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Unconventional Campaigns
October, 2008
Recently I joined AIGA (American Institute of Graphic Arts). To compliment my recent membership, I've been taking advantage of some of the lectures and speaking events locally coordinated by the Minnesota chapter.
Last week the speaker was Josh Simpson from BBDO. He was talking about where the "big idea" comes from and all the research that goes into studying people's daily habits. He called people's habits "rituals."
The point of researching people's daily habits was to better understand the best ways, as advertisers, to sneak into these day to day to-dos of the average citizen.
Simpson showed several campaigns where the ads became part of the day. One of his examples was an AMP energy drink campaign where bikers drinking AMP were providing energy to power a large portion of a Super Bowl game. In addition to AMP's purchased air time AMP gained free media coverage showing the bikers hard at work. The campaign was a success!
Usually I enjoy seeing the ads that slyly sneak into daily life (especially if they're smart). Attempting to recall a campaign I'd seen recently I thought of an example, I was not so fond of. It was a yellow flyer stuck under my windshield wiper disguised as a ticket. To my relief it was not a ticket. Instead it was a junky flyer. Nice effort, but conjuring anger first and annoyance second didn't quite seem to be the right emotions to sell me whatever it was they were offering.
I left Simpson's lecture with a revived interest in innovative advertising. Now sitting back and reflecting on the good (AMP energy drinks) and the bad (crappy car flyer), I hope I never have to resort to tricking people into being relieved that they didn't get a parking ticket.
Unconventional advertising is becoming more and more popular, and I look forward to seeing the fresh ways it's used forthcoming.