communication is essential to business making and it involves more than the ability to name your product, write a tag line or a press release. It's an intricate, rational and scalable effort and, let's face it, not anyone can do it.

11/22/2008

The confusion of gradeur

I don't like big ads. I mean I like "small-big" ads, ads where the idea is big or the emotion is big and the execution is small scale. I find that it takes a lot more talent to look closer at things than to take a step back and look at the whole picture, because, after all, saying big things with big things is just too easy.

In Romania, we love big ads, lots of props, lots of make up, lots of extras, huge locations, bird eye views, it gives the illusion that the brand is bigger, for more people. I am trying to figure out why we like to make big ads and all I can come up with is we are a small country no one pays attention to, we have had small houses, small pieces of chocolate, have never occupied other countries, never been an empire.
I look at GB, a former empire and find that they look deeper into the small things to discover the value within. Russell once told us in a training to look for meaning in the product or the things around it. He said that inspiration for the yogurt is usually found in the spoon.

I think that Bravia balls worked because the emotion was huge but it was presented with small balls and maybe that is why the follow-up with the huge explosions and the huge bunnies was less of a hit. That is why i used to like Orange ads, and that is why I love everything Wieden does. That is why there is no Romanian brand that has made me empathize. In a very small country we have brands that try to act too big.

2 comments:

Oxygen said...

E ca si cum ai intreba de ce oamenii saraci asculta manele despre bani si smecherie...

Bogdana Butnar said...

@oxygen...true, dar eu vorbeam despre cei care fac reclamele si/sau le aproba. nu neaparat despre cei care le vad ptr ca, iata, intr-un studiu care e about to break se spune clar ca anul trecut cele mai apreciate reclame au fost cele cu omuletii de la Orange :-)