I’m wondering how important and/or useful it is to stick to a brand’s advertising “category”. For the sake of this discussion, let’s use shampoo as an example. It’s fair to say that there is a “standard” for shampoo ads: nice young woman having a shower and washing her shiny healthy hair in slow motion. This formula became the standard because most shampoo brands employ it. It’s easy to see why: it’s efficient; the consumer immediately recognizes the product category and understands the pitch thus the impact on awareness is immediate. But on the other hand, can this injure a brand by standardizing the way its story is expressed; its message?
Can you trigger a strong reaction when you’re simply one of many and not the one that stands out?
I believe, for example, that it’s really risky to create an ad for a car without actually showing the car in question. But perhaps, if the message is strong enough, the consumer will retain the message just as well. In this noisy world, maybe the car itself isn’t that important.
Maybe thinking outside the category box is what gets you noticed?
Post by Isabelle Quevilly, Apr 23rd
Tags: category, digital branding, disruptive
