I get a bit pissed off at how snobby so many in adland are.
There’s a big group of people who regard anything other than double page spreads and television ads as beneath them.
They tend to be the same people who regard point-of-sale as a bunch of starbursts and promotions as the sort of work only suitable for village idiots.
Let’s get to the point … mainstream communication can only do so much.
Sure, there are times it can get someone to react and buy … but that is the exception rather than the rule.
Things like point of sale and promotions might seem painful, but they play an important and integral part of the sales process and to ignore them – or worse, disregard them – basically demonstrates to the client that our interest in their business goals are not nearly as high a priority as we claim they are.
The thing is, if done well, point of sale and promotions can be the foundation for the most interesting and effective part of the creative process as we’ve seen with such things as Tesco’s ‘Computers For School’ and Queensland’s ‘Best Job In The World’ promotions.
Then there’s sampling.
If there’s one thing that drives me nuts, it’s how agencies – and brands – approach their ‘sampling’ campaigns.
I remember once being handed a loaf of bread by some Australian company at 11 o’clock in the morning on a weekday.
A loaf of bread.
What the fuck did they think I was going to do with it, stop right there and then and start eating it?
All they had to do was turn the bread into some sandwiches and I might have walked away feeling more positive about the experience … but instead, by handing me a whole loaf, I went away thinking they were a bunch of twats who had no appreciation of the people they were trying to target.
Then there was the time a bank representative stopped me in the street and told me that if I agreed to have one of their mortgage advisors come to my house and give me a quote, they’d – I kid you not – give me a balloon.
A fucking balloon.
They seemed genuinely perplexed when I pointed out that any bank who thinks a balloon will [1] give people a positive impression of their financial organisation and [2] attract the right sort of customer … were fucking idiots.
While handing out free stuff may be be an easy way to get people to ‘try’ your product, it’s very important to remember how you offer it them plays a very significant part in both magnifying the experience and creating a positive frame of reference … and that’s why everyone in adland shouldn’t view ‘below-the-line’ campaigns or agencies as beneath them, because often they provide us with the information that tells us most about what will change consumers behaviour – at least in certain environments or situations – which is possibly why the best agency that ever existed – HHCL – included this discipline in their creative approach rather than turning their back on it.