It’s evident that advertising has undergone a massive shift in the last decade. While story-telling is at the heart of advertising, the kinds of stories, the people who consume these stories and where they consume the same is constantly widening.
We’re in a time when an ad we don’t like can be blocked forever, and, at the same time, expressing a hint of interest in a certain product awakens retargeting.
That said, two ads I really like are on opposite sides of a spectrum. One is a print ad campaign from the past that still connects with audiences across ages, countries, and gender, while the other is a digital innovation that was a first to reach its audience using this medium.
Two ads I like
Absolut Print
This is a tribute to a long-running ad campaign. Absolut has reached a stage in their lifecycle where they can release an ad without mentioning their brand name and people will be convinced that it’s an Absolut ad.
I believe very strongly in one thing – ‘community builds community’ and Absolut did just that. They used the art and music tribe to help create and build a community for themselves. Brands need to stop talking to everyone and speak to someone.
A brand that had a 2% market share in the 80’s, is now the #1 vodka brand in the world but more than being number #1, it has come to be seen as one of the most recognizable brands in the world.
At a time when advertising was all about reaching the masses, Absolut was trying to carve a niche, trying to build communities to own a space in the market. While the realities of the Andy Warhol commissioned ads are in question, it was an inspired moment in itself. Identifying that artists and musicians can help create and ultimately elevate the brand was an interesting approach and the final output had simplicity at its core.
Every print ad almost only had two words, the bottle in the center and art to complement that. Rinse and repeat that 1,500 times across cultures, using design as their currency. These ultimately resulted in long-standing success.
Absolut used design as branding, and in that process, they were able to patent the shape of their bottle and any brand that tried to emulate it came across as cheap knock-offs. Any consumer that comes across a large medicinal transparent bottle in communications is going to be convinced it is an Absolut ad, and this is the equity that they have in the eyes of the consumer through its positioning.
I believe very strongly in one thing – ‘community builds community’ and Absolut did just that. They used the art and music tribe to help create and build a community for themselves. Brands need to stop talking to everyone and speak to someone.
Closer to home in India, brand marketers need to narrow their audience profiles. The creative agency’s curse is understanding who products are made for, and this needs to come from the brand – “we want to target all current 18-25-year-olds”; “we want to be a mass brand and talk to everybody” “our target audience is mothers from south India”.
We’re in a time when an ad we don’t like can be blocked forever, and at the same time expressing a hint of interest in a certain product awakens retargeting.
I understand that the onus is on strategists to push back with clients and convey the importance of segmentation and sub-segmentation of the audiences, but why remain oblivious about the product or service’s audience in the first place?
Takeaway – Forge the right partnerships and alliances and leverage on the same by consistently delivering the same message
Wi-Fiction – Melbourne Writers Festival
One of those “I wish I worked on this” campaigns – because of the challenge they were dealing with and the human problem that they were addressing because of the realities of the time.
A campaign that was conceptualized and executed in 2011, a time when phones, technology, the internet had just about to start taking over our lives, the rise of the ‘always-on’ generation, also the time that saw a decline in the sales of physical books, the objective was to simply drive awareness and traffic to a festival that was centered around books and the writers.
Brands offering free Wi-Fi as a way to attract customers was becoming a norm then, and coffee shops and fast food eateries were capitalizing on this world over. But just offering free Wi-Fi wasn’t enough for this event. They went a step further to establish their intent and put stories while people were simply searching for Wi-Fi.
The brilliance of this campaign was that they identified a touchpoint that is searched for by people, a touchpoint that in hindsight, makes human beings receptive, a touchpoint that delivers happiness through convenience. It was perfect for the brand to showcase that every single spot becomes a touchpoint to reach people.
Takeaway – Understand human being’s behaviors in a way that relevancy can be found even in the most intimate setting.
One I don’t like
Burger King x Google Assistant & Google home
For the past few months, most of the advertising chatter that I’ve come across has been around Burger King’s ‘innovative ad’. Multiple marketers and forums have been applauding that piece of work but I feel, that’s a part of advertising that I wouldn’t celebrate.
‘Voice’ and the entire eco-system around it is an exciting and fresh space for a brand to be present in but said advertising shouldn’t be the means to hack and enter a person’s life. Burger King forced their way into the user’s life without thinking this activity through.
The first line of the Burger King Whopper Burger’s Wikipedia page was edited and re-edited by users to convey negative messages about the brand and at the time of release, broke the terms and conditions.
Takeaway: Don’t call a novelty an innovation!
