7 Things You Should NEVER See in an Ad (or any marketing materials)
It’s 10:30 pm. Your brain is cooked. The first round of ad comps are due tomorrow and your computer screen keeps displaying The Idea you’ve been working on feverishly all day. Unfortunately, The Idea stinks. Oh sure, the concept sounded really good when when everyone was brainstorming. You could visualize it all coming together with powerful visual assets and a clever headline. And you knew, you just knew people would swoon at the unveiling. But it didn’t come together. Looks like the swooning’s been postponed. And now it’s —
11:15 pm. You try a different photo. Try some Photoshop filter and some technique you saw in a video podcast recently. Surely that will pull this idea back from the abyss. It doesn’t. It goes over the edge and you watch helplessly as it spirals down to its death. In slow motion. Screaming “SAVE ME PLEASE!” But there is no saving of this idea.
12:45 am. You make a strong pot of coffee and splash cold water on your face. It helps, but only for a moment. It’s then, that your eyes glaze over and you have a weak moment. It starts as just a tiny thought that you immediately dismiss. But you think about it some more, and start rationalizing it. And then common sense kicks back in, and you feel dirty. Not because the clothes you’re wearing have been on for more than 18 hours and 27 minutes. You feel dirty, and cheap, because you’re rationalizing using a — cliché. Yes, a worn out cop-out cash-it-in surrender to the circumstances cliché. And your mind continues to wrestle with the thought. You think you could dress it up so it doesn’t look like a cliché. Get a really cool photo from Getty Images (there is a little photo budget in this job, isn’t there?). Get some dramatic lighting, maybe a little grunge background with some cool shadow stuff going on. Place and kern the type tastefully and expertly so that it just sings visually. People might just might swoon after all!
1 am. But the battle rages on within you. As tired as you are, a tiny vestige of rational thought struggles to its feet and croaks to be heard. You try to block out that little voice, but you hear it anyway. It says, “No amount of window dressing will ever change the fact that this “concept” is still just a photo of two guys shaking hands.”
___________________________
A little dramatic, perhaps, but consider the landscape. Take a look at some of the ads floating around, specifically in the B2B space. One would think it obvious to not be this trite, but alas, that’s not the case.
Many years back we made a list and posted it in our conference room. It’s a list of all the VERBOTEN things for ad and marketing imagery. We will NOT, under any circumstances, use ANY of these things in our ads or marketing material for our clients (unless of course they insist and their budget is . . . just kidding). Are there exceptions? Sure, but they’re rare.
So, don’t be tempted to use these whether you have an in-house marketing department or work with an agency. There are actually many more than these, but these are some of the biggest offenders.
The 7 deadly things that should never be in an ad.
1. Shaking hands
2. Globe
3. Gambling things (specifically dice, playing cards, roulette wheel, slot machine)
4. Mountain climbing
5. Dart boards
6. Crystal balls
7. You pick. What do YOU think should be number 7? Let us know in the comments.
Tim HodgsonPrincipal/Creative Director
#7 for me is anything where a hand or hands are holding an object (plant, globe, etc.)
Yes, good point Timothy. I’ve seen my fair share of hands holding a seedling, among other things. And globes — don’t get me going! That’s as bad as hands holding money. And speaking of money (currency or coins), that would be a strong contender for slots 1 – 7 on this list. But like I said, there are many more and these are just some of the more blatant offenders. Thanks for the input!
#7 – A woman in a call centre with a phone headset on
#7,8 & 9 –
7. Pointing at me like (YOU need this!). If you’re pointing at me I don’t want it.
8. Fists on hips = confidence.
9. Ashton Kutcher
Kudos to Dave for the call center agent observation. As my dad used to say, “if I had a nickel for every” photo I’ve seen of a call center agent with a headset on, I would be a wealthy man. So with inflation, maybe that should be a dollar (or more), but you get the idea. And to Mr./Ms. Unknown, regarding the pointing person, yes also. That is lame-o and should be illegal. Actually, I think it is in some parts of the world . . .
puzzle piece with either spot color or pulled out somehow
http://www.tpaservicesinc.com/strategicAlliances.htm
http://www.capacitybuilders.com.au/aboutUs.htm
http://pcasw.com/prevueselection.htm
http://xvmercy.wordpress.com/category/family/man-of-the-house/
http://www.fineskids.net/?page_id=11
Need I go on?
See, the reason that these problems arise is that the time of day doesn’t allow for creativity! 12:45 am?
Does anyone offer “shaking hands “as creativity these days? More to the point, are there clients who will pay for it?
I agree with Jen that Puzzle Pieces qualify. Good one. In fact, that could be in the Top Twenty, if not Top Fifteen. If anyone disagrees with me on this, I’d be really puzzled.
Baldchemist. I will not argue that Art and Business are not exactly simpatico (I don’t know if I’m using that word correctly, an Italian guy said it to me once and I’m just trying to sound international . . . Italians, please weigh in here ), and your observation of creativity barely existing at all in a state of exhaustion is well taken. Alas, that’s the the beast of Business forcing Art to produce on a deadline. As to your second point, unfortunately there are hordes of clients who will pay for cliché creative. In fact, not only will they pay for it, they’ll even assist in art direction, which is an added bonus. To that I say merde! (which I think is French for “Wonderful, isn’t it?”)
How about a muscle-bound guy in sunglasses with his arms crossed to depict toughness?
Good, solid advice. And I happen to be in the process of creating ads, so thanks.
(Thumbs up; I found you on StumbleUpon, and more people will too.)
Gary, I see your muscle-bound guy wearing a black leather vest and sporting maybe a few too many tattoos? Yes, agreed, he’s been around the block a few too many times. Probably on his Harley.
S. Smith, you’re welcome. In honor of your Stumbling Upon this blog, I’m tossing in one more thing to avoid: MONEY — meaning, currency and coinage. Hoo boy. Very difficult to use successfully. Not necessarily impossible. I mean, you could be super creative in your approach and possibly pull it off. But more often than not, it’s not a good idea. So before you invest any energy in that direction, think twice. (get it? “invest”? . . . sorry, couldn’t resist.)
I’ve seen more than enough pictures of keyboards, mice and html code and globes on tech pages.
No doubt on the computer stuff Bill. I think if the stock photo vendors deleted all that kind of imagery from their databases, they’d free up petabytes! ( — that’s one million gigabytes, to the not-so-geeky folks out there.) And now that the computer/Internet world is going more and more mobile, be on the lookout for a flood of images of people using the iPad. Hmmm, well maybe I’ll make an exception there. At least for awhile.