...I said they were doing something right, using Burger King and pre-marketting Ronald McDonald as the comparison. 
Burger King seriously had no idea how to sell themselves. Even Wendies is trying harder than they are now.
I wouldn't know. I stopped watching commercials sometime around 1999. You know besides the occasional one that sneaks itself into my life. They are inescapable after all.
Even that add blocker software is accepting money from advertisers to let certain advertisements go through.
You know what's truly criminal. Is that if the same person watches the same video over and over again, and watches the commercials that go along with it, the content creators are not getting paid any more money than they would for a single view.
I don't have the proof, but it's obvious.
The videogame crowd, Burger King offered it as a Happy Meal of sorts. They also have a shitty racing game and a game about bumper cars. They're marketed toward a young crowd that sucks at games, based on the lack of difficulty and the cover art being very colorful from that promotion as well as the overly PC gameplay. They knew kids played videogames and wanted to try to hit from a different angle than usual, and it failed miserably.
It's more about how well they're selling to their intended audience. McDonalds tailors their advertising a good deal based on the region, and they cater to trends and what "tests well". Somehow... I feel like Burger King might have skipped the testing stages and just did whatever came to mind in the moment.
Here's how Ronald McDonald started when they had no idea how to market themselves properly: 
Especially when compared to that, Ronald McDonald nowadays is quite a successful brainwashing technique of sorts. Kids love him, even if their side characters are so easy to ignore, and kids are suckered into the terrible food for the prospect of a free toy once the initial happy-go-lucky clown's lured them in at least once.