Lying In Advertising.

Lying in advertising is bad, but common. Too common.  Do your research before you buy.

Attention Spans

Humans have a pretty short attention span and I think that when it comes to advertising that can be a pretty good thing.  With the thousands and thousands of ads that we are bombarded with everyday our attention spans allow us to glimpse over anything that doesn't seem interesting to us. This is beneficial both to the consumer and the advertisers.  The consumers are able to easily tune out anything that doesn't interest them while advertisers are able to get the attention of their main target market (so long as the ad is designed well).

Keeping with the idea of short attention span I figure this is probably enough to get my point across without making people want to skip through the rest and getting bored. =)

Shock Advertising.

Using shocking images and/or text in advertising is nothing new.

I think that advertisements that shock people can be very effective because it makes the viewer actually stop and rethink what exactly they just saw.  But I also think that the shocking image can make people view the brand in a different light.

In the ad above for example the message is quite shocking and makes the viewer think about the killing of animals in a different way.  But it also would make many people question the WWF's tactics.  There are many people in the world who don't view animals as 'equals' or as beings worth saving and would be upset that they (the WWF) would compare the value of a human child's life to that of a wild animal.

http://newevolutiondesigns.com/75-shocking-advertisements

The above link is to a blog where someone compiled 75 shocking ads.  Quite a few of them are very strange and I can't help but wonder how they even promote the brand.  For example:

This is an advertisement for some kind of chocolate, yet it features a young girl putting a canary through a meat grinder.  The connection is not immediately made and honestly this ad makes me not want to eat their chocolate. 

Shocking advertising can be effective if used properly, if not it can cause harm to the brand.

(Sub)Liminal Advertising.

Every ad is trying to sell us something; that's what ads do.  But some ads do this in a much more subtle way.

I do believe that there are ads that try to 'manipulate' us and make us associate certain feelings or things with different products.  I also believe that there are some people who look too far into things and start to see messages that no one intended to exist.

The kind of liminal advertising that I believe is created by the advertisers and the designers are small design things or when an ad is seen.  For example the FedEx logo

it's a logo that people see very frequently and has a small design element that most people never notice until someone points it out to them.  In between the E and x an arrow is created in the whitespace.  This is liminal advertising.  It imbeds an idea in the viewers mind that with FedEx your package will go wherever it needs to go (as the arrow implies movement of some sort).  

When or where an ad is viewed can also imply liminal advertising.  If someone is looking through an expensive magazine and they see an ad for a certain brand of shampoo they're going to immediately relate this product to also being expensive and high class (even if it's the same as any other shampoo).  It's also seen in television.  Companies will buy ad space during certain programs depending on the content.  If  a show is happy then companies who want people to associate happiness and feeling good to their product will buy ad space during that program.

Humour & Advertising)

Humour is a very powerful tool.  It can easily make a person remember your product but it's not always for the best reason.  

I find that recently humour has become commonplace in today's marketing; it's in print ads, commercials, online...  But when using humour in ads you need to be very careful that you're not offending anyone (which let's be honest is almost impossible to not do now-a-days).  I also find that humorous ads tend to get old quick.  Take the Old Spice commercials for instance. The original one found here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owGykVbfgUE, was actually pretty funny when it first came out.  It was something that had never been done before and it made people question what they were watching and what was going on in the commercial.  Now three years later Old Spice is still trying to use that same brand of humour (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PF_X3l3TnJs) and honestly it's getting boring; the first time you see it it's kind of interesting to see what's going on but in the end I'd rather change the channel then sit through that commercial again.  This is why one example why I say humour can be very effective, but it doesn't last for very long before people get sick of it.  

There's always also the risk that people may not take your product seriously if you use humour in your advertising; you have to be careful when coming up with ideas that you're not giving people a reason to think less of your product.

I feel like I really agree on Schiller's views on how to use humour in advertising: 

"Bottom line: Use humor if—and only if:
 You use it to reinforce and support your basic promise.
 You use it to be friendly, not funny.
 You use it to attract, not to distract.
 You NEVER lose sight of what you're really doing: selling.So don't clown around. But smile when you sell that!"

http://www.mortyschiller.com/html/does_humor_sell_.html

Advertising & Food

Advertising and food seem to go hand in hand; unfortunately it's mostly the fast food or junk/snack food industry that take full advantage of advertisements. When I was a child every weekend I'd get up early and watch my cartoons which were riddled with commercials, many of those being for unhealthy foods.  To me, these commercials were bright and fun and made whatever it was they were advertising to be something I wanted.  Things haven't changed.  Children still watch cartoons and the ads are still designed to appeal to the younger generation.  

With obesity levels rising it's not surprising that advertising is taking a good part of the blame; it is how most people first come into contact with the unhealthy food choices.  The commercials or ads make the food seem delicious and fun and this makes people want to go and eat it.  It's unfortunate that we live in a world now that's run by media; whatever people see or hear or watch from any media source (tv, social medias, magazines) is what people tend to believe or agree with; the healthy food industries have seem to have very little presence in these places.  Admittedly there is a rise in the presence of healthy eating/healthy living choices in some forms of media (I have quite a few Facebook friends who post healthy food ideas/exercise tips) it still doesn't compare to the hold that fast food industries have on people.

I feel like the advertising does carry some of the blame for the weight issues that are rising but on the other hand that's the agencies job.  They are supposed to make their client's food, or whatever it happens to be, be something that the viewer wants or even needs; and in the fast food industry this is clearly being done well.  However, I do also feel that the consumer themselves are also at blame.  In the accessible world we live in today it's easy to do research and find out what is or isn't good for you and how you should be taking care of your body.  The knowledge is out there, people just need to take initiative to find this information and then actually use it. 

Photoshopping Ads

Photoshopping ads seems to be a very touchy subject.  Personally I feel that it is okay to use Photoshop in ads; but in moderation.  It's one thing to fix a blemish and a completely different thing to completely remove body parts.

In the Forever 21 ad it's pretty obvious that whoever was doing the Photoshop editing took it a little too far (and didn't do a very good job); I don't think it's right to change how a person actually looks.  Honestly I don't see why the company would even want to remove a part of the model, especially when that showcases the look and fit of the product.  Although many people realize that most models and celebrities are photoshopped to look a certain way it still creates an unattainable body image that some people will go to extremes to have.

Photoshop should be used to fix small blemishes or imperfections (because no is expecting to see a model or celebrity with pimples or other blemishes) but it shouldn't be used to change a person's body. That's just crazy.  And it could be used to add effects to images, like filters or whatever might be needed to fit the feel of the ad.

If companies are going to continue to airbrush their models to ridiculous standards they should have to state it somewhere on their site that the models have been altered.  People have the right to know when they are looking at something that has been altered.

I also feel like companies that feel the need to airbrush their models are also saying something about themselves.  Obviously the companies have a strange and very high standard as to who should be wearing their clothing if even a super thin model isn't thin enough.

tl;dr: Photoshop in ads is okay to fix small things but shouldn't be used to completely change a person's appearance.