978-0133506884 Chapter 8 Lecture Note Part 1

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PRACTICE: DEVELOPING BREAKTHROUGH IDEAS IN THE DIGITAL AGE

The new century has created a huge challenge for brand communication creatives who

have to develop breakthrough messages that will not get lost in the media explosion of

the 21st century. As Professor Karen Mallia explains, “We are in a second creative

revolution that challenges creative thinkers to reimagine the way they work.”

The Second Creative Revolution: Magical Thinking Meets Bits and Bytes

New brand communication can be anything from sponsored tweets to a

charmingly retro 30 second television spot. Increasingly, campaigns consist of

media channels that are layered and interwoven in clever and complex ways.

The entire process of making brand communication has undergone a massive

shift, the likes of which the industry has never seen before. Digital tools and

emerging platforms disrupt the creative department paradigm, now that creative is

married to technology.

However, the underlying principles behind making brilliant work have not

changed much.

Enduring Creative Truths

Professor Mallia lists nine enduring creative truths in the textbook. The new

creative truth is that great work now takes a village – not just one or two

geniuses. Creating for digital media requires diverse talents of more than just a

writer and art director. The key is collaboration.

Chapter 8

The Creative Side

CHAPTER CONTENT

CHAPTER KEY POINTS

1. How do we explain the art and science of creative strategy as well as the logic and

important parts of a creative brief?

2. What are some key message strategy approaches?

3. How is creative thinking defined, and how does it lead to a Big Idea?

4. What characteristics do creative people have in common, and what is their typical

creative process?

5. What issues affect the management of creative strategy and its implementation?

CHAPTER OVERVIEW

Effective advertising is both an art in its creativity and a science in its strategy. This

chapter explores how the two of those come together as creative strategy, which is the

logic behind the message. We’ll also examine a planning tool called a creative brief,

which provides direction for the execution of the Big Idea and for the evaluation of the

creative strategy. Next, we explore the characteristics of creative people and the process

of creative thinking, with the aim of showing how you can become a more creative

thinker. We end with a discussion of extension, adaptation, and evaluation as a means of

managing creative strategies.

CHAPTER OUTLINE

SCIENCE OR ART?

Effective marketing communication is a product of both logic and creativity. The

logic is built on fresh insight that comes from research. The message itself translates

the logic of the planning decisions into a creative idea that is original, attention

getting, and memorable.

Effective advertising is successful because the right media delivers the right message

to the right target audience at the right time. Like two hands clapping, media and

message need to work together to create effective advertising. In fact, planning the

message usually happens simultaneously with planning the media. Figure 8.1

diagrams this relationship.

Who Are the Key Players?

All agencies have copywriters and art directors who are responsible for developing

the creative concept and crafting the execution of the advertising idea. They often

work in teams, are sometimes hired and fired as a team, and may work together

successfully for several years.

 Broadcast producers can also be part of the team for television commercials.The

creative director manages the creative process, plays an important role in focusing the

strategy of ads, and makes sure the creative concept is strategically on target. Of

course, the account planner originally put the strategy together in the form of a

creative brief, so that person may also be involved in providing both background and

direction to the creative team.

The agency environment is particularly important. Agencies represent the perfect

“think tank” to inspire creativity and infuse research into creative thinking. Sasser’s

research has found that agencies are natural incubators in terms of the 3P’s of

innovation: place, person, and process.

Although agencies offer an environment designed to stimulate creative thinking,

professionals working on their own find that the varied nature of their management

assignments and projects create their own challenges, as Jennifer Cunningham

describes in this chapter’s A Day in the Life feature.

What is the Role of Creativity?

The art and science of advertising come together in the phrase creative strategy. A

winning marketing communication idea must be bothcreative (original, different,

novel, and unexpected) and strategic (right for the product and target and meeting the

objectives).

Advertising creativity is about coming up with an idea that solves a communication

problem in an original way. Professors Stuhlfaut and Berman remind us that

creativity is directed at achieving objectives. Creative strategy solves problems and

problem solving demands creative thinking – the mental tools used in figuring things

out. Both Big Ideas and Big Plans both call for creative thinking.

Media planners, market researchers, copywriters, and art directors are all searching

for new ideas. Creative people are found in business, science, engineering,

advertising, and many other fields. But in advertising, creativity is both a job

description and a goal. Figure 8.2 contains a mini-test to evaluate your own creative

potential.

The Creative Brief

The creative brief (or creative platform, worksheet, or blueprint)is the document

prepared by the account planner to summarize the basic marketing and advertising

strategy. It gives direction to creative team members as they search for a creative

concept.

