I will take different ads from the U.S. as well as other countries and compare them. I'll talk about what works, what doesn't work and how the ad would be perceived here and in its home country.
On the blog roll you'll find links to additional advertisements and articles.
This ad pulls fear into the mix. Most ads play on humor or sex so it’s nice to find different ads that pull on different areas of consumers.
The words that show at the end, “Fortunately he fell asleep at the office. Driving tired can kill,” really make the viewer think. After seeing this ad, it puts driving tired into perspective. I don’t want to know what happens if you fall asleep at the wheel so I’d say this ad was very effective. It’s a good message presented in a good way. Good work APS.
Advert = British slang for advertisement, much like the American "ad"
The ad above created lots of hype in Europe in 2008, but also in other countries such as Singapore. Featuring a drum-playing gorilla is pretty original. He seems to be pretty real until you realize that he’s going to play the drums. It definitely would catch the viewers’ attention and keep it, almost like sponsoring a sitcom. Talk about gorilla marketing... More like guerrilla marketing.
“A glass half full of joy” appears on a purple screen at the end of the show underneath a Cadbury bar of milk chocolate. It’s the only reason that you know it’s a Cadbury ad. I did some minor research on the effectiveness of the ad and actually even with all the hype around it, Cadbury didn’t sell as much chocolate. The advertisement won many awards and was the topic of conversation at countless water coolers, but according to TNS, a marketing research company, during the period of the advertisement’s run up to July 2008, Cadbury’s Dairy Milk actually lost ground to Galaxy (produced by rival Mars). See article here
This gorilla ad and the eyebrow ad below spawned many spoofs on youtube. Some were of kids imitating the eyebrow ad others of adults. There’s a gorilla ad spoof that is set to a Deep Purple song and many other versions, much like the David After Dentist spoofs. These also create a lot of hype around the ad when people start making their own versions.
In my Consumer Behavior class, we’re discussing the Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM) and it applies to the route that the Cadbury marketers took. When ability and involvement of the consumer are high, the central route works best. Cadbury sells chocolate, not yachts, so they didn’t follow this model. They went with the Peripheral route to get their message across. This is said to work best when the consumer’s ability and/or motivation to buy are low. When using the peripheral route, persuasion is accomplished through positive peripheral cues. For example, peripheral route ads typically use attractive pictures, spokespeople, or music, there are a lot of claims made and humor to get their point across. These two Cadbury ads used humor.
I would have said that they were effective but according to TNS, Cadbury’s Dairy Milk actually lost ground. Their back up plan is probably the sleeper effect, where as the ad is forgotten, the message lingers: Buy Cadbury. The next time I’m picking between chocolate in London, I probably won’t go for Hershey’s. I’ll tell ya that much.
My room mate is taking scuba diving. She bought her $250-something worth of gear which is now pretty important to her and got a magazine out of it which became interesting to me. I was flipping through Sport Diver and found two ads that I thought would be cool to critique. The cool thing about Sport Diver is that its circulation is greater than just America. According to one of its many photographers, "Current circulation of Sport Diver Magazine is 175,000 internationally and it is the official publication of PADI, which is the world’s largest scuba diving and training certification agency."
Here are the two ads I chose:
This ad uses fantasy effectively because it makes you think that if I was in that situation, I would need at least three layers (bottom right corner) to my wet-suit. In reality, most people that own wet-suits would not go on a dive like this. They may snorkel or dive a rock quarry, but nothing this extreme unless they had the money to do so. In which case, they would probably have a more expensive suit. I think it sells the thought that the diver would be more adventurous and get to go out and do more. It sells the experience too.
I think this ad is effective because it applies the mask to an attractive woman. Her skin is glowing, her lips are plush and glossy and her nails are long and painted. These are all subtle clues that you can look like this woman or if you’re a man you can be with a woman who looks like this if you use this brand of goggles. Goggles are probably the most unattractive thing you can put over your eyes and this ad jazzes them up because of the sex appeal of the woman in it. For a magazine article it's also good with the text at the bottom to explain a little more about the goggles. Overall, a very effective ad.
