Marketing Communications

210 CHAPTER 7 ADVERTISING

A few examples may clarify what is meant by creative advertising ideas:

z Miller beer has a screw cap instead of a crown cap. Miller promoted its beer in TV commercials with the slogan

‘twist to open’, showing a fat man in his underwear twisting in front of his bottle of Miller beer, pausing a moment

to see whether his bottle had opened, and then starting to twist again.

z Volkswagen promoted its Beetle with the slogan ‘think small’, turning the small size into a competitive advantage,

just as Smart tried to do with ‘reduce to the max’. Nissan did the opposite, promoting its new pick up using print

ads and billboards. To stress the size of the pick up, a countryside picture features a man and, no, not his dog,

but his hippopotamus playing with a stick. The baseline reads ‘ Think Bigger’. Nissan won a Gold Clio Award for

this campaign.

z To make clear to the Spanish audience that children should watch less TV and play more, an ad was run in which a

little boy is shown watching TV while his dog is watching him. After having waited a while to get a bit of attention,

the dog turns away and starts packing its bags. With the bag in its mouth, the dog waits a few minutes in front

of the boy, but when the boy does not even look up, the dog sadly leaves.

BUSINESS INSIGHT

Creativity in advertising

Photo 7.2 Eastpak: the selling

power of a creative idea

Source : Reproduced with permission of VF

Corporation: AMVBBDO.

M07_PELS3221_05_SE_C07.indd 210M07_PELS3221_05_SE_C07.indd 210 6/5/13 3:01 PM6/5/13 3:01 PM