Why is it that some news promos never seem to lose their freshness and others make viewers weary after just a few plays? “Ad fatigue” is a well studied science on Madison Avenue, but something that television stations rarely consider when designing news promotion campaigns for their products. In a research study, Starcom MediaVest Group found that certain creative approaches will wear out faster than others.
For example, one of the most durable ad campaigns of the past decade has been Anheuser-Busch’s “Real Men of Genius.” This over-the-top creative campaign has been saluting legends such as “Mr. Toupee Wearer” and “Mr. Nudist Colony Activities Coordinator” since 1999. They have created delightfully schmaltzy salutes to more than 100 different everyday-guy legends since the campaign began. Here are some of my favorite radio and TV ads:
The creative has been so popular that the company created three separate CDs with collections of the best ads. They have sold 200,000 disks. In a Wall Street Journal story, Bob Lachky, an Anheuser-Busch VP, said that, “Part of my job is to keep new brand managers from killing it. We want to own the idea of having fun, and this helps us do that.” They rotate the ads so no version ever gets too tiring.
So how can you reduce ad fatigue when producing promos for your news product? What promos break through the clutter and have Duracell Bunny staying power? The research recommends:
1) Aim for the heart
Ads that engage the emotions of the audience are more effective and have more staying power. In news promotion, emotional appeals are fairly rare. Most news promotion is firmly centered on a narcissistic inventory of our news coverage. Typically, we tell viewers how great we are, how crappy the competition is, and why the world should fear our new whopper doppler. Sure, we give lip service to keeping the viewer safe, but all the dialogue and video focus on us – not the customer. When was the last time you watched a news promo and felt good about yourself?
Last week I saw a promo campaign that started with the main anchor on camera professing that, “The news isn’t about us, it’s about the needs of our viewers.” All the shots in the promo showed the anchor running around the newsroom. Real people were nowhere to be seen. After that initial line, he spent the entire spot in a self-absorbed diatribe on the importance of his job.
General Mills has been running a Cheerios ad every Christmas for the past ten years. It shows a loving Grandma making a map out of Cheerios on a baby’s feeding tray. It continues to be a holiday favorite. An ad that extolls the nutritional virtues of Cheerios would not have such staying power.
2) Use different media and different approaches for the same creative.
Using the same piece of creative in different ways helps to eliminate fatigue. Create one version for radio, another for television, another for print. Seeing the creative campaign on different media types reduces ad fatigue.
On TV, create many different versions of the same great creative. Use your great idea in many different scenarios. This keeps the campaign fresh, but doesn’t require new creative and shoot set ups each time.
3) Play the creative hard, give it a rest, then bring it back.
Studies show that non-stop campaigns that continually play the same creative burn out the customer. The best strategy is to do an intense run of the campaign, then stop. Give the creative a rest for two or three months. Research shows that this break rejuvenates the audience. When the campaign comes back it will be fresh again.
This is especially important for big expensive news image campaigns. Typically, we spend a fortune on these and they get a lot of play. Some campaigns run continually for years at a time. Instead of running the same image campaign continually, bring it back again and again for short intense runs. Run it hard, then rest it for two or three months.
4) Avoid common advertising themes
Copycat creative approaches burn out faster. Audiences see the same type of creative for many different stations and are inundated with a common theme. They get sick of it fast.
For example, it seems like most stations in a market have done the “keeping you safe” weather promotion. After the audience has seen your campaign piggybacked with three identical competitor campaigns, the creative will be overexposed almost overnight.
A lot of station doppler weather campaigns have an eerily similar look and feel. You know the stereotype – frenzied tech images that feature animated green doppler waves radiating across the countryside. The goal is to help the audience visualize the power of the radar system. Plain and simple, if your competitors have taken a specific creative approach, make sure your campaign looks demonstratively different.
There are almost a thousand news operations in this country. So why is it that most of them are stuck in one of five basic creative campaigns that have been used for the last twenty years – Breaking News, Investigative, Weather, Advocacy, and Time?
Each one of these approaches has an incredible list of hackneyed imagery associated with it. Investigative has smoky alleys and bad-ass, arm-crossing reporters in the shadows at midnight. Breaking news has speeding trucks, running with cameras, and urgent telephone answering. Weather has Top-Gun style zooming animations, serious conferring while pointing at weather monitors, and seizure inducing flashing weather graphics. If it’s been done, come up with something new. Common creative is creative that easily tires and can’t break through the clutter.
This research proves it. Unlike the hackneyed news campaigns, unique creative has a greater chance of success from the first run. Take a look at all your news creative and give it this little test. Put your competitor’s call letters in place of your own and read the spot again. If the promo still makes sense, it’s time to go back to the drawing board and come up with a creative approach that will truly differentiate your product.
Graeme Newell works for 602 Communications as a broadcast and cable marketing consultant. He specializes in emotional marketing. He guarantees that his teasing seminar will immediately increase your news ratings or his workshop is free. Find out more here.
