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SHOULD ADVERTISING BE MORE ABOUT BEING USEFUL THAN ENTERTAINING?
Advertising has always been about being entertaining or useful from one degree or another. Typically, it's been more about entertainment than being useful. Think of the budgets that have been spent on TV campaigns such as Guinness' “Good Things Come To Those Who Wait” (i.e The Surfer ad), Heat Electric's Creature Comforts ads by Wallace and Grommit animator Nick Park, Lego Kipper, and so on. These types of campaigns have been central to the existence and success of the leading, traditional ad agencies over the last few decades. But advertising has, also, been about being useful, too. Charmin toilet paper providing free toilets to shoppers in Time Square over the Christmas period, a few years ago, for example. But this kind of advertising, at least for the leading brands, has been relatively small fry, compared to the type of advertising the leading brands have invested in campaigns based around being entertaining.
But things have changed in recent years. Audiences are now more skeptical of advertising. They're not opposed to advertising in general, as long as it is not irrelevant to them. As long as it isn't spammy and annoying. Advertising that is entertaining still works. We know this because of the successes of campaigns on the internet such as Cadbury's “Gorilla”, Cadbury's “Eyebrows”, and many others. In fact “entertaining” can work just as well in new media as it does on old. And new media offers new opportunities of being entertaining as well, for example, microsites, free games, interactive sites in general, and more. Not just that but because of digital technology, it is now easier to target this type of advertising to target audiences. But the internet, also, offers people in advertising, multiple opportunities of offering advertising that is “useful”. For example, providing audiences with free applications, widgets, and more.
On the other hand, how entertaining and useful is advertising on the internet in general? Can you give some examples of advertising, on the internet, that work and other examples of advertising, on the internet, that doesn't work in being entertaining and/or useful?
Should advertising now be more about being more useful than entertaining? Yes, no, or no difference (and why do you think this?).
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5:38 pm
February 11, 2010
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singhvivek6
| | India | |
| New Member | posts 2 |
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Advertising is a communication from the company to its consumers with a purpose. The purpose can be to increase awareness or get trials or something else.
Now, for the consumers to act the way the company wants them to, they should first see the ad and then like it and then act upon it. For someone to notice an ad, it better be entertaining and memorable. Only then will someone notice.
Once the consumer has noticed the ad, then he/she will see what's inside. If their emotions are moved, they will act upon the ad. Because we all know that emotions lead to actions.
Hence for an ad to succeed, it has to stir emotions. The emotions can be of fear or anger or love or anything.
Entertaining ads are catchy, memorable and get remembered. That's why many companies choose to make their ads entertaining.
The Indian industry is currently going through a phase where some categories (like potato chips, candy, gum) are dominated by 'entertaining ads'. And yes, they are doing pretty well. The only thing which the marketer has to remember is this: "Ad ad which is so entertaining that the consumer remembers the ad and forgets about the brand."
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Vivek,
"An ad which is so entertaining that the consumer remembers the ad and forgets about the brand."
- and an on-going issue between branding/marketing people and creative people in ad agencies (i.e. branding people criticising creatives for their creative ideas being irrelevant to the branding brief, and creatives criticising branding people for trying to hammer home their branding message at the cost of putting audiences off the ad). I suppose the best ads are made by individuals who are responsible for both coming up with the branding message and the creative concept (and blending them successfully together): David Ogilvy, for example, back in the 50's, 60's and 70's. Or by branding people and creatives who work well and closely in creating (from both a branding, and a creative, perspective) the ad overall.
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5:23 pm
April 12, 2010
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rd7765
| | New England | |
| Member | posts 10 |
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There is a fine line between entertaining your audience and getting them to buy your product. Who hasn't viewed a television ad that made them laugh out loud, but when describing the ad to a friend, couldn't for the life of them remember what the ad was actually for? I think the key element to this is relevance. You can be humorous or entertaining, but stay on target with what you're marketing or your product will be lost in the pomp and circumstance of the ad itself.
I'd almost propose that one make their ad more "annoying" than entertaining. For example, I don't know one person who isn't irritated every time the "Head On" commercial comes on – "Head on, apply directly to the forehead….Head on, apply directly to the forehead…" etc. Annoying, yes. Memorable? Absolutely. Again, a fine line because you don't want to turn your audience off to the point that they boycott your product.
On a side note, I think that advertising on the web is a whole different ballgame than print/television. With sophistocated pop-up blockers and the ability to exit ads and go directly to a website, the importance lies much more in being useful rather than entertaining. Offering a promotion, discount, buy-one-get-one, etc. will be much more likely to result in a click through than something flashy.
To be successful you have to understand your audience and your medium to determine what will get the most results. Stay focused on your brand and know the fine lines so you can avoid crossing them.
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@rd7765
"Who hasn't viewed a television ad that made them laugh out loud, but when describing the ad to a friend, couldn't for the life of them remember what the ad was actually for?"
- good point. Advertising isn't just about a good creative idea. It's, also, about basing that good creative idea in a good marketing insight, based on a thorough understanding of the audience, the market place, the product, the competition, and so on (hence why ad agencies invest in brand/account planning before an ad campaign.
"With sophistocated pop-up blockers and the ability to exit ads and go directly to a website, the importance lies much more in being useful rather than entertaining."
- Yes. Not only can you reach your target audience more easily now, its' easier, now, to offer them something useful (useful app / widget and so on).
I still think it's possible to be creative on the net, but in many ways it's a lot more challenging than before because the landscape is now is so varied and constantly developing – with the opportunity of being entertaining in so many different ways: mircrosites, virals, games, websites, banners, videos, email (graphical look), Twitter (Twitter background), Facebook, blogs, mobile phone apps, and so on.
Another problem is who decides which digital channel to be "entertaining" on, the brand planner, the communications planner, the art director, the copywriter, the web designer, and so on. In order to be entertaining (and useful now) in general now, a much more holistic approach is required, I think, with people behind an ad or brand campaign working much closer than before.
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3:16 pm
May 10, 2010
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Julie
| | Cincinnati, OH USA | |
| Member | posts 15 |
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Either relevancy or entertainment value (or both) will work, and neither is necessarily better than the other as long as it accomplishes its purpose. First and foremost, before it can communicate anything to anyone, an ad must get the audience's attention, and communicating to the audience about an issue they are already looking to learn more about, or entertaining them both work toward that end.
What the ad accomplishes after getting the audience's attention then becomes an issue, and it's true that if, in getting the audience's attention, you alienate them, then your effort has been wasted.
I used to see the purpose of advertising as twofold:
1. Get the audience's attention
2. Inspire the desired end result (= buying your product/service)
And if either of these was lacking, then the advertising effort had failed.
The challenge in the current advertising climate is more about getting the audience's attention, because people are constantly bombarded with marketing messages and have started to selectively tune them out, which is why pop-up and spam blockers were needed in the first place.
People now want to choose what messages they are interested in hearing, since there is only so much time and attention to go around in any given day, so you now have to not only get someone's attention with the ad itself, you also have to get them to be willing to receive the communication in the ad before you even attempt to communicate with them.
So now, there really needs to be three parts to the advertising success formula:
1. Convince the audience you will have something to say that they want to hear (i.e., you are knowledgeable on a topic they are already interested in) so they will be willing to pay attention to what you have to say
2. Keep their attention with your message
3. Inspire the desired end result.
Blogs in particular speak well to #1 above, which is why they are currently so big.
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@Julie
"Convince the audience you will have something to say that they want to hear"
- Yes, and this in particular i think.
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