Let’s face it. Do you think people sprint home from work, switch on their TV sets and then wait with bated breath for ads to come on? Or, rise and shine at dawn to feverishly scan newspapers so they can enjoy the latest puns churned out by copywriters? Could it just, just be possible that listeners rabidly switch between FM channels so they can catch the latest jingle for Beige And Handsome Skin Whitener?
You know it’s quite the contrary. The fact of the matter is that besides the people who create the advertising and the clients who run it, nobody’s life is earth-shatteringly altered by an ad. People have reasonably more important things to do. Like getting their kids ready for school each morning. Or, concentrate on multiple pizza toppings in front of their TV sets. Or look at their mobile phone for the 979th time in the day. But ads? You’d find it a trifle hard to discover somebody risking his life so he can reach home in time to catch the new Paan Parbat ad on TV.
Now let’s examine how ads are usually encountered. Most newspapers are quickly skimmed through on toilet seats. And it’s safe to assume that newspapers are read for news, not some smart-alec advertising headline. Your TV ad will probably hit a viewer while he’s just watched Sachin’s stumps go cart wheeling and is cursing every commercial break in sight. And that internet banner is quickly minimized into oblivion, the second it tries to pompously intrude on to the main stories on the home-page.
Quite a bit of competition for our little piece of advertising, don’t you think? The truth of the matter is that advertising is viewed mostly as a rude intrusion. After all the money that has been spent producing an ad and the even greater sums spent running it, the poor thing is not really welcome at first sight.
What then is the solution? How do you prevent that viewer from playing Fastest Finger First as soon as your ad begins? Well, you have to remember that you are part of the entertainment business.
Pretty much in the way the role-reversal ad for Amul Macho entertains. The whole portrayal of men being treated in the same manner as the Bollywood women of yesteryear films is quite hilarious. Spoofs on Bollywood are nothing new. What sets this apart is spoofing the spoof. Getting men to bear the brunt of what is usually reserved for women, amidst the background of kitsch, melodrama and exaggeration. The part where the domineering girl on the motorbike brakes hard forcing the guy gingerly perched behind to fall all over her is worth switching many channels to see. We’ve had enough of boring ads showing beefed-up forty something heroes, stretching their booze and steroid infested biceps in various banians. The Amul Macho ad is a refreshing change. The genuinely high Entertainment Quotient ensures you won’t tire of repeat viewings.
Advertising is a very serious business where tons of serious money and serious effort is expended. It better be entertaining for it to work.
(The author is National Creative Director, Dentsu Marcom)