Are You the Reason?

That consumers are trying to ignore stupid advertising? I hope not...

From the THINKing blog:

Be Relevant

Posted: 07 Dec 2009 06:49 AM PST

It comes as no surprise to me that Americans are trying harder than ever to avoid advertising. According to a new study by Synovate,

More than four in 10 US consumers said they were skipping ads on TV and the radio as well as avoiding Websites with intrusive ads more in 2009 than they were the year before.

Why, you ask? Because advertising is increasingly less relevant. We’ve discussed this before: advertising needs to be relevant, original and impactful or consumers will avoid it like the plague. And they certainly won’t share the ad with their friends.

When asked about positive ad-related activities, such as searching for advertisements online, sharing and discussing ads with friends, or following brands on Facebook and Twitter, responses were in the single digits. Most consumers reported never doing any such activities.

Relevant ads get shared. But most ads aren’t relevant because the advertiser hasn’t done the hard part: determining who his target audience is from a demographic and psychographic perspective. The more you know about the customer, the easier it is for your creatives to develop relevant, original and impactful messages, and to determine the best ways and vehicles through which to disseminate your messages.

But I’m not letting the agencies off the hook here either. Too often, the agency goes for the easy, humorous approach because they know that using humor increases likeability of the brand. Here’s the problem with that: they inject the humor but leave the brand message out of the equation. How many times have you laughed at a beer commercial only to say after it was over, “whose ad was that?”

Remember, understand your customer and ensure your agency is developing relevant, original and impactful ads for you, or save your money for something besides advertising.

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