Five Interesting Things from “101 Things I Learned in Advertising School”
Just yesterday, I finished reading through 101 Things I Learned in Advertising School by Tracy Arrington & Matthew Frederick. It was quick, well-organized, and highly value oriented. Each page has a lesson and a succinctly written set of examples, allowing the reader to clearly understand each point and move on. I have been reading a few of these every day, and when I think something is particularly interesting, I dog-ear the page for later. Here are a few things that I found interesting enough to go back and discuss.
1) An advertising campaign helped bring an end to the world’s second longest civil war.
Since 1964, The Columbian group FARC has been engaging in a conflict that has claimed 200,000 lives. This conflict started with the 10-year long civil war between conservative and liberal parties known as La Violencia. Around Christmas in 2010, the Colombian government worked together with a advertising creative named Jose Sokoloff to create a campaign for demobilization. They placed decorated Christmas trees with motion sensors in a jungle commonly visited by FARC soldiers. These trees were accompanied by a banner that said “If Christmas can come to the jungle, you can come home. Demobilize.” This campaign led to the demobilization of 331 soldiers, about 5% of the FARC force at the time. Later, Sokoloff decided to send glowing plastic balls filled with gifts and messages from loved ones floating down the rivers where the soldiers frequently travel. These campaigns helped to cause the overall demobilization of 18,000 guerillas by 2015, which in part led to the peace struck in 2017, ending the decades-long conflict.
2) The more effective your emotional appeal is, the more you can widen the gap between production cost and retail price
For a brand whose audience is already aware of the products they sell and their benefits, an emotional appeal can add more implicit value for customers deciding between two brands. Emotional appeals tend to dominate in the realm of more expensive products, because a large amount of the value for such a product is in the brand association. If done correctly, this appeal can create a positive association to a product in any price range. When we are faced with multiple similar options, our subconscious will remember the emotional association created by an ad, which will contribute to which one we choose whether we think about it or not. This has worked on me before, here’s an ad that I actually ENJOYED watching:
This ad isn’t super well written, the gum isn’t featured that prominently, and to be honest it’s overly cheesy. Even so, it got me. I enjoyed it enough that whenever I buy gum, I grab Extra, regardless of the fact that they all taste pretty much the same.
3) A priority never includes “And”
This one is simple. Campaigns can have multiple goals, like “increase north eastern sales by 15%.” However, when you decide on the priority of the campaign, that priority should never include an “and”. At this point, it is no longer a priority. On top of this, having simple priorities for campaigns make it easier to track ROI for the future.
4) More choices can lead to fewer sales
This point dives into the concept of the paradox of choice, which is becoming more relevant as we continue to grow more consumeristic as a society. When customers are faced with many options for a low impact purchase such as food or office supplies, they will often make fewer purchases because they are overwhelmed by the amount of similar choices they have available to them. The average adult memory can comfortably take seven individual instances of information in at once. Having a number of options far outside seven induces anxiety and makes customers think they have to make the perfect choice, which is time consuming. Having a smaller selection of options may draw in a smaller audience, but will increase the sales volume of the smaller audience that it draws.
5) Talking more can make you appear less trustworthy
This point was interesting to me specifically because I tend to talk alot when I am nervous. I have been told by past interviewers and mentors that this is what undercut my personal pitch, despite my passion. In the book, the author states that “Long explanations make people uncomfortable” followed by a few small examples. This point can be boiled down to the age-old aphorism “Brevity is the soul of wit.” You will be better percieved overall if the things you say are precise and well thought out.
There were many more interesting things in this book, but my favorite thing about it is its conciseness. I got more information out of these 100 pages than I’ve learned from many longer, wordier books in the past. I highly reccomend taking a moment to look through this book to anyone interested in advertising or efficient business writing.