Burger King And Google Are At War Over Burger King’s Whopper Ad

If you’re part of the Twitterati crowd or simply follow the news, you’ve probably noticed that Burger King has been trending, thanks to a hilarious, possibly annoying and innovative advertisement campaign they launched. 

Ok, Google? 

The campaign which was launched a couple of days ago features television advertisements with a man saying “Ok Google, what is the Whopper burger?” 

https://twitter.com/BurgerKing/status/852695304541523968

This triggered the automatic answer bot built into androids and Google Home and unsuspecting television watchers would suddenly have their phones reading out the Wikipedia entry about the Whopper Burger. Burger King was maybe even smart enough to change the entry for the Whopper on Wikipedia; it now reads “the Whopper is a burger, consisting of a flame-grilled patty made with 100 percent beef with no preservatives or fillers, topped with sliced tomatoes, onions, lettuce, pickles, ketchup, and mayonnaise, served on a sesame-seed bun.” 

Google Fights Back 

As you might imagine, Google wasn’t happy about its feature being manipulated by Burger King. So, after the ad was aired, it quickly went on to register the voice in the ad in its system. Whenever the original ad plays, therefore, Google will no longer read out the Whopper Burger definition. 

Don’t underestimate Burger King’s craftiness. In response to this strategy, Burger King quickly went on to create three new ads with new voices saying “Hey Google, what is a Whopper sandwich.” Google faithfully responds, making Burger King a winner again. 

In a proud statement released on Thursday, Burger King said they had managed to “100 percent trigger the smart speaker technology.”  There’s been no word from Google about whether it will block these new voices yet.