Creative strategy, or message strategy, is what the advertisement says. Execution is

how it is said. The following outline summarizes the key points in a typical brief:

A problem that can be solved by communication.

The target audience and key insights into their attitudes and behavior.

The brand position and other branding decisions, such as personality and image.

Communication objectives which specify the desired response to the message by

the target audience.

A proposition or selling idea that will motivate the target to respond.

Media considerations about where and when the message should be delivered.

Creative direction that provides suggestions on how to stimulate the desired

consumer response. These aren’t creative ideas but may touch on such execution

or stylistic direction as the ad’s tone of voice.

Different agencies use different formats, but most combine these basic advertising

strategy decisions. The point is that advertising planning—even planning for the

creative side—involves a structured, logical approach to analysis, which may leave

out the intuitive, emotional message effects.

Message Objectives

What do you want the message to accomplish? What message objectives would you

specify? Below is a review of some of common advertising objectives that relate to

the Facets Model of Effects.

See/hear – Create attention, awareness, interest, recognition

Feel – touch emotions and create feelings

Think/learn/understand – deliver information, aid understanding, and create recall

Connect – establish brand identity and associations, transform a product into

abrand with distinctive personality and image

Believe – change attitudes, create conviction and preference, stimulate trust

Act – stimulate trial, purchase, repurchase or some other form of action, such as

visiting a store or website

Targeting

The target decision is particularly important in planning a message strategy. It is

essential to understand what moves this group.

Branding and Positioning

The demands of the brand are also important considerations. Brand positions and

brand images are created through message strategies and brought to life through

advertising executions. Finding the right position is difficult enough, but figuring out

how to communicate that position in an attention-getting message that is consistent

across multiple executions and various media further heightens the challenge.

The classic “Think Small” campaign that launched the VW Beetle shown in the

textbook is an example of advertising that created a powerful brand name at the same

time as it carved out a unique position in a cluttered auto market.

Advertising and other forms of marketing communication are critical to creating what

brand guru Kevin Keller calls brand salience, that is, the brand is visible and has a

presence in the marketplace, consumers are aware of it, and the brand is important to

its target market.

In addition to brand salience – measured by top-of-mind awareness – another

objective for branding and positioning campaigns is to create trust. We buy familiar

brands because we’ve used them before and we trust them to deliver on their

promises.

MESSAGE STRATEGIES

Once you have objectives stated, how do you go about translating those goals into

strategies? Remember, there is no one right way to do advertising—in most cases

there are a number of ways to achieve a communication objective.

Planners search for the best message design – the approach that makes the most sense

given the brand’s marketing situation and the target audience’s needs and interests.

Which Strategic Approach to Use?

First, let’s review some simple ways to express a strategic approach—head or heart and

hard or softsell. Then we’ll look at some more complex models that get a little deeper

into the complexities of message strategy.

Head and Heart

In the Facets model the cognitive objectives generally speak to the head and the

affective objectives are more likely to speak to the heart. However, sometimes a

strategy is designed to inform the mind as it touches the emotions.

Another way to refer to head and heart strategies are hard- and soft-sell approaches. A

hard sell is an informational message that is designed to touch the mind and create a

response based on logic. The assumption is that the target audience wants information

and will make a rational product decision.

A soft sell uses emotional appeals or images to create a response based on attitudes,

moods, and feelings. The assumption with soft-sell strategies is that the target

audience has little interest in an information search and will respond more favorably

to a message that touches their emotions or presents an attractive brand image. A

soft-sell strategy can be used for hard products.

However, there are examples of ads designed to stir emotions that did not work

because they were too manipulative or raised inappropriate emotions. It is possible to

manipulate emotions in a way that viewers and listeners resent. But sometimes high

emotion works.

Systems of Strategies

Head or heart, hard sell or soft sell—these terms all refer to some basic, simple ideas

about message strategy, but creative strategy is often more complex. Frazer’s Six

Creative Strategies and Taylor’s Strategy Wheel offer more complex approaches.

Professor Charles Frazer proposed a set of six creative strategies that address various

types of message situations. Although not comprehensive, these terms are useful to

identify some common approaches to strategy. They are preemptive, unique selling

proposition, brand image, positioning, resonance, and affective/anomalous.

 A description of each strategy and its uses is detailed in a table in the textbook. The

preemptive strategy shows up in competitive advertising where one competitor tries

to build a position or lay a claim before others enter the market. We saw an example

of this when the coffee wars between Starbucks and McDonald’s erupted after

McDonald’s introduced its McCafe line of fancy coffees at lower prices.

