What is the purpose of advertising anyway?
Tuesday, February 17, 2009 at 03:35PM Before reviewing the comments from leaders in the advertising agency world related to this year's Super Bowl, I knew their observations would disappoint me. Why? Because they would disregard advertising's reason for being.
Before addressing the purpose of advertising, let's look at some sample quotes (with my underlining) taken out of Bob Garfield's editorial of February 2, 2009 in Ad Age entitled "Ed McMahon's Bad Ad Steals the Super Bowl".
MONSTER.COM
"The moose! We don't care if it's implicitly crude. We've never seen this joke before, and the joke, she is perfect."
HULU
"Very, very funny."
E-TRADE
"The baby is back, this time with a sidekick... Weird, adorable, funny..."
HYUNDAI
"Who needs jokes, CGI or chimpanzees when you have an extraordinary offer? Buy a new Hyundai and, if you lose your job, return the car at no risk to your credit."
PEDIGREE
"Here we see it dramatized, along with glimpses at other unruly pets, such as wild boars, ostriches, etc. Then the payoff title card: "Maybe you should get a dog." Very funny, and a nice way into Pedigree's pet-adoption do-gooding."
TELEFLORA
"The selling proposition -- you don't know what boxed flowers will look like, so you don't know what they'll say about you -- is, at best, thin. The "creative" solution is disgraceful: a box of talking flowers nastily ridiculing homely people about how ugly and sad they are. That is ugly and sad. And cruel."
Notice the frequent subjective references to style, funny, creative, adorable, ugly, sad and so forth. Some of this is appropriate considering the audience.
But what about something really important such as whether the spots worked or did not work to yield new revenue for the advertiser?
I saved the best quote for last because it reveals the typical advertising agency's true mentality.
CASH4GOLD?
"On the Super Bowl? Really?
Things are even worse than we thought.
Not because it's pitiful that the down-and-out Ed McMahon and MC Hammer should humiliate themselves before 100 million appalled eyewitnesses. Not because in the Dustbowl Super Bowl poor NBC is reduced to accepting a schlocky direct-response spot thinly disguised as a winking spoof of schlocky direct-response spots. Not even because the economy is so bad that we're panicked into trading our jewelry and bridgework for 17¢ on the dollar of gold value.
Here's schlocky: Cash4Gold spot not clever, but it works.
The truly scary thing is that this skeazy exercise from Euro RSCG Edge and Arnold Worldwide will generate, by far, the biggest ROI of the Super Bowl. With the financial structures of advertising in a state of collapse, if creativity is so beside-the-point, then what is the point? Answer that to the Leading National Advertisers' satisfaction, and you'll get cash for gold."
My take:
Things are indeed getting worse than we thought for advertising agencies that waste millions of dollars of their clients' money with advertising that does not get the cash register ringing. Agencies do this by making sure that their clients' advertising entertains, comes across as funny and clever -- and never sells anything.
Denny's gets a top rating even though the financial results of giving away free meals to America probably will not deliver an ROI the CFO for the company would approve. But at least it comes with an offer!
The only relevant comment that relates to ROI in all of Garfield's comments gets the blast of his disdain.
He accidentally approves of Hyundai's offer. Though he would not normally do this because any offer that asks the viewer to do something somehow demeans the brand from his lofty perspective. I suppose he rates this offer highly because it is new and clever. Not just any offer could pass his stringent screening process.
Hopefully this recession will weed out these arrogant advertising "gurus" and the clients that follow their advice.
Conclusion:
Garfield asks this question. “With the financial structures of advertising in a state of collapse, if creativity is so beside-the-point, then what is the point?“
Let me answer Mr Garfield’s question with another question that will answer it. What is the point of creativity if it is not there to shore up the clients’ financial structure?
It's about time that we killed advertising that is more concerned about style, entertainment value and creativity for creativity’s sake than the real goal of advertising. ADVERTISING'S REASON FOR BEING IS TO MAKE MONEY FOR THE ADVERTISER. PERIOD.
Reader Comments (11)
The continually increasing emphasis on a spot's entertainment value to appeal to the lowest common denominator is quickly and systematically eroding the higher and more subtle brainwashing techniques that have historically been the core of effective persuasive brand advertising.
OR so it seems.
A lot of times the dumbed-down, seemingly waste of money spots are actually simplistic "Problem/Solution" set-ups wherein the advertised product is the solution. What's wrong with that? Everybody gets it.
Does it make the sale?
Does the word "Gatorade" on the side of a Nascar vehicle make the sale?
Does the word "Staples" behind the pitcher make the sale?
Maybe not. But it does create EXPOSURE for the brand.
Nowadays, one ad doesn't make a register cha-ching. It's a cumulative thing. Word of mouth, exposure, PR (good and bad), etc. - but the biggest thing? Does the darn product or service actually offer real value or answer the consumers wants/needs? Sometimes you can sell a dud product with great advertising. Of course, a good product can sell itself - in which case, who needs advertising? LOL.
Bottom line - you've got to get the word out. There's only so much you can say about a bottle of Coke. Let's see one of those big bottles on sale for $25 - they'll fly out the door. MacDonald's gets it when they do their 99 cents thing and roll back prices.
