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With a brilliant presentation at his disposal, Deshpande was pleasantly
surprising with his well researched and well prepared session. With
the prime focus being how to unbox ones self, he called attention
to various syndrome that advertising as a profession faces and talked
about how to overcome it.
Defining the box, the box essentially is a state of mind that makes
you think within your limits, one that enables you to make safe
decisions and is an environment which is comfortable and secure
and hence one attains a comfort level.
Describing traps that one walks into knowingly or unknowingly as
syndromes, he went on to talk about the various syndromes of advertising.
Category Syndrome:
This is a syndrome where a car ad looks like a car ad, a bank ad
looks like a bank ad and a shampoo ad looks like shampoo ad. So
essentially the concept is the category, and hence most often than
not the ad is decided even before the brief is written. Unknowingly
we produce work that comes out of the category advertising formula.
Another key message; " Blend in if you don't want to get eaten
and stand out if you don't want to attract a mate."
So, how does one get out of the box?
Get away from ads in that category in a responsible manner. Away
from the predictability and strive to become more anti-category.
Music Syndrome:
Often the music replaces the idea of the ad. Jingles and happy images
seem to mistaken for advertising. Music can only enhance the idea
not replace the idea. Eg: Hutch ( Dog ad), Lucky magazine ( mannequin)
Scream Syndrome:
Common belief: Make your ads scream and you'll get the consumers
attention, instead you get your consumer to reduce the volume. ]
Funny Syndrome:
Most Indians are obsessed with writing funny ads. That is surprising
as genetically Indians are not funny people. Hence, this obsession
with writing funny copies is truly funny. So here the key learning
was "Avoid humour unless you are 100 per cent sure. What is
funny to you may not be funny to the millions of others. Don't set
out to be funny, set out to be interesting and fun will follow."
Celebrity Syndrome:
Put a famous jock in an ad and the brand will sell is the most celebrated
myth in the Indian advertising scenario. The only place it will
work is when the celeb has a strong connect with the brand. For
example: Aggasi or Tiger Woods for Nike and Beckham and Carlos for
the Pepsi ad.
A point to be noted, "In times of recession, good agencies
do better because advertising is more important, not less."
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