The ‘surprise’ is what’s missing in TV ads
There’s a recurrent theme on the Ad industry blogs these days. The general feeling seems to be that TV ads aren’t as surprising (read ‘engaging’) as they used to be. They’ve become predictable and conservative. Consumers are rarely intrigued and delighted by what they see. To illustrate this, let’s think about the Gorilla. Yes, him with the drumsticks. Now, no matter what you think about its strategy or relevance, it’s not just within Advertising circles that it stood out. I bet if you asked any member of the public which TV ad springs to mind from the last few years, 7 out of 10 consumers would prefer it. There’s a simple explanation too. It surprised people. It defied convention. People sat down expecting to see the usual fare and instead were dished up something totally unpredictable and intriguing.
So why, when asked to name something similar over the past few years, would we struggle to think of many other examples? What’s gone wrong? Advertising used to be a creative maverick, the wild child that didn’t play by the rules. Now it’s just the apologetic fellow in the pin-stripe suit who drives a saloon and plays squash at the weekend (no offence to any formally attired squash-playing saloon-driving readers). You can blame it on the shift in power between agency and client. You can blame it on research directing ads rather than just informing them (though to be fair, research has been in the industry since the 1950s). You can ascribe it to the fact there we’re all subjected to communications on thousands of different channels these days as opposed to two or three. You can even blame it on the recession. But who cares what or who’s to blame? More importantly, what can we do?
It seems to me that the future for TV ads lies in three areas: clients, consumers and (somewhat confusingly when you talk about TV ads), Digital. Firstly, the more clients that commit to doing something truly engaging, and enjoy the success it brings, the more others will want to follow suit. Secondly, Digital – often pitched as TV’s adversary – could ironically be its saviour too. The advent of Digital allows us to place filmed content online – not just in the middle ad break during Fair City. It’s less regulated too. So your big idea might be expressed in a much more daring way online than it is in other media. Lastly, Digital allows consumers to have a bigger say in the development of creative ideas. Not just literally in the advent of crowd-sourcing, but in the way we now receive instant feedback to our ads. The water-cooler is now the blog or the social media site. So if something doesn’t work, we know about it a few seconds later.
As we know from current research, although TV no longer enjoys the dominance it once had, it’s still one of the most effective ways to get your message across. So it would be a shame to see TV ads slowly sink into a repetitive and dull dotage.
So to conclude, consider this: a TV ad from an interesting character called Tom Rubnitz. It’s not real of course. But I would love to see the reaction were something similar to be screened. It’s certainly surprising (warning: contains extremely camp scenes). *Relevance v Gratuitousness to be discussed at a later date.