went to a pub the other day; on the walls they had all sorts of kitsch old advertisments from the turn of the century. one particular ad for 'bile tablets' caught my eye, graphically describing the constipations of an edwardian housemaid.
anyway, in the bottom right was a small box offering a free sample of the tablets, all you had to was write to the company and provide your name and address and the name and date of the paper the advert was seen in. it was humbling to know that direct-response ads were being tested over a 100 years ago. considering how much everything else has evolved since then, have we really moved on that much?
Thursday, 11 December 2008
Tuesday, 2 December 2008
if you thought jonathan ross' career was heading south...
if you get a quiet moment of an evening, do check out paul ross' black book of horror on the paranormal channel. never has a programme title been more appropriate.
why the dub movement sucks
our correspondent writes:
if you have cable or satellite, you'll probably have access to the comedy channel. you may have even come across a show called 'badly dubbed porn'.as the title suggests, each episode consists of some low budget porn film overdubbed with amusing english dialogue. often the absurd 'plots' (such as they are), bizarre costumes, sets and locations are played upon to good effect. very funny.
not so the increasing prevalence of badly dubbed foreign adverts on our tv screens. not very funny and actually rather irritating for a number of reasons.
the trend towards using foreign locations and actors appears to have come out of the growing obsession of the euphemist term 'out-sourcing' – better known as 'the exportation of british jobs to cheap foreign workers'. you know what I'm talking about. try phoning bt customer support or any of the major banks and you're unlikely to talk to anyone based in the uk. you're even less likely to resolve whatever you were trying to sort out because the person on the other end lacks even basic english skills. Ironic don't you think for customer support. maybe that's the idea. the experience is so appalling that you just won't bother to try again.
growing 'globalisation' and the growth of the eu means a wider market for corporations and this inevitably means rationalisation of marketing strategies across a number of languages. so what started out as a cost-cutting exercise has transformed into a tool for marketing execs. to easily repackage the same ads for multiple markets. prague is apparently the favorite low-cost location for glade. which is fine if you market your product across europe. much of europe has a common landscape, both architecturally and culturally.
there are, however, issues when you try to use the same ads in the uk.
architecturally, the uk is quite individual. not only do we drive on the left side of the road, our buildings are a product of our unique history. past isolationist policies prevented large scale european influence on our culture. being an island nation also played its part. our landscape has been sculpted by a combination of geological effects and ancient farming practices. our history is written on the countryside, as well as on our towns and cities.
not a consideration when filming the latest barclaycard ad in rio de janeiro. it's quite plain to any viewer that the location used isn't anywhere in the uk. So… Barclaycard are trying to sell us a uk product, aimed at the uk market with advertising that is foreign. literally. why? well, we all know the answer to that one, but there are basic advertising principles being ignored here. the most basic is the prospective customer being able to relate to the product.
the easiest way to do this is to place the product in the environment of the prospective customer. Easy. this creates an instant affinity to the product. it's possible for the potential customer to see this product in their life, in their home, in their environment because that's where it's been placed. if you replace that environment with one that is literally 'foreign', that instant empathy is lost. location! location! location! as they say. because of this geographical anomaly, the product becomes detached from the target audience in a way similar to a crowd watching a football game instead of playing on the field. spectator instead of participent. Getting consumers to feel like they're part of what's being sold to them is half the trick of advertising. what surprises me is how popular that ad actually is. i'd rather eat glass than see it again.
don't get me wrong, i'm not against lavish foreign locations, as long as they're appropriate. barclaycard's previous campaigns were set in various foreign locations that worked because of the creative concept of being on holiday. They also featured british actors and dialogue. this current campaign is nothing more than a cheap vehicle for the waterslide concept.
car manufacturers face more specific problems when trying to 'port' foreign ads to the uk market. that's assuming they care enough to try and hide their origin. the most obvious being that uk vehicles are right-hand drive. one european car manufacturer recently released an ad obviously shot in europe, but with uk plates on the vehicles shown. so someone thinks it's important to make us think that this is taking place in our own environment. not very subtle though. it also requires creative photography so that vehicles aren't shown as being left-hand drive. tinted windows are one trick available. vauxhall use uk spec vehicles but in foreign locations. road markings and street furniture are another important consideration.
probably the most obvious problem is language. it's really very simple. english bears no resemblance to any european language. Pretty obvious you would say. The facial expressions physically caused by speech in any other language are almost impossible to match to english dialogue. well, obviously not a problem to these marketing execs who think that they can just dub english over what is plainly a foreign ad. it's painful to watch. the sound comes out, but the lips don't move! the current prime offender is the new mr muscle ad. apart from being appalling in every possible way from creative to execution, it is one of the worst examples of what I would call 'language rationalisation'. the original dialogue is so obviously foreign that the pathetic attempt to pretend it's english is just insulting. And this is my point.
marketing managers and executives think that people in the uk will buy a product that has been marketed primarily for the european market, with the uk only as an afterthought. as a consumer, i want to see manufacturers making an effort in their communication to me – or risk alienating me with lazy, cost-cutting advertising that is neither properly targeted nor tuned to me culturally.
this is particularly true in these tough economic times. cutting costs might seem like a good idea at the moment but it shows a basic lack of understanding for the target audience. does some suit sitting in a plush office somewhere really think I'm going to buy something on the recommendation of someone whose lips don't even move when they're talking?
of course, most people won't even notice these details and you might well might say "why does all this matter?". well, it does. these people are trying to sell me things 24/7. the least they can do is acknowledge where i'm from. perhaps we're all supposed to be 'europeans' or 'world citizens' now? Well, as a consumer, i don't want to be treated like a fool. "no-one will notice it's in rio de janeiro" isn't good enough. we all need to be more critical of the advertising that increasingly invades our lives and more discerning about the products and corporations we let into our lives and develop relationships with, increasingly, involuntarily.
so next time you flinch or cringe at some poorly crafted love scene you may have 'inadvertently' come across whilst in front of the entertainment machine, just wait until the advert break and settle back for some 'badly dubbed