Well, enough of my ramblings.
Please note that I am not saying that none of the advertising is valid or does not sell product.
What I am saying is that those responsible for such advertising (namely brand building agencies and their clients) forget that their main job and advertising goal is to move product.
If they focused more on the GOAL and less on trying to be CLEVER, then I believe that the advertising in many of these spots would work a lot harder at getting sales.
And to answer you question about the advertising examples you cite, the answer is that they must all produce sales as a whole or die. No company should spend millions on these efforts if their productivity cannot be proven with actual sales results.
It’s up to the CMO (in cooperation with the CFO) to come up with metrics for evaluating the productivity of ALL advertising dollars spent.
And on another point. Why can't the spots sell and build the brand at the same time?
Ultimately, all strategies such as branding, PR, social marketing, image advertising, positioning advertising and direct marketing must work together or singly to deliver the incremental sales goals to survive.
No single strategy or combination of strategies are immune from delivering the appropriate ROI.
You know, it may be their job to move product - but if the product isn't movable, the advertising will ultimately reflect it.
How many bags of Dorritos must be sold and eaten anyway?
Let the market decide if an ad is good or bad with their checkbooks, to paraphrase you on another blog - AND, heck if those creating it forget what their jobs are, off with their heads! There are plenty of other hungry people looking to step in their places.
I'm at a point now where I do not believe in sell, sell, sell - the market has a natural way of leveling it all out in the long run.
Am I making any sense? It's late ... I'm trying to tie up some invoicing stuff. Anyway, it's always good to have an inspired dialog on these subjects. I must say, I am becoming cynical. Or more cynical. As the years pass!
I like to tie it back to the marketing cycle: awareness, consideration, preference, purchase.
Advertising should move the needle on some aspect of the marketing cycle. Most mass media advertising is not designed to generate awareness, consideration and preference -- and not necessarily produce the sale. That's ok.
The problem however, is that advertising should be measured on the INCREMENTAL impact on these metrics. So when Coke runs an amusing ad, or Doritos does a UGC spot, the question should be: what incremental awareness, consideration or preference did the ad generate?
If there are people out there who drink soda, but have never heard of Coke, please let me know. If there are soda drinkers who have heard of Coke, but have never considered trying it before, please let me know. If there are soda drinkers who switched from Pepsi to Coke because of a TV ad, please let me know.
oops. comment should have read:
Most mass media advertising is designed to generate awareness, consideration and preference -- and not necessarily produce the sale
Hi Ron. Great to hear from you! And thanks for the thoughtful comments. But as you know, I can't resist elaborating on your thoughts.
If building "awareness, consideration and preference" do not produce incremental sales within the time frame allocated for an appropriate ROI, then the advertising, the strategy or both failed.
As you said so succinctly, "advertising should be measured on the INCREMENTAL impact on these metrics."
So the goal remains. Even though not immediate, mass media must ultimately drive incremental sales! (Somewhat contradicting your last comment).
Unfortunately, you are right. The advertising industry does not routinely establish metrics for success before selecting the advertising strategies. If they did, then I believe a lot of the advertising we see today would never see the light of day.
That is the Achilles heal for "soft" ojectives that do not have numbers and time lines associated with them.
Before undertaking such enormous investments such as those required for Super Bowl advertising -- or any advertising for that matter -- the marketing strategists should make the development of sound metrics the number 1 priority.
The industry must define success as it relates to the sales goals and not the strategies.
In other words, high unaided recall numbers measure the success of the strategy and not sales.
It is this change most of my clients are looking for from their agencies and their marketers. Click throughs are great, but what did that translate to in terms of sales.
No wonder marketing expenditures disappear at the blink of an eye when times get rough as they are now. Advertisers and some marketers have not demonstrated how sales results go up or down based on the size of their advertising budgets.
Ted,
Dead-on. It's too bad most ad folks simply don't get it. Thanks for the post.
Great...
The purpose of advertising is to capture a targe markets attention, hold their interest, create desire for the brand, and entice the target market to take the desired action. Pepsi commercials are great examples of advertising done right.
As a consumer, I remember products through the ads that I see on TV, internet, and billboards. And whether it's effective or not, the ads that I remember are the one's that are very interesting.
Darryl Keith
Pawn Shop
Thanks for the comment Darryl.
I'm not sure how to respond to your comment except to agree that awareness spots definitely help you remember the product. In some cases, however, the consumer remembers the spot and not the product! That's wasteful advertising any way you look at it.
But I still contend that gaining awareness is a strategy and not a goal. Just because I know Chevrolet products does not mean that I ever intend to buy any of them.
So targeting and evaluating the awareness strategy based on its ability to generate incremental revenue is the true test of any marketing spend. It you can't evaluate marketing expense based on its ability to make money, then I question whether you should spend even one cent doing it.
Marketers essential role is to validate their campaigns based on ROI. There is no other way to do the job without the numbers.
Package goods have a difficult task in this respect, because sales come primarily through awareness and positioning advertising. Coca-Cola still manages to evaluate the financial impact of their advertising. But this level of sophistication does not exist for most advertising spends in my experience.