100 Ideas that Changed Advertising
As the name suggests, the book literally introduces 100 factors that influence contemporary advertising fields. As it is a book review, not a summary of the book, I am not going to list 100 factors one by one. If there is someone who get interested in the book and want to specifically check 100 factors mentioned in the book, I really recommend you to read the whole book. It is definitely worth reading.
From my perspective, all the 100 factors in the book belong to 5 upper categories, which are Technology, Technique, Media, Changes in AD agencies and surroundings, and Contents. Though there are some certainly overlapping factors between categories, as far as I am concerned those categories are a great way to classify.
1. Technology
Developments of technology have hugely influenced advertising. It is true that technology has influenced all the industries in the world. But I think we can't talk about changes to advertising without considering about technology because advertisements is all about contents and the contents that can be expressed are certainly diversified as technology is developed.
Advertisements have existed from long ago. There is still a vestige of some posters at Pompeii ruins. Before printing technology were developed, posters were only painted directly on to walls. Now, however, we can see not only photography but also digital graphics and videos on posters. There are some advertisements that use AR(Augment Reality). When an advertisement using a new technology came out, a history of advertising was written again. Therefore, A new technology is definitely a new opportunity for new contents. I believe being enlightened to new technologies can't be too emphasized for people who dreams to be great marketers.
What I also want to focus on most is more sophisticated research with developments of technology. From the 1970s, computers began to be used in research and it enabled researchers to conduct large-scale data analysis. Nowadays, researchers even use brain-scan to figure out if ads are effective or not (This is called NeuroMarketing.)
Whether it is before advertising or after advertising, doing thorough research about consumers is significant process now. And the accuracy and effectiveness of research has become one of the most important keys for an ad's success. However even though research techniques become more sophisticated, the one who interpret results is a person who is responsible for a project. Therefore, having an insight and an ability to read data generated properly is the key to success, I am sure.
2. Techniques
Advertising is thought of as being somewhere between commerce and art. However, ads in the past was certainly close to commerce compared to recent ads.
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| Camel cigarettes ad in 1946 |
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| LEGO ad in 1978 |
A picture of people using a brand's product, a clever headline, and sentences for explaining a product of which an ad is full. Although creatives must have made lots efforts to create creative works, ads in the past was more like just delivering information except for a main copy(a headline). It was after the 1960s that scientific research began to prove that humans are primarily visual creatures. And once the notion began to take hold, visual Ideas started to be more powerful. To visually attracts consumers, art technique like surrealism has been adopted in some ads.
In addition to technique of creating an ad, techniques for placing ads has been developed in advertising history. What I realized while reading this book is that 'If there are people, there are advertisements too.' Advertising industries has been facing diverse obstacles including regulations and sometimes technology, but they have always found a way with which to cope with problems anyway. For example, When the government in the US banned cigarette brands from appearing in TV, what cigarette companies focused was sporting events. By placing their logos on players' uniforms in exchange for certain payments, their brand was able to be exposed to many people and connect their brands with images of sports teams. I am looking forwards to seeing further improvements of advertising techniques in the future, and I desperately want to be a part of the improvements.
3. Media
As time goes on, a variety of media has been developed. Newspaper, Radio, TV, Magazine, Website, Search Engine, Social media, Mobile games, you name it. In the past, when a new medium came out, the medium surely brought huge influence on advertising. Now, however, the situation got pretty different. Audiences are highly fragmented, and fewer people are watching each medium. The impact of each medium is not as strong as the impacts in the past anymore. Therefore, advertisers have to spend more to reach the same number of people than before. According to the book, today it takes four or five airings to deliver the media weight of a single spot 20 years ago. In this situation, many advertisers often try to make and build their own funded channel. From the perspective of cutting cost and brand loyalty, I think the importance of the channels is getting important. It is definitely the era of media proliferation.
One of the problems which is getting serious in this era is advertising wear-out. As a result of high ad clutter, more people are getting sick of messages from brands. It is definite that getting consumers' attention and foaming close relationship with consumers have become really difficult. On the other hand, when thought about in the different way the fact that people are being exposed to contents whether they like it or not can a good opportunity. an ad below by Mietwagen got an remarkable results even though it was a search ad to which people usually have negative perception.
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| Clever search ad which resulted in 47 more visitors. |
Given the fact, Majority of people are still react to excellent contents. They just hate bad advertising. In addition, people began to look for good contents in the flood of contents and people can access to any contents so easily in this media environment. Especially thanks to social media, contents can be able to resonate with people so fast these days. These means if a content is better enough than others it can make remarkable success regardless of the media. Red Bull's supersonic freefall is a good example.
