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Belch: Advertising and
Promotion, Sixth Edition
V. Developing the
Integrated Marketing
Communications Program
9. Creative Strategy:
Implementation and
Evaluation
change of its name to E*Trade Financial and poking fun
at the excesses of the dot-com era.
Many in the advertising community believe that the
next creative revolution in advertising will come not
from ads for Internet companies but from the medium
itself. They feel that the skill set of the creativity community
will really be unleashed as technological limitations
that handcuff web creativity, such as bandwidth
problems, are solved and the Internet converges with
other traditional media such a television and print. As
discussed earlier, advertisers such as BMW, Skyy vodka,
and Levi Strauss are taking advertising in a new direction
by creating short films that can be viewed and/or
They are also used in TV advertising, with an announcer generally delivering the sales
message while the product/service is shown on the screen. Ads for high-involvement
consumer products as well as industrial and other business-to-business products generally
use this format.
Scientific/Technical Evidence In a variation of the straight sell, scientific or
technical evidence is presented in the ad. Advertisers often cite technical information,
results of scientific or laboratory studies, or endorsements by scientific bodies or agencies
to support their advertising claims. For example, an endorsement from the American
Council on Dental Therapeutics on how fluoride helps prevent cavities was the
basis of the campaign that made Crest the leading brand on the market. The ad for Dermasil
Pharmaceutical Dry Skin Treatment shown in Exhibit 9-13 uses this execution
style to emphasize the breakthrough from Vaseline Research.
Demonstration Demonstration advertising is designed to illustrate the key
advantages of the product/service by showing it in actual use or in some staged situation.
Demonstration executions can be very effective in convincing consumers of a
product’s utility or quality and of the benefits of owning or using the brand. TV is
particularly well suited for demonstration executions, since the benefits or advantages
of the product can be shown right on the screen. Although perhaps a little less
dramatic than TV, demonstration ads can also work in print, as shown in the ad for
Du Pont’s Teflon Bakeware Liners (Exhibit 9-14).
Comparison Brand comparisons can also be the basis for the advertising
execution. The comparison execution approach is increasingly popular
among advertisers, since it offers a direct way of communicating a brand’s
particular advantage over its competitors or positioning a new or lesserknown
brand with industry leaders. Comparison executions are often used
to execute competitive advantage appeals, as discussed earlier.
Testimonial Many advertisers prefer to have their messages presented
by way of a testimonial, where a person praises the product or service on
the basis of his or her personal experience with it. Testimonial executions
can have ordinary satisfied customers discuss their own experiences with
the brand and the benefits of using it. This approach can be very effective
when the person delivering the testimonial is someone with whom the target
audience can identify or who has an interesting story to tell. The testimonial
must be based on actual use of the product or service to avoid legal
problems, and the spokesperson must be credible.
Apple Computer made effective use of testimonials as part of its
“Switch” campaign, which features computer users from various walks of
© The McGraw−Hill
Companies, 2003
downloaded from their websites. This hybrid of advertising
and entertainment is referred to in the ad world
as “branded content.” The agency for Nike created a
campaign with cliff-hanger commercials whose endings
could be found only on the Nike website. A new creative
revolution may indeed be under way. However, this
time it may involve more than ads showing gerbils
being shot out of cannons.
Source: Suzanne Vranica, “Dot-Com TV Ads Make a Comeback,”
The Wall Street Journal, Apr. 10, 2002, p. B5; Suein L. Hwang and
Kathryn Kranhold, “Where Have All the Gerbils Gone?” The Wall
Street Journal, March 30, 2000, p. B1; Eleftheria Parpis, “You Say
You Want a Revolution,” Adweek, Dec. 13, 1999, pp. 29–36.
Exhibit 9-13 This
Dermasil ad cites a scientific
study
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Chapter Nine Creative Strategy: Implementation and Evaluation