Speaking in colloquial terms

We all know adverts have their target audiences (poster ads specifically here), they adopt many different styles, forms, tones and ideas. They all "speak" in some way; be it visually, or via text, to the audience; and in order to relate to them, the ads need to speak in colloquial terms.

These poster ads are from the portfolio of Claire Watson, a D&AD Best New Blood winner, this first few advertising a brand of tea, "Make mine a builders":

Although brash, the text speaks in a familiar tone to the target audience - builders. There's an instant cultural click, and cleverly the product name is ready to become a workplace catchphrase when supported by an effective campaign.

Another campaign of Claire's is for Dickinson & Morris Pork Pies. The product; a mid-priced pork pie, I believe is targeted primarily at middle class families, dads in their 30's-50's who do DIY, BBQs and fix their own cars. I think their secondary market is tradesmen who appreciate a quality traditional snack over the value alternatives:

Humorous, they play to the cheeky personality trait that many of their dynamic, middle class audience have; poking fun at a relatively dark meat breeding industry. The house imagery recognising their practical tendencies. The second ad not only showing the product in all its meaty goodness, is labelled, like a dissection of an object, or a chart. This time stylistically and semiotically, the ads play to the established common ground between the customer and their target audience projections, relating directly to the audience. It seems so specific to the customer that the brand almost becomes an extension of their personality, as with the builders tea, a brand that, amongst all the others on the shelves, makes you feel comfortable and able to trust it and even make you think you enjoy it more than you actually do.

By talking in terms that aren't obviously trying to sell a product, and in such a way that is so familiar to the customer, they will inevitably feel an "attachment" to the product in comparison with the competition, they may even trick themselves into thinking they're enjoying it more than they really are because their anticipation of the product that seems so familiar to them is too high for it to be a disappointment in their minds.

Socially, people are influenced into posing themselves questions by all manner of things, from advertisments to art, religion and news. If a question is implied, or a problem presented and the viewer "gets" it and perhaps even without thinking about it asks themselves the question, the answer will be far more accepted and acted on by them because it appears to have come from themselves, not preached to them by a corporation.

These ads by Durex are aimed at the young adult male market primarily, posing, without explicitly asking, the question, "What's cheaper, some jonnies or looking after a baby?".

The viewer can't help but agree with the ad, no matter who they are. Unless of course they want a baby, in which case they probably won't ever be persuaded to buy the product. It's a far more effective way of posing the question than simply having text saying, "It's cheaper to buy our product than to run the consequence". The viewer doesn't feel imposed upon.

In my opinion, all ads are far more engaging and effective when they speak the same language as their target audience. The effects on the viewer, both consciously and subconsciously are dramatic in comparison to a generically styled ad and develop an early rapport with the consumer that most new products don't have a chance to do until after they have been tested.

The importance of proper research

Tesco. Global giant. Third-largest retailer in the world. Multi-billion pound company. Pretty impressive. You'd think they'd know all there is to know about big business, and over and above that, how to implement it.

However, according to a case by John Quelch, Professor of Business at Harvard that looks at Tesco's expansion into the USA, it appears their strategy and preparation work may need refining...

Throughout the rest of the world, Tesco have managed to be very successful so far; adopting a working policy of buddying up with a pre-existing retailer; gaining local knowledge, locations and homegrown management talent in the process. They've also largely kept the Tesco name to operate under. This approach obviously makes sense on all levels and that's why it has worked so far. Unfortunately, they didn't tackle the US in the same manner.

Firstly, they opted to enter the US market under the guise "Fresh & Easy", supposedly a "Neighborhood Market" aiming to offer a wide range of wholesome foods for cheap...except that the stores only carry 4,000 different products, compared with at least 40,000 in the UK Tesco stores. Many of their products are ready-made meals too, bringing into question the integrity of one half of their name, "Fresh".

Secondly, although attempting to mask it as being eco-friendly, they scrimped on the interior design; most of the stores apparently resembling hospitals inside rather than the wholesome, colourful, busy aesthetics Americans are used to in their supermarkets. "Tesco" say, "We design our stores to save you money, and the savings start from the ground up, literally. From simple cement floors to energy-efficient LED lighting, we keep our costs down and pass the savings on to you." Sean Silverthorne, editor-in-chief of HBS publication "Working Knowledge" says, "The advance team didn't learn all that it should, such as the notion that designing stark stores with concrete floors wouldn't necessarily appeal to American tastes."

Thirdly, the 50 British executives were sent to live with families only in California. This would probably be okay if they were planning on opening stores only in California, but the fact that they have opened Fresh & Easy stores in Arizona and Nevada too, despite their geographical closeness suggests a huge amount of cultural ignorance on Tesco's part...shopping habits, trends and customer requirements can vary dramatically from city to city in the UK, let alone entire states in the USA. John Quelch argues that Tesco had too many preconceptions of the market, and looked to the research reports with a view to, "gaining evidence in support of a predetermined strategy."

