How brands like Tide, Paddy Power, Lego and Channel 4 are breaking the norms of TV advertising and attracting precious attention...
One of my favourite definitions of creativity is that it's about taking what already exists and mashing it, breaking it up and testing its limits.
We think of being creative as having some lightning bolt Eureka moment, but I love the concept that creativity is combinatorial, nothing is entirely original and that we create by taking existing pieces and making something new from them.
Great artists steal, but they also evolve and improve. Smart, innovative ideas are often remixes and iterations of what has gone before. This is the approach to creativity that Austin Kleon, writer of the brilliant 'Steal like an artist' lives by. It's the approach that Faris and Rosie Yakob have named their company after.
In advertising, great creativity is also about working within existing constraints. Much as we would love to, most briefs don't allow for free form idea generation. They come with mandatory channels, budgets, brand guidelines etc.
For that reason many in adland see constraints as inherently negative. Actually, as author Adam Morgan outlines in his brilliant book 'A Beautiful Constraint', constraints can often be the grist that creates the pearl. Rather than being a restrictor, they lead to bolder, more innovative solutions. They can often be the stimulus to finding a better way of doing something. They can be helpful in making us explore lateral solutions.
Elon Musk was constrained by the cost of the battery packs available for his Tesla cars, so instead he bought the component parts and made them himself.
Ikea was constrained by the defaults of the furniture industry, but came up with a business model that enabled low costs and high quality design.
So if we take the idea that creativity is about remixing and breaking what's gone before while taking constraints and applying some lateral thinking, what's happening at the moment in TV advertising is extremely interesting.
Novelty and newness
For decades, television advertising has been consistent in format, consistent in content style and narrative structure, with a range of lengths and very little innovation. You were generally given a 30 second slot to fill with some sort of ad that told a brand story. Some brands chose to deviate from this, but it was very rare.
Now with declining audiences and attention, the rise of multi screening and general consumer ambivalence or avoidance of advertising on TV, brands are finding it harder than ever to stand out.
In the modern world, consumers expect novelty and newness from what they see on television between the ad breaks, so why shouldn't they expect that from the ads too?
Brands and broadcasters are starting to wake up, and there's some lovely creativity coming to the fore. Advertisers are starting to repeatedly toy with the creative norms of television. That's a very healthy thing.
While television is still by far the most effective and most watched advertising medium, consumers have become familiar with different types of video advertising online. So we're now seeing ads that are shorter, longer, multi brand and live. A whole host of different creative ways to advertise have cropped up.
Here are some examples:
Doritos and Mountain Dew mix and match
One of the most talked about ads of the Super Bowl 2018 season was this spot combining two hot and cool brands from the PepsiCo stable into one.
Tide tie in other brands
Another brilliant example of TV creativity from this year's Super Bowl comes from Tide. How can a laundry detergent own the biggest marketing event of the year? Simple, it messes with the creative format of a TV ad and in doing so creates massive fame, talkability and creates its own catchphrase to boot! It's the perfect judo move - use the strength and brand recognition of other companies for your own leverage and benefit. ID Comms Tom Denford has called this 'the best Super Bowl ad ever made', and he's a man who knows!
Orchard Thieves fox steals airtime
This approach is something that we've seen in Ireland too. Upon launching in 2015, cider brand Orchard Thieves stayed true to its mantra by literally thieving ads from other brands. The cider's fox icon was seen interrupting ads for Meteor and Hailo, as well as intruding on 3e idents. Creative agency Rothco brokered the attention grabbing execution between three of their clients. A really cool example of a smart media buy and messing with the default TV ad.
Virgin says 'fuck it, we'll do it live'
To prove the point that fashion is cyclical live ads have come back into vogue too. In the early days, many TV ads were read live. Now, the approach is the same, but the results are very different. Virgin's recent TV ad, launched during X Factor, took shaking things up to a whole new level and stretched creative boundaries. As Bill O'Reilly once said, 'fuck it, we'll do it live!' Virgin gave ITV viewers a live shot of nine destinations around the world in a 60 second spot, with everything from Arabian camels to Mickey Mouse included!
Other brands have attempted the live ad trick too. For last year's Super Bowl, Snickers used Adam Driver to shoot a western inspired spot.
Over this side of the pond, Paddy Power have been one of the most innovative TV advertisers, bringing their famous online 'fan denial' videos to the big screen. At half time and full time in big sporting events, the brand puts out a spot that includes tweets from fans about the action. It's unlikely they're shot and edited live, but still, the idea is solid. (And the videos are less foul mouthed than the online version below!)
In Mindshare Dublin we've gotten in on the act too. Last year our Invention team partnered with RTE and Sure to create live half time stats debriefs for fans.
Live ads present the opportunity for brands to create context, not just buy it. In the fight for consumer attention and increasing concerns over brand safety, programming media within cultural moments allows marketers to create ads that add to experiences at scale, particularly around big sport or entertainment events.
Ronseal make their point!
The old full break takeover trick is coming back into fashion too. In 2016, the brand literally encouraged viewers to watch paint dry for three minutes!
Pepsi take learnings from YouTube
Aat the opposite end of the spectrum, Pepsi have created 5 second TV ads that draw attention to their new emoji bottle. Similar to YouTube bumpers, the ads work hard visually and aurally to grab attention, with a simple message and a consistent brand icon in shot. Expect to see a lot more 5 second ads in 2018.
Channel 4 change perceptions
Channel 4 seem to be pushing this creative charge in the UK, and another of their full break spots for RNIB took existing ads from brands like Amazon and Specsavers and applied filters to illustrate the difficulty of living with certain eye conditions.
Lego takeover
And finally, perhaps the best example of grabbing attention for your brand by taking a creative risk and remixing how we usually do TV is Lego. To launch the Lego Movie, they partnered with ITV to animate other brands creative. Like Tide, it's a good example of taking other brand's assets and making them your own. I'm sure the brands involved were delighted too!
I've spoken quite a bit on here about how the death of television advertising as a medium has been greatly exaggerated. But it's also learning a lot from other, newer types of digital advertising about how to command attention.
The 30 second spot with a simple narrative structure and a pack shot isn't a thing of the past yet, but the times are certainly changin'. Creative stodginess is becoming a thing of the past.
As Ad Contrarian Bob Hoffman once sad, television isn't dying, it's having babies.
Beautifully diverse, creative, novel and attention seeking babies that are changing the norms of television advertising.
We should all be excited for what's coming next.
Shane O'Leary
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