Professor Ron Taylor developed a model that divides strategies into the transmission

view, which is similar to the more rational “head” strategies, and the ritual view,

which is similar to the more feeling-based “heart” strategies. He then divides each

into three segments: rational, acute need, and routine on the transmission side and

ego, social, and sensory on the ritual side. In the A Matter of Principle feature in this

chapter, Professor Taylor explains his model in detail.

Strategic Formats

Even though advertising is a search for a new and novel way to express some basic truth,

there are also some tried and true approaches that have worked over the years. These

tried and true approaches are outlined below.

Lectures and Dramas

Most advertising messages use a combination of lecture and drama to reach the head

or the heart of the consumer. A lecture is a serious instruction given verbally. The

speaker presents evidence and uses a technique such as an argument to persuade the

audience. Lectures are relatively inexpensive to produce, and are compact and

efficient. The phrase talking head is used to refer to an announcer who delivers a

lecture about a product.

Drama relies on the viewer to make inferences about the brand. Usually the drama is

in the story that the reader has to construct around the cues in the ad. Through

dramas, advertisers tell stories about their products; the characters speak to each

other, not to the audience. Viewers learn from commercial dramas by inferring

lessons from them and by applying those lessons to their everyday lives.

Psychological Appeals

The psychological appeal of the product to the consumer is also used to describe a

message that primarily appeals to the heart. An appeal connects with some emotion

that makes the product particularly attractive or interesting, such as security, esteem,

sex, and sensory pleasure. Although emotion is at the base of most appeals, in some

situations, appeals can also have a logical dimension. Appeals generally pinpoint the

anticipated response of the audience to the product and the message.

Selling Strategies

A selling premise states the logic behind the sales offer. A premise is a proposition on

which an argument is based or a conclusion is drawn. To have a practical effect on

customers, managers must identify the product’s features or attributes in terms of

those that are most important to the target audience. Another type of selling premise is

a claim, which is a product-focused strategy that is based on a prediction about how

the product will perform.

Here is a summary of rational customer-focused selling premises:

Benefit. The benefit emphasizes what the product can do for the user by

translating the product feature or attribute into something that benefits the

consumer.

Promise. A promise is a benefit statement that looks to the future and predicts

that something good will happen if you use the product.

Reason why. A type of benefit statement that gives you the reason why you

should buy something, although the reason sometimes is implied or assumed.

Unique selling proposition (USP). A USP is a benefit statement that is both

unique to the product and important to the user. The USP is a promise that

consumers will get this unique benefit by using this product only.

Most selling premises demand facts, proof, or explanations to support the sales

message. The proof, or substantiation, needed to make a claim believable, is called

support. In many cases, this calls for research findings. With claims, and particularly

with comparisons, the proof is subject to challenge by a competitor as well as

industry review boards.

Other Message Formulas

In addition to the basic categories of selling premises, some common message

formulas emphasize different types of effects. The planner uses these terms as a way

to give direction to the creative team and to shape the executions. Here are some of

them:

A straightforward factual or informational message conveys information

without any gimmicks, emotions, or special effects.

A demonstrationfocuses on how to use the product or what it can do for you.

A comparisoncontrasts two or more products to show the advertiser’s brand

superiority. The comparison can be either direct or indirect.

In a problem solution format, also known as product-as-hero, the message

begins with a problem and the product is the solution. A variation is the

problem avoidancemessage format, in which the product helps avoid a

problem.

 Advertisers use humoras a creative strategy because it is attention-getting and

they hope that people will transfer the warm feelings they have as they are

being entertained to the product.

The slice-of-life format is an elaborate version of a problem solution staged in

the form of a drama in which “typical people” talk about a common problem

and resolve it.

In the spokesperson or endorser format, the ad features celebrities, created

characters, experts we respect, or someone “just like us” whose advice we

might seek out to speak on behalf of the product to build credibility. A recent

FTC rule makes endorsers as well as advertisers liable for false or

unsubstantiated claims, so spokespersons have to be very careful about what

they say about products they advertise.

Teasers are mystery ads that don’t identify the product or don’t deliver enough

information to make sense, but they are designed to arouse curiosity. These

are often used to launch a new product.

The use of celebrities as spokespersons, endorsers, or brand symbols is an

important strategy because it associates the brand positively – or negatively – with

a famous person and qualities that make that person a celebrity. In the past,

celebrities were often reluctant to appear for a brand because they feared it might

tarnish their image. More recently, advertisers have worried about celebrities they

have signed who tarnish the brand’s image.