Fourthly, they really messed up on the location research. Obviously people driving out of a big city at the end of the day are going to be more inclined to purchase a ready-made evening meal from their "Neighborhood Market", over those going in...purely because there'll be more people commuting to work in a big city than there will those going from the city to work in the suburbs, and so they'll be considering dinner as they leave at night. So why on earth purchase retail units that are, effectively, on the wrong side of the road? Quelch argues that some of the stores are far more accessible to inbound traffic than outbound, and that could have a huge impact on their sales.

As a completely new venture, Tesco missed out on lots of, "local retail savvy" as Quelch puts it; largely due to their decision to employ mainly British expats in high level managerial roles. Without their UK reputation also, Tesco were always unlikely to attract the cream of the crop in terms of retailing talent. Almost 50% of their already compact product range is own brand too, the figure being far lower in the UK stores.

Five years on from the first store opening, "Fresh & Easy" are yet to make a penny...there are a plethora of mistakes that Tesco made with this foray, perhaps some of them only minor; but as they say themselves, "Every little helps".

Digital Cleanse

You may already be savvy with this term. John Mayer made it famous at the beginning of this year, posting about it, ironically, online, and encouraging people to join in the "cleanse" with him.

For those of you who don't know what a "Digital Cleanse" is, allow me to explain.

Essentially it is, for a period of at least a week, not going on (reading or contributing to) social networking sites, nor using your mobile, however smart it is, for anything except calls (NO text messaging or email), no forums, and no entertainment or gossip sites. Email is only allowed if accessed via a desktop or laptop.

It's an interesting concept; on the one hand, fully recognising our obsession and reliance on all of the above, but viewing it perhaps more like an addiction, encouraging going cold turkey in order to escape the collective's wrath, and ideally question your need for all the convenience it can provide.

On immediate consideration, I, as i'm sure many of you did, thought that it would be an easy thing to do. Thinking further, and looking back retrospectively however, it's easily forgotten just how much time (and on a regular basis) is spent browsing, reading, sponging up useless information on your friends, acquaintances and enemies. Think how many texts you send. I'm guessing most of us write more words in text messages each week than we do actually putting pen to paper.

Maybe we just forget how much we rely on Facebook, Twitter, text messaging, and permanent access to email on our phones, because they have all become an intrinsic part of our lives...extensions of our personalities - we communicate as much information about ourselves via these digital media as we do face-to-face. I'm guessing most of us would find it extremely difficult in putting this exercise to practise.

This rather rapid adoption of social media into our daily lives is quite a significant cultural shift, and it beggars the question, what next? If 7 years ago we'd have laughed at the idea of being constantly connected, and informed of our contemporaries' movements, of being to reel off as much about a person from their Facebook page as they can tell you in person, then...what next?

Community Earth

The Harvard Business School recently published an online newsletter detailing what some of their 2010 graduates had been doing since leaving the university.

Expecting to see a report full of zany products that had been created a la "Dragon's Den", I was pleasantly surprised to see how community minded the graduates have been.

It seems to be an entreprenurial trend for new businesses to create platforms via which their customers can contribute to their contemporaries' lives, and vice versa.

It also happens to make complete sense, of course, especially within the current worldwide economic context. This new breed of company will create, "stronger...smarter communities...driven by capitalistic principles", so says Shelby Clark, co-founder of RelayRides.com.

In other words, people provide a product or service that is mega convenient for the consumer, and in return they are financially rewarded - no big corporation to snatch your hard earned money, and a happier, more organic community as a result.

In conjunction with existing social networking setups, these business models have the potential to thrive, and perhaps even stretch further than the immediate vicinity that many of them seem to concentrate on...could it be long before we have a culture/nation-transcending community based on "helping a brother out"? Probably, is the answer; it may not happen, but it's an idealist's dream.

Check out the newsletter here: http://media.www.harbus.org/media/storage/paper343/news/2010/09/27/News/The-Entrepreneurial.Class-3936514.shtml It makes for interesting reading.

Virgin got me hot

It's 2010, political correctness is (unfortunately) king, and we've almost regressed back to the 19th century in terms of the standard of content that actually gets passed and shown to the masses via adverts, across all media.

Talking televisually, lots of adverts are "nice" and "safe", but that's not always very interesting. Obviously with so many restrictions to have to work within, and with so much pressure to not upset the ready-to-complain public, it can't be easy for the teams who try to have a little fun with their campaigns.

IKEA did pretty well with their 2001 "Tidy Up" campaign, managing to avoid a banning...here's a little video collage of three of the five 30 second ads:

But that was nine years ago, times have changed, everything is now PG...schools aren't allowed to put tinsel up at Christmas anymore for fear of insulting people of other religious beliefs! Nothing edgy, risque or even slightly sexy will ever be shown on TV again...until now.

Virgin, the dons of having fun, have released via Facebook their new TV ad - it's actually not even out yet, and won't hit UK TV screens until Sunday the 3rd October. It'd be pointless in trying to break it down...it speaks for itself. I can only hope that it doesn't get banned; it shouldn't, it's classy enough, and it's extremely clever...capitalising on the "X-Factor" style of judging everything today, and flaunting it's wares...i'm almost finding the company attractive. Oh boy, this is one hell of an audiovisual delight. I want to fly with Virgin. NOW. www.facebook.com/virginatlantic