This week’s marketing winners, losers and newsmakers.

Winners

Domino’s: The pizza giant had the most likable TV ad in the quick-service restaurant category in the first half of 2022, according to recent data from iSpot. The “More Than Pizza” commercial, a food-filled video promoting non-pizza items like specialty chicken and savory pastas, scored in the 97th percentile for likeability, iSpot found. It's not the most creative ad in the world, but perhaps the lesson here is when you sell craveable food, just show it.

Popeyes: The chicken chain has been running Twitch livestreams that replicate its digital menu boards, allowing people to order food by simply using word commands in the Twitch chat. 

While that is unique, the backstory is more interesting: Popeyes did it to seize on the publicity generated by a TIkTok video in which a man claims he bought a 70-inch TV “from a guy on the street”—but when he brought it home, he realized it did nothing but showed the Popeyes menu. Ad Age cannot confirm the validity of the account. But when it comes to social media marketing, the truth might not matter. The TikTok video has generated more than 10.5 million views.

NFL: Yes, NFL preseason games are largely meaningless—but millions of people are watching them, proving yet again that when it comes to TV ratings, there is the NFL and then there is everything else. Example: Sunday’s game between the Baltimore Ravens and Arizona Cardinals averaged 3.22 million viewers on Fox, reports Front Office Sports.

Read more: NFL and college football marketing—tracking brand moves

Losers

Sephora: The cosmetics retailer was ordered to pay $1.2 million as part of a settlement with California regarding the state’s new online privacy law, the California Consumer Privacy Act. Sephora was accused of selling customers’ data and information to online tracking companies without informing them.

Zoom: The COVID-19 video darling reported single-digit quarterly revenue growth, missing analyst expectations and sending shares down 16% on Tuesday. Zoom also said it did not add as many enterprise customers–where it works as a business platform for companies–as expected, another blow for the tech brand.

Sony: The electronics company announced it was raising the price of its popular Playstation 5 video game console by up to 20% in Europe, the Middle  East, Africa, Asia Pacific, Latin America and Canada “due to global economic environment, including high inflation rates.”

Tweet of the week

Quote of the week

“We went from sneakers to death.” –David Odusanya, a former VP of design at Nike who is now co-founder and chief creative officer of Solace, a direct-to-consumer cremation brand that is disrupting the funeral industry.

Number of the week

27: Percentage of families that say they turned to resale for child and baby items because of inflation, according to the Reuse Report: Family Edition from resale brand Mercari.

On the move

Kohl’s named Christie Raymond chief marketing officer. She had been serving as interim CMO since May. Prior to that, she was executive VP, customer engagement, analytics and insights.

Aspen Skiing Company appointed Gabby Cohen as chief brand officer. She had been global head of brand and communications at Harry’s Inc.

Denny’s Corp. promoted John Dillon to president of Denny’s Inc. from chief brand officer. In addition, David Schmidt was named president of Keke’s Breakfast Cafe. He had been chief financial officer at Red Lobster.  Denny’s is searching for a new CMO.

Kellogg Co. made several executive announcements for the upcoming North American cereal company being formed in the company's pending split. Along with naming Gary Pilnick CEO of the cereal business, other moves included naming Doug VanDeVelde chief growth officer and Bruce Brown chief customer officer.

Burger chain Krystal named Casey Terrell as its CMO. Terrell was most recently head of digital transformation for Focus Brands.