Show don't tell, and other good advice

I haven't blogged in...geezum...forever. Busy, busy, busy! Such is the glamorous life of a graphic designer. Oh wait. It's glamorous? Ha...I missed that memo.

I was having a conversation today with a colleague about what is better..."direct response" advertising, or more conceptual stuff, and what I prefer. He's a firm believer that the most effective ads are the type with a call to action which is obvious (Like "Call Today" et al).

I disagree. I think an ad which is WELL DONE is the most effective type of ad. Period. I've seen excellent ads with calls to action, and I've seen, dare I say, even better ads which are intended to inform but compel to buy.

Apple Computer. Nike. Geico. AFLAC. Coca Cola. Target. Volkswagen. All very successful brands. Think about the last time any of these people came out and told you "Buy a Coke today!"

Uh huh. So why are they successful anyway? Because they don't have to ask you to buy the product flat out. They create the want - the fundamental part of why you buy something anyway - without asking.

Case in point: Apple Computer. How much money do you think it cost Chiat/Day (the agency that produced the spots I'm about to mention) to produce those black silhouette, dancing iPod people commercials? Probably not much. All stuff that can be done on a computer with the right software. Or heck, if you are using actual people dancing it is still not a zillion dollar endeavor. And if you have ever sat there and dissected one of these, you'll see..these are a lot simpler spots than you realize. All it says is, with some uber-trendy music playing as the silhouette is dancing in the background: iPod. iTunes. Now for Windows. www.apple.com

That's it. Do they need to tell you where to find one, or how much it costs? Nah. The people this type of commercial appeals to already knows where to buy one. They may already own one. And if they don't...they likely will soon because iPods are cool and trendy and sexy and all those things that we all secretly wish we were.

The rule of Simple = Good definitely applies here.

They did the same basic thing with the iPhone, except no dancing silhouettes. They showed the phone (clever!) because the device sells itself, and it shows a guy watching a movie, getting a craving for pizza in the middle of it...he looks up the pizza place, calls and orders, goes back to the movie. All of these are things you can do on your phone in a matter of moments. How appealing is that-the art of multitasking-to today's busy urbanite/professional/tech geek? Very. And honestly...at this point in the product's launch...who is buying these phones? 68 year old grandmothers of 5? Err...no. It is THIS demographic.

So what does this have to do with the price of pizza? The title of the post: show, don't tell. Telling readers why your product is great is never better than showing them. I could spend all day explaining to you how great my vacuum cleaner is. It does this, or that blah blah BLAH BLAH. I'm starting to sound like the mysterious adults on the Peanuts cartoons. =) But...if I take that vacuum and suck the spots off a dalmatian, or all the water out of a fish bowl...do you sit up and take notice?

You bet your sweet patoot you do. Not only does this show the person how amazing the product is, it lets them come to their own conclusions. People eat that stuff up.

So what is a better way to demonstrate how cool a new jet ski is? Put the same old tired cliche of a happy smiling ultra white family waving on the beach as they ride around on one? Or perhaps use a visual I saw once in an ad for Polaris...which I thought was so darn clever that I remember it to this day, even though it's been at least 6 years since I saw this. It was a hippo. A hippo who was obviously sitting on the jet ski. All you saw was the ski parts...which would normally be in the water. The tag line was understated...at the bottom of the ad. So you had no choice but to look at that hippo. I think it said something about one of the features of the engine being great towing power. So you can draw your conclusion there. Another simple = good example.

Simple? But advertising costs oodles of money and...we should feature all the reasons why we are cooler/better/more trendy/sexier and so on. You can still do that and be simple. You just have to find a creative way to do it.

Have you ever heard of Occam's Razor? It states: "What can be accounted for by fewer assumptions is explained in vain by more."

So basically...he was saying: Simple = good. =)

So why does simple = good?

It's hard to miss. It's bigger (Less is more. It really is!). It's more believable, it's easier to remember. It breaks through advertising clutter and nonsense. And about 1,000 other reasons.

I think I'll take my own advice and "simply" end this post with that food for thought...