeper belief is is like a pitch is a pitch. A game is a game. A legend can start anywhere. And so like, if you can create your brand around that concept, it's easier to tell that story, you know? So great brands don't just sell what they make, they sell what their audience wants to believe about themselves. You see that? It's what, it's you.

take yourself out, you remove yourself out of that and you put your audience, your customer as the hero, okay, and how they want to be believed and perceived on the marketplace. If you can position your customer as that hero, game changer. And that all starts with how you message and talk about your brand on your website, on social media, in your emails, all that stuff. And so,

The last piece is like the mini content around all of this. They did these little short clips of like 15, 20, 30 second clips building this all up. And I mean, it was genius. It worked. And so the best campaigns don't end with when the ad ends, they create a world where people want to keep exploring. And so I've been on their social feed. They've gained a follower.

Anyways, like I believe this is kind of the end of it, but.

I really believe that Adidas gave marketers the playbook. Start rumors, build a world, create a hero that we don't expect, use celebrities as story fuel, not decoration, make nostalgia serve the plot, let the product live inside the culture, and most importantly, give people something to believe in. You know, so.

Javier Lozano, Jr. (37:13.686)
And do you have to have all of those elements, all those ingredients? No, I don't think so. But if you can take like three or four five of those ingredients and put that into your brand, into your company, you start creating a bigger moat between you and your competitors. It's not even fair. It's not fair anymore. So like, I really believe that this wasn't just a great soccer ad. I really believe that it was a reminder that the best marketing still comes down to the oldest thing humans have ever cared about. A great story told well. That's it.

And if you can tell a great story, aw man.

no one else can compare. And so it's important to, you gotta sharpen how you tell those stories. You gotta have the right kind of person knows how to tell those stories. You gotta have the right kind of CEO that is not egotistical, that wants them to be the center of the stories because they created a product or a solution that solves a problem. No one gives a shit about that. Okay? What they care about is the story and how they can put themselves into that story and become that hero. I can tell you that right now. You do that.

changed the game. Okay, so my opinion, this is probably the best ad of 2026. I mean, it's May right now, but yeah, I would say this is probably the best ad of 2026. Nothing comes close to it right now, even after those Super Bowl ads. Some of them were pretty good too, I thought. This one, I mean, they would have spent a fortune running that campaign on the Super Bowl. I mean, it have been a waste of money, in my opinion. But the way they did it, I think it launched,

on Chalamet's social. He's the person that launched it first, I believe, and obviously tagged Adidas and all those other people. But I wanna say that he's the one that put it on his social first, and then he got traction from there. Interesting take. So, think about that, watch it, study it. If you've got questions, by all means, let me know. Hope you thought this was inspirational. I got a little geeky on this, but it just tells you right now the importance of storytelling. If you can do that, changes things, all right?

Javier Lozano, Jr. (39:17.391)
Alright, I'll talk to everybody later.