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| Red Bull's supersonic freefall |
This event scored over 35 million views But Red Bull didn't pay money for the media. It spent money for just the contents. The event was probably 2012's most successful trans-media campaign in the world. As far as I remember, it was on air live on YouTube and I also watched it. Media environment has dramatically changed, but I think the essence of advertising has never changed; Only great contents can move people's mind and change their perception. 'What contents will I be able to make while I am working in the communication field?' From time to time, I think about the question. On one hand, I feel nervous and anxious as I don't know I am good enough, but on the other hand, I feel excited about they pictures in which I am working on developing a content with my team members. To make a better contents and stand out, I will always keep broadening my perspective and knowledge.
4. Changes in AD agencies and surroundings
One of the great things of the book is that I can learn about history of the ad industry. What I found out after reading this book was that roles in an ad agency like AE, AP hadn't existed at the beginning. At first, the role of an ad agency was to buy media in bulk from broadcasters and re-sell them. Anyway, the ad industry which once just functioned as a media re-seller have become such a huge industry in the world. Even though there are some organizations that wants to remain small and foam the micro-network, some agencies, such as Inter-public, Omincom, Publicis, WPP, have become global organizations and are exercising their influence over the world.
Advertising is to deal with people's perception. Therefore, It is controversial as it is and no one knows at what point an ad will become offensive for someone even if it passes regulations. Sometimes, those who work in agencies are viewed by some anti capitalists as conspirators engaged in the distortion of reality in pursuit of profit. And sometimes an ad is blamed by some activists such as feminists for some reason. They can't change how the advertising industry function, but they can change the general climate of opinion which can affect advertising's output. Therefore, the impacts are already huge especially in the current media environment in which controversies are whipped up easily through social media. I think these are natural as all people have different opinions and backgrounds and I can't satisfy all people. I think it is the destiny of those who work at communication fields. In my opinion, the most important thing not to be swayed by others is to define what marketer I am. By successfully defining myself at work, I am sure I can keep making my own contents for good communication. In the process of developing my career, I hope I can figure out what marketer I am.
5. Contents
I think advertising is meaningless without creativity. From my perspective, What influenced change in advertising the most is contents themselves. New creative contents elaborately designed for persuading people has always been initiatives for improvement and change in advertising, which is why the book dedicated the most pages to introducing contents that have influenced advertising.
Among many contents that changed advertising which were introduced in the book, what I want to focus in this book review is USP and ESP. Before the USP which means the singular factor that made a product superior to its competitors was coined by Rosser Reeves, advertisements often featured a listing of products benefits. However, After Rosser Reeves applied the USP in his slogans and made huge successes, using the USP became popular in the advertising in the industry. It is still universally accepted by marketers as a marketing tactic.
However, there are now few products with a genuinely unique competitive advantage. To borrow the word in the book, we are living in product parity. In many cases, competing products at the same level in a product category are almost identical. In most cases, of course not always, any advantage that a manufacturer can incorporate into their product tend tends to disappear in a matter of months or even weeks. In this situation, emphasizing the singular factor doesn't seem attractive.
That's why the term 'ESP' was coined. Is a human perfectly rational? We think we are but actually we are not According to behavioral economy. We are rational in a limited way and swayed by emotion. In addition, a focus on the emotional triggers to purchase is being increasingly vindicated neuro-scientific research, which has revealed that the parts of the brain we use when considering purchase decisions are indeed areas associated with the emotions.
Like most people, one of my favorite brands is Nike. The reason why I like Nike is because I can strongly feel passion and enthusiasm from the brand while it depicts the life I would like to live at the same time. I still sometimes watch the ad video of the campaign, 'Find Your Greatness'. when compared to other brands, I am not sure the functions of Nike products are better than the others. Nevertheless, my first priority in the situation where I consider buying shoes would be Nike although prices of its products are way higher than other brands. It is pretty uncommon for me as I usually consider price the most when buying something. For this reason, I believe emotions can perform a really critical role in building relationship with consumers as I have experienced this personally.
'What emotion should my brand deliver to consumers?' It would be one of the most important questions in my future career.
In addition to the ESP and USP, diverse contents have influenced and sometimes revolutionized advertising. The USP and ESP are just a part of the contents. (The reason why I focused on the USP and ESP in the book review is that It impressed me the most relating to my works for competitions. Thus I recommend you to read the entire book as the book introduces various contents that changed advertising.) As it has always done, Creative and clever new contents will always come out and change advertising with a way people never expected. And who know? Maybe I'll end up influencing advertising with clever contents!
