Every week I attempt to share my pick of clutter-breaking ads. I have been doing it for several years now setting aside some time every weekend. This blog has been around since 2008 and focused on critiquing ads for the first few years. I realised my folly as I was very much part of the ecosystem back then which produced such ads. I then switched to sharing good work which hopefully inspires some in advertising. I know how tough it is to produce above average work, leave alone the occasional brilliant ones. Sometimes, I don’t come across anything remotely interesting for weeks or unable to find time to update my blog due to other commitments. It is heartening to have some followers of this blog, as it motivates me to carry on writing & sharing.
This week, the ad industry portals were full of coverage from the Cannes Advertising Awards. And like clockwork, criticism & mockery of the awards (some of them relevant) is also seen. More on that topic and a round up of some of the work which caught my eye in this week’s blog.
Omega: Olympic and Paralympic Games
This year will see Paris host both the Olympics and the Paralympic Games. Omega is the official timekeeper of the games since 1932. A new ad dramatically shows the famous landmarks of the city as sporting arenas which famous athletes show their skill in. The juxtaposition of scale between humans and static objects gives it a visual appeal and brings a smile and the integration of the brand is subtle yet powerful.
By playing with scale to create these optical illusions that transform Paris into a sporting playground, OMEGA aims to celebrate both the inspiring abilities of the athletes and the iconic sights of the host city.
Lemonn: low cost ads
I remember seeing one of the ads during the live streaming of the ongoing ICC Cricket World Cup and being piqued enough to check the app out on the App Store. That’s a win for the ad which is anchored on a creative idea linked to the ‘zero fee’ proposition of the investment app. Clever, relevant, effective.
Agency: Enormous
Prime Video: Federer
It must be so tough to dream up creative ideas which can be executed in non-traditional media and yet be relevant & compelling. Here is one such by Prime Video to promote their new series, ‘Federer’. Great use of technology in the context of the ‘product’.
Fevicol: jugalbandi
‘This idea has legs’ – used to be a comment in ad agency circles back in the days. It simply meant that it was a ‘campaignable’ with several creative expressions possible with that idea. ‘The unbreakable bond of Fevicol’ is one such which has seen some great executions by Ogilvy. The execution varies between the subtle and the quirky but always bringing a smile. Here’s one on the latter scale, maybe even bizarre – but drives home the point while getting the laughs.
Agency: Ogilvy
DoorDash: delivering all the brands of Super Bowl
While writing about the DoorDash effort during Super Bowl this year, I had said, I had a ‘wish I had thought of this’ moment. Was so happy to see this win the ultimate Cannes Lions award – the Dan Wieden Titanium Lions Grand Prix. It ticks all the boxes of genuine work: a real brand, it ran on media (big time), hugely creative and relevant for the advertised brand.
Agency: Wieden+Kennedy Portland
V&A: if you are into to it
Getting people interested in visiting a museum is a tough task. According to the case study film (and it rings true) the common belief is that museums do not keep objects of ‘our interest’.
‘If you’re into it, it’s in the V&A’ was a highly targeted campaign that heroed the breadth of the museum’s collection. We worked with curators to showcase 70 different objects across out of home, press, digital and social media, reaching the general public and the most passionate of collectors alike.
What I liked about the campaign was not just the idea but the way in which it spoke to us individually taking us back into time, making us hark back to personal collections and deep passion about offbeat stuff like comics & collector’s cards. It also saw some fantastic media placement for the audience to stumble upon.
Agency: Adam&eveDDB
Stella Artois: new face
Celebrities endorsing brands is nothing new. The way celebrities are used – either as themselves or as characters, makes the difference. In India, we’ve seen both the approaches. In the west, I tend to notice use of celebrities as themselves (the Uber Eats one for example) more. In this context (pretty similar to the strategy adopted by MakeMyTrip recently), Stella Artois chose not to show the celebrity’s face – in this case David Beckham and let just a hint do the rest.
Agency: Gut, Miami
Cannes Advertising awards: the juggernaut rolls on
During this season, many detractors of creative awards in general and Cannes in particular get vocal. Many of them make relevant, factual points against the awards system. The primary argument against the system is that they award work that is not ‘real’ – the campaigns never ran, they are made up to address fake ‘briefs’ and are not addressing a real brand problem or opportunity. And they are true to a large extent. We all know that most big-name and emerging ad agencies have a crack team to focus only only ‘award potential’ work. They may do it for real, big name clients as special projects but there is no denying that ‘award submission’ is the ultimate goal. All the garnishing of effectiveness is captured in a slickly made case study video which then makes the rounds of all major awards, across categories. Of late, some sort of technology is baked into the execution so that the chances of winning are higher. There is nothing one can do about this. The system is far too invested in this process as it benefits everyone – the event organisers, agencies and the brands.
I belong to the skeptical group, taking the award-winning work with a fistful of salt. Among the many ‘made for awards’ projects, which aren’t ads or never ran, there are a few genuine efforts for real brands (the one for DoorDash in the post above is a great example). Even among the ‘made for awards’ work there is some really creative thinking and great execution. Pity that the same is not seen consistently for real brands, real business problems. Nevertheless, the facts:
- Cannes is business. It makes tonnes of money (£100m revenue when I checked last) and must be hugely profitable.
- It’s a a treadmill that agencies & clients cannot get off. They keep coming back every year.
- Agencies see ROI in some form; be it ‘reputation’ and as magnet for new business & talent (of a certain kind)
- A few big advertisers and those seeking brand fame see the badge of ‘Cannes winning agency’ as some sort of filter to select. Never mind if the work produced later is regular stuff
- Detractors of the event will be ignored as the attraction of the event far outweighs the ‘utility’ factor
- It really doesn’t matter to the industry if the work is genuine or not – they have taken that aspect out of the equation
- Much like Oscars, it has become the award that matters for the industry
Classic ads: Tag Heuer
Back in 1995, Tag Heuer ran this much celebrated campaign anchored on the theme: ‘Success. It’s a mind game‘. The print executions dramatised how ‘imagining’ an adversary spurs one to give one’s best, making every second count, as it were. The production was top class and the creativity was spell binding. I had a few of the executions pinned on to my soft board.
Agency: BDDP, Paris
Which one was your favourite? Do comment in.