Why Your Advertising Isn’t Working

You’re in your family room, surrounded by family and friends, anxiously awaiting the launch of your new product spot.

It falls flat. 

Sure, there were a few token ‘good job’ comments, but you know in your heart of hearts that this spot was a disaster. You’re also wondering whether it’s time to dust off the old resume, because production costs alone (discounting spot purchases), are approximately equal to the annual marketing budgets of your five largest competitors.

So as you wonder whether your parking space will be filled tomorrow, you sit there alone, wondering what went wrong. From storyboard to prop rental, everyone loved it! Well, the answer is likely shorter than your tenure with your current employer.

It’s time to review Marketing 101 and get back to basics to get an answer for the person to whom you report. Because answers will be demanded. After opening your dusty textbook, it’s not long before you realize your commercial’s downfall came down to just two words: “benefits” and “features.”

Benefits sell. Features describe.  

Most of the commercials you see today are NOT benefit oriented; that is, not only do they NOT impart a benefit to the viewer who then hopefully takes the requested CTA (Call to Action), but also the visual portion of the spot and product being sold are only marginally interrelated.

There is a TV spot you may have seen that is gorgeous visually. The scene: an elegant ballroom, with men in formal wear, their dates/wives/significant others similarly dressed. As one single gentleman walks into the scene, he takes two offered glasses of champagne and goes directly toward the back of the head of a seated, beautifully platinum colored and coiffed…dog.

If you’ve seen the commercial, do you recall the advertiser? A premium dog food, perhaps? Some type of hair product? Champagne for upscale dogs? Nope. If you thought that was the direction the commercial was headed, so did I, until I found out it was created for an airline! Quick cut from the ballroom to a shot of an airliner, flying high, logo proudly displayed.

Before I wrote this post, I wondered how the two scenes were interconnected. After 29 years in marketing and advertising as a CD/CMO, I still can’t.*  Maybe you can.

* Well, I did come up with one connection: both gentleman and dog are sitting together in first class, hand in paw, flying into the sunset. Except this particular airline doesn’t have first class. Damn! So now it really IS up to you!