A few weeks ago, in the wake of a controversial Time magazine cover featuring a breastfeeding woman, Adweek asked me to comment on the use and effectiveness of women's breasts in advertising. They didn't use my comments, so I'll reproduce them here.
On May 15th, The New York Times reported that researchers had found the “oldest evidence of any kind of graphic imagery” -- 37,000-year-old images in a rock shelter in France. What was the subject matter? The female anatomy.
Apparently, advertisers weren’t the first to discover sex.
I think I can say with a relatively high degree of confidence that 37,000 years later, a large majority of men still like to look at women’s breasts. How else do you explain Hugh Hefner’s mansions or Pamela Anderson’s acting career?
Publishers learned a long time ago that women with their shirts off sell their wares. This is why magazines feature cleavage on the cover (and, by the way, why Adweek writes stories about it.)
I’m no psychologist, but it seems a rather tenuous proposition to hold that we like to look at ‘em on the editorial pages but not on the ad pages. So I’m going to take it as a given that ads featuring the female breast attract the male eye.
This fact has lead to a whole genre of unfortunate advertising. We’ve all seen these ads -- top-heavy women standing next to copy machines and earth-moving equipment. Near-naked women eating drippy hamburgers or slurping light beer. Super Bowl spots with that naughty, middle-school sensibility. The entire economy of the state of Nevada seems to rely on this type of advertising.
So the eternal question is: does sex sell? As usual, market research will not get you an answer, just more questions.
It’s always been my opinion that the first job of an ad is to garner attention. If it doesn’t get your attention, it can’t sell you anything. But getting your attention is not the same as making the sale.
I’d like to think an ad that just goes for titillation (sorry, couldn’t help myself) and doesn’t make a point is worthless. I’d like to think that successful advertising requires more than this. I’d like to think that ads with stacked women making inane sexual innuendoes are stupid and wasteful. So, please, don’t ask me to explain the success of GoDaddy.
By the way, every 10-year-old is now 2 clicks away from the most disturbing types of pornography. This seems to bother no one. But when a magazine puts a breast on its cover everyone suddenly goes all sensitive.
June 12, 2012
June 11, 2012
Why Clicks Matter
I used to be creative director on the Blue Cross account. We did some very nice advertising for Blue Cross. We even won some Clios (no thanks to me, I had great people working for me) -- back when Clios were worth something.
The primary objective of the advertising was simple -- to get people to apply for a Blue Cross policy.
The way we did it was to put 800 numbers in our TV spots and coupons in our print ads. We were clear why we put these response mechanisms into the ads -- because they were supposed to elicit a response.
We had an exceedingly stupid client. He insisted on evaluating our performance based on how many policies he sold. On several occasions I tried to explain to him that advertising could not sell his policies.
All advertising could do was to get people to either send in the coupon or dial the 800 number. Once they did that, it was out of our hands.
I tried to make it clear to this genius that the only logical way to evaluate our advertising was on how many coupons or phone calls it generated. That was advertising's job. The advertising couldn't answer the phone, talk to the customers, or write an attractive policy. That was his job.
Of course, being an imbecile, he never understood this and if he is still alive and sober somewhere I'm sure he still doesn't.
This is why the people who are trying to convince us that clicks don't matter are so wrong.
The only realistic expectation for display advertising is to generate clicks.
The argument that display ads should be evaluated on sales is wrong. The ad usually can't make a sale, it can only link us to someplace where a sale can be made.
The argument that a display ad should be evaluated as a "branding" mechanism is also unsound. Display ads have very little value as brand builders. They are largely invisible. They are no more effective as "branding" vehicles than any other small-space ads. To my knowledge there is no major brand of anything that has ever been built on display advertising.
The argument that display ads are an effective way to create awareness is similarly erroneous. In general, online advertising has proven to be extremely poor at generating awareness. Or, as one web usability guru says, web users "... almost never look at anything that looks like an advertisement."
The only realistic, worthwhile expectation for a display ad is that it will generate clicks.
Web gurus have their logic all backward. If, as they tell us, people who click are no more likely to buy than people who don't, it doesn't mean the click is worthless. It means where the click lands is.
The primary objective of the advertising was simple -- to get people to apply for a Blue Cross policy.
The way we did it was to put 800 numbers in our TV spots and coupons in our print ads. We were clear why we put these response mechanisms into the ads -- because they were supposed to elicit a response.
We had an exceedingly stupid client. He insisted on evaluating our performance based on how many policies he sold. On several occasions I tried to explain to him that advertising could not sell his policies.
All advertising could do was to get people to either send in the coupon or dial the 800 number. Once they did that, it was out of our hands.
I tried to make it clear to this genius that the only logical way to evaluate our advertising was on how many coupons or phone calls it generated. That was advertising's job. The advertising couldn't answer the phone, talk to the customers, or write an attractive policy. That was his job.
Of course, being an imbecile, he never understood this and if he is still alive and sober somewhere I'm sure he still doesn't.
This is why the people who are trying to convince us that clicks don't matter are so wrong.
The only realistic expectation for display advertising is to generate clicks.
The argument that display ads should be evaluated on sales is wrong. The ad usually can't make a sale, it can only link us to someplace where a sale can be made.
The argument that a display ad should be evaluated as a "branding" mechanism is also unsound. Display ads have very little value as brand builders. They are largely invisible. They are no more effective as "branding" vehicles than any other small-space ads. To my knowledge there is no major brand of anything that has ever been built on display advertising.
The argument that display ads are an effective way to create awareness is similarly erroneous. In general, online advertising has proven to be extremely poor at generating awareness. Or, as one web usability guru says, web users "... almost never look at anything that looks like an advertisement."
The only realistic, worthwhile expectation for a display ad is that it will generate clicks.
Web gurus have their logic all backward. If, as they tell us, people who click are no more likely to buy than people who don't, it doesn't mean the click is worthless. It means where the click lands is.
June 07, 2012
Businesses Clueless About Social Media
Over the years, some of the dumbest articles I've ever read about advertising and marketing have been published by Fast Company (examples: here, here, and here.) But this week I read a good one. It's called "Facebook Is About People, Not Brands--So What Is Your Company Doing?"
The article makes several important points about the cluelessness of businesses regarding social media:
The article makes several important points about the cluelessness of businesses regarding social media:
- According to a study by IBM, over 60% of businesses think consumers follow them on social media because they want to be "part of a community." In fact, this is the least important reason to follow a business. What's the most important? Like we've said here about a zillion times, getting a discount.
- Among the top 10 reasons consumers say they use social media, interacting with brands is -- wait for it -- number 10.
- According to IBM “Businesses hoping to foster closer customer connections through social media conversations may be mistakenly projecting their own desires for intimacy onto customers’ motivations for interacting."
"Welcome to a new world... It's a world in which consumers want to have relationships with brands and conversations with marketers. It's a world that is causing a revolution in advertising and marketing. Unfortunately, it's a world that exists largely in our dreams."The Fast Company article draws the same conclusion and uses an example that is very near and dear to my heart...
"The IBM study should dash the misguided way of thinking... like that of Pepsi Refresh, where product-focused marketing is replaced by gauzy notions of relationships, and should cause marketers to realize the large numbers of people they see on Facebook and Twitter should not be mistaken for an audience clamoring to connect with brands."Will the last bozo still hustling "the conversation" please turn out the lights.
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