There are a number of ways to measure a celebrity’s appeal or influence, such as

the E score, the Q score, and the Davie Brown Index. These scores are not just

related to conventional celebrities. In social media, anyone who attracts a lot of

followers can be identified as an ‘influencer.’ Klout and PeerIndex are rating

services for social media.

Matching Messages to Objectives

What types of messages deliver which objectives? The Facets Model can be helpful in

thinking through objectives and their related strategies.

Messages that get attention. To be effective, an advertisement needs to get

exposure through the media buy and get attention through the message. Getting

consumers’ attention requires stopping power. Creative advertising breaks through

the old patterns of seeing and saying things—the unexpectedness of the new idea

creates stopping power. Intrusiveness is particularly important in cluttered

markets, and curiosity is particularly important for teaser strategies.

Messages that create interest.Keeping attention reflects the ad’s pulling

power.An interesting thought keeps reader or viewer attention and pulls them

through to the end of the message. Ads that open with questions or dubious

statements are designed to create curiosity.

Messages that resonate. Ads that amplify the emotional impact of a message by

engaging a consumer in a personal connection with a brand are said to resonate

with the target audience.

Messages that create believability. Advertising sometimes uses a credibility

strategy to intensify the believability of a message. Using data to support or prove

a claim is critical.

Messages that are remembered.Not only do messages have to stop (get attention)

and pull (create interest), they also have to stick (in memory), which is another

important part of the perceptual process. Most advertisements are carefully

designed to ensure that these memory traces are easy to recall.

Principle: A message needs to stop (get attention) and pull (create interest. It also

has to stick (be memorable).

Repetition is used in both media and message strategy to ensure memorability.

Jingles are valuable memorability devices because the music allows the advertiser

to repeat a phrase or product name without boring the audience. Clever phrases

are useful not only because they grab attention, but also because they can be

repeated to intensify memorability.

Brand communication uses slogans for brands and campaigns, such as “Get Met.

It Pays” (MetLife) or Nike’s slogan “Just Do It.” Taglines are used at the end of

an ad to summarize the point of the ad’s message in a highly memorable way.

Many print and interactive ads and most television commercials feature a key

visual, a vivid image that the advertiser hopes will linger in the viewer’s mind.

Color may be a memory cue, as with Wrigley’s Doublemint Gum.

Messages that touch emotions.Emotional appeals create feeling-based responses

such as love, fear, anxiety, envy, sexual attraction, happiness and joy, sorrow,

safety and security, pride, pleasure, embarrassment, and nostalgia. Appetite

appeal uses mouth-watering food shots to elicit feelings of hunger and craving,

like the photo in the Quaker Trail Mix Bar print ad. A more general emotional

goal is to deliver a message that people like in order to create liking for the brand.

Messages that inform. Companies often use news announcements to provide

information about new products, to tout reformulated products, or even let

consumers know about new uses for old products. The news angle, which is often

delivered by publicity stories, is information focused. Comparison ads are often

heavy on information and used to explain a product’s point of difference and

competitive advantage.

Messages that teach. People learn through instruction so some advertisements are

designed to teach, such as demonstrations that show how something works or how

to solve a problem. Educational messages are sometimes designed to explain

something. Learning is also strengthened through repetition, which is why

repetition is such an important media objective.

Messages that persuade. Persuasive messages are designed to affect attitudes and

create belief. Endorsements by celebrities or experts are used to intensify

conviction. Conviction is often built on strong, rational arguments that use such

techniques as test results, before-and-after visuals, testimonials by users and

experts, and demonstrations to prove something. Celebrities, product placements,

and other credibility techniques are used to give the consumer permission to

believe a claim or selling premise.

Principle:When advertising gives consumers permission to believe in a product, it

establishes the platform for conviction.

Messages that create brand associations.The transformative power of branding,

where the brand takes on a distinctive character and meaning, is one of marketing

communication’s most important functions. Image advertising is used to create a

representation of a brand, an image in a consumer’s mind through symbolism.

Advertising’s role is to provide the cues that make these meanings and

experiences come together in a coherent brand image.

Messages that drive action.Even harder to accomplish than conviction is a change

in behavior. It often happens that people believe one thing and do another. Sales

promotion, for example, works in tandem with advertising to stimulate immediate

action using sampling, coupons, and free gifts as incentives for action.

Most ads end with a signature of some kind that serves to identify the company or

brand, but it also serves as a call to action and gives direction to the consumer

about how to respond, such as a toll-free number, a website URL, or an e-mail

address.

Ultimately, advertisers want loyal customers who purchase and repurchase the

product as a matter of habit or preference. Reminder advertising, as well as

distributing coupons or introducing a continuity program, is designed to keep the

brand name in front of customers to encourage their repeat business.