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Tag: advertising

  • Why I Hate Cynical Ads

    Hate Cynical Ads? I Know I Do.

    OK, before moving on to why I hate cynical ads, let’s start by saying that I generally enjoy listening to ads on the radio (I watch relatively little telly).

    I particularly like really great radio ads, like the campaign run during 2017-2019 from Appliances Delivered. I mean, they were so well written and brilliantly delivered (excuse the pun) by the “voiceover guy”. How they managed to create humour from humdrum extractor fans was genius, but the best line of all was the one where the reader declares that he doesn’t know how Appliances Delivered make any money “what with my voiceover fees”. Brilliant! And no, I’m not on a commission.

    Interestingly, that company went to the wall during 2019.

    hate cynical ads
    Image © Nick Youngson at http://www.creative-commons-images.com/

    But I really hate cynical ads. There’s one out at the moment from Love Irish Food pontificating about how its members must be producing in Ireland using Irish ingredients in order to earn the label. Yet, this is patently not always the case. There are Love Irish Food products on the market containing ingredients which are no more form Ireland than the man in the moon. Visit their website, dig a little bit and you’ll discover that, in fact, “the brand uses ingredients from Ireland where these are available”. Mmm, not quite the same thing as the radio ad declares.

    But that’s nothing when compared to Bord na Móna’s “Naturally Driven” campaign.

    Bringing cynical advertising to an all-time high (low?), one of the biggest environmental criminals in the history of the State now wants people to believe its spin that it is in some way ‘naturally driven’. Here is a company which has destroyed many thousands of hectares of our once beautiful boglands. Here is a company that currently imports palm tree kernels from the other side of the world to burn in one of its power stations claiming to be ‘naturally driven’. Give us a break.

    A number of years ago, the UK’s Advertising Standards Authority commissioned a report into UK citizens’ attitudes to advertising. While mostly positive, the report referred to a trend towards what the writer called ‘untruthful truthful advertising’, defined as being “assumed to be legally true, but economical with the truth”. I’m not aware of any similar research having been carried out in Ireland.

    Why I hate cynical ads

    Cynical ads that try to deceive consumers, or at least be sparing with the truth, give marketing a very bad reputation among the general public.

    When I ask attendees at training courses I run what they think about marketing, quite often one response forthcoming is that “marketing equals false or misleading advertising”. Unfortunate, but true. I hate cynical ads because they lower the quality of an industry which, ultimately, is supposed to be trying to match goods and services with what the market wants. Mis- or disinformation is hardly achieving that.

    Not to mention disrespecting the listener.

    Advertising Authority for Ireland (ASAI)

    Farcically, the ASAI is a “self-regulatory body set up by the advertising industry”. I mean, seriously …

    Updated 2020.

  • Winking at a good-looking Girl in the Dark

    Avoid Winking at a Good-looking Girl in the Dark

    As the old adage goes, “Running a business without advertising is like winking at a good-looking girl (or guy) in the dark. You know what you’re doing, but nobody else does”.

    winking at a good-looking girl

    Now, for “advertising”, you can substitute “promoting”, thereby allowing yourself to concentrate on social media, for example, or getting out and meeting people. You may not have a budget for pure advertising, in the sense of spending money on media. However, if you’re short of cash, mister *, you might still be able to time-manage yourself to a sufficient degree to allow yourself dedicate some time to social media work, on Facebook, Twitter or other. Or get along to some networking opportunities. Or try to generate some favourable and free press coverage through PR work.

    Essentially, you’ve got to be telling people (your target markets) about what you’re doing and what’s good about your product or service. Another adage states that “If you’re not telling, you’re not selling”. There’s no arguing with that.

    As the summer winds up over the next few weeks, many of us self-employed small business owners who have perhaps been on autopilot for the previous two months will begin to turn our thoughts back to the job at hand. I regularly say that micro-business owners often have two beginnings to their year. The first, of course, is in January. But there’s a second one in September, once the holidays are over and the kids have gone back to school. Let me suggest that you develop some rigorous system to urge yourself to communicate with your audiences into the future.

    • Develop a social media marketing plan and schedule that makes use of the platform(s) your audience is active on.
    • Get networking offline, regularly.
    • Build relationships with journalists, bloggers and other influencers who can give you some coverage gratos.
    • Ask for testimonials from satisfied customers and put them up on your website. Even better, shoot some video testimonials.
    • Employ some free content marketing amplifiers, like Missinglettr. I like it very much.

    Winking at a good-looking Girl

    So, the next time you’re considering it, switch on the light first …

    *  Stolen from an old U2 track, “Bullet the Blue Sky”.

  • 5 Great Irish Advertising Slogans

    5 Great Irish Advertising Slogans over the Years

    I was listening to the radio the other day, Joe probably, when my mind drifted to some of the great Irish advertising slogans that have adorned the airwaves over the years. It must have been something he said.

    Wondering why these slogans were (are) particularly excellent, I realised that one characteristic they all share is a small number of words. One of them is so short, it contains just two! But, of course, that in itself is not enough. The slogan also needs to speak in some way about the brand and its market – the “feelings” of its consumers, if you will.

    1. “My goodness, my Guinness”

    While recalled somewhat less frequently than its more famous cousin, “Guinness is good for you”, the amazing thing about this classic from the 1930s is that people still say it on the street, every single day, without even noticing.

    great irish advertising slogans

    2. Brennan’s, “Today’s bread, today”

    The grand old character from Brennan’s Bakery who’s been uttering these immortal words for decades is a legend in himself. The bakery’s advert sketches, played out between “Old Mr. Brennan” and one of his side-kicks are fantastic and the tagline is simple, but brilliant. Two words, one repeated. One of the truly great Irish advertising slogans.

    great irish advertising slogans - brennans

    3. Centra, “For the way we live today”

    Centra’s memorable tagline makes great use of a nice little musical ditty, so that we not only recall it fondly, but sing it.

    great irish advertising slogans centra

    4. “Look up, it’s Aer Lingus”

    It’s a long time since our skies were filled with more or less just Aer Lingus, British Airways or Aeroflot. This ancient slogan still makes those of us of a certain age mutter it to ourselves whenever we see or fly the “national carrier”.

    great irish advertising slogans - aer lingus

    5. Homestead, “Brings value home”

    Used, among others, in the ad that won the award for Irish Radio Ad of the 20th Century, this was all about warmth, comfort, homeliness and reasonable prices in the recession-hit Ireland of the 1980s.

    great irish advertising slogans homestead

    Great Irish Advertising Slogans

    There are other greats, of course. But another of the characteristics of these taglines is that they make us smile. Like this superb old Guinness TV classic, “Tá siad ag teacht”. Brilliant.