Advertising does not change society. (except for certain political campaigns that may have influenced the results of elections.) Instead it reflects society. As societal changes go on, Advertising has evolved and changed again with those 5 categories above as the central figure. However, What we should know at the same time is that the fundamentals of advertising it self have not changed. The author of the book says, "It remains essentially an appeal on behalf of company for someone to buy its goods or services. And an ad that is based on a human truth, for a product that answers a human need, and which communicates in an entertaining, engaging or involving way, will be successful. Despite all the societal and technological changes, this is what advertising has always been, and always will be: an entreaty, whether crassly or artfully made; a unique cocktail of art and commerce. That is where its fascination lies."
Comments
I am so proud that I read the entire book and have written the book review successfully. But I took the first step just now. Aristotle said "You are what you repeatedly do." Excellence ought to be a habit not an act. As if it is my first time, I will keep reading a book and writing a book review consistently with the mind I had while I was reading the book and writing the book review.
5. Contents
I think advertising is meaningless without creativity. From my perspective, What influenced change in advertising the most is contents themselves. New creative contents elaborately designed for persuading people has always been initiatives for improvement and change in advertising, which is why the book dedicated the most pages to introducing contents that have influenced advertising.
Among many contents that changed advertising which were introduced in the book, what I want to focus in this book review is USP and ESP. Before the USP which means the singular factor that made a product superior to its competitors was coined by Rosser Reeves, advertisements often featured a listing of products benefits. However, After Rosser Reeves applied the USP in his slogans and made huge successes, using the USP became popular in the advertising in the industry. It is still universally accepted by marketers as a marketing tactic.
However, there are now few products with a genuinely unique competitive advantage. To borrow the word in the book, we are living in product parity. In many cases, competing products at the same level in a product category are almost identical. In most cases, of course not always, any advantage that a manufacturer can incorporate into their product tend tends to disappear in a matter of months or even weeks. In this situation, emphasizing the singular factor doesn't seem attractive.
That's why the term 'ESP' was coined. Is a human perfectly rational? We think we are but actually we are not According to behavioral economy. We are rational in a limited way and swayed by emotion. In addition, a focus on the emotional triggers to purchase is being increasingly vindicated neuro-scientific research, which has revealed that the parts of the brain we use when considering purchase decisions are indeed areas associated with the emotions.
 |
| Nike - Find your greatness in 2012 |
Like most people, one of my favorite brands is Nike. The reason why I like Nike is because I can strongly feel passion and enthusiasm from the brand while it depicts the life I would like to live at the same time. I still sometimes watch the ad video of the campaign, 'Find Your Greatness'. when compared to other brands, I am not sure the functions of Nike products are better than the others. Nevertheless, my first priority in the situation where I consider buying shoes would be Nike although prices of its products are way higher than other brands. It is pretty uncommon for me as I usually consider price the most when buying something. For this reason, I believe emotions can perform a really critical role in building relationship with consumers as I have experienced this personally.
'What emotion should my brand deliver to consumers?' It would be one of the most important questions in my future career.
In addition to the ESP and USP, diverse contents have influenced and sometimes revolutionized advertising. The USP and ESP are just a part of the contents. (The reason why I focused on the USP and ESP in the book review is that It impressed me the most relating to my works for competitions. Thus I recommend you to read the entire book as the book introduces various contents that changed advertising.) As it has always done, Creative and clever new contents will always come out and change advertising with a way people never expected. And who know? Maybe I'll end up influencing advertising with clever contents!
Advertising does not change society. (except for certain political campaigns that may have influenced the results of elections.) Instead it reflects society. As societal changes go on, Advertising has evolved and changed again with those 5 categories above as the central figure. However, What we should know at the same time is that the fundamentals of advertising it self have not changed. The author of the book says, "It remains essentially an appeal on behalf of company for someone to buy its goods or services. And an ad that is based on a human truth, for a product that answers a human need, and which communicates in an entertaining, engaging or involving way, will be successful. Despite all the societal and technological changes, this is what advertising has always been, and always will be: an entreaty, whether crassly or artfully made; a unique cocktail of art and commerce. That is where its fascination lies."
Comments
I am so proud that I read the entire book and have written the book review successfully. But I took the first step just now. Aristotle said "You are what you repeatedly do." Excellence ought to be a habit not an act. As if it is my first time, I will keep reading a book and writing a book review consistently with the mind I had while I was reading the book and writing the book review.
Comments
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