Advertising do’s and dont’s. .
I’ve had the opportunity to see a lot of commercials over the course of the last six months that I hadn’t been privy to in the year and a half or so previously. Over the course of time I lived in Long Island City with my brother we didn’t own a TV and what little television I saw was usually on mute at a bar which I was playing a gig at. So sure, I saw advertisements for the usual suspects – beer, food, cars, sex (aren’t they all about sex?), make up, sneakers, sports, gadgets – but I didn’t get any direct exposure to how exactly they were trying to sell America to me until I moved back to my dad’s house, and then out to my current apartment where I’m equipped for television. With that bit of background out of the way, I’m going to outline two of the best and two of the worst commercials I feel I’ve seen recently, and the reasons why.
The Best of Them:
- Blackberry Torch – I actually saw this commercial on mute for the first time and was so intrigued that I was driven to look it up on my own time. As good as it was with no sound, it was that much better when you got to follow the story. The story was a 30 second vignette of a small business starting out producing hand bags. There was a designer and a traveling salesman. Over the course of the commercial their prestige grows owing to a model wearing the bag on a red carpet someplace, it getting photographed and placed in the press and their order load increasing exponentially overnight. Throughout the whole commercial they are communicating via the various capabilities afforded to you by the new snazzy Blackberry. The climax of the commercial (if I may, thank you) has the salesman receiving a figure from his partner back in the warehouse letting him know they’ll need an order for something like 300,000 units, the salesman dropping his bags and raising his arms in triumph on the moving sidewalk in the airport. You get the whole human experience in 30 seconds, and it’s very obvious what the commercial is selling. I’ll do some more exhaustive research and find it to post so you can have a look but I’m confident enough of you have seen it and know what I’m talking about. Effective sale, great marketing department.
- Guinness – As referenced above, it even looks good on April Fool’s day. Never has a product done such a good job of making themselves seem unique and exclusive. . at least not to me. The “Only For The Bold” commercials make one feel like a cut above the rest when they order, receive and subsequently sip a Guinness stout. I’m pretty aware of the fact that many millions of people drink Guinness on a daily basis, and I bet they all feel like they’re the only one – or at least that they’re part of an elite group. Only for The Bold.
The “Worst” Of Them (really, just ineffective and unclear)
- I saw a Three Olives Vodka commercial – and it was so bad that I can’t even describe it to you because I have no idea what was going on. I then saw a different ad from the same campaign and still couldn’t tell you what it was about except that it ultimately ended up being for Three Olives, distilled in Britain. So. . as there’s no such thing as bad press, they’ve still gotten me to talk about it, but I won’t concede to them having done a good job simply on the strength of getting mentioned. I’m no more likely to drink their product and have doubts about the quality of their marketing department.
- Ford F-150. I’m usually a fan of their commercials because they usually do a pretty good job of selling that Ford is THE truck company and making the exploits of Ford truck owners seem rugged and exotic. In this particular commercial, the narrator speaks as the truck in the first person, making all kinds of promises about its capabilities (hauling, towing, fuel economy) and the music playing in the background is Collective Soul – The World I Know. For those of you not intimately familiar with their catalog, it’s a kind of sullen and depressing sounding song and not really one that I’d want associated with my man’s man car. Conversely of late, Jeep commercials have employed a soundtrack that so very much paints the automobiles in question as a bad ass car that you need to own to understand.
Until next time boys and girls.
Peace Love and Vocal Harmonies
