Friday, November 16, 2018

Advertising 201.

There's a new Christmas spot out from the British department store, John Lewis.

It's everything a spot should be.

Everything advertising should be.

Everything we should be.


And if we were, the industry wouldn't be in the throes it is currently in. In other words, it wouldn't be relegated to the fringes of the business world.

Bull-shitting about data. About conversations. Bull-shitting about re-targeting. Bull-shitting about the efficacy of treating people in ways they hate being treated. (The de rigueur of advertising today.)

The John Lewis spot doesn't go there. Instead it reasserts the only true advertising truth. That the only thing, the only thing that works, is creativity. Doing something that people like watching. That motivates them, makes them smile, makes them talk.

Take a look at the spot here:



What can we learn from it?

1. If you want to breakthrough and have an impact, be breakthrough and impactful.

2. That costs money.

3. It probably means a big production.

4. With genuine feeling and emotion.

5. Not stupid-ass ribbons tied to a new TV set.

6. It takes time.

7. Thought.

8. Effort.

9. And, fuck collaboration, sticking to a simple story and a simple vision.

10. Maybe we don't need plasticine smiles.

11. Statements like 'save big during our holiday savabration.'

12. And more bullshit.

13. And, oh yeah, wall to wall copy.

I don't believe it's ads people hate, or advertising, or even interruption.

It's crap they hate.

Because they're people. 

Not targets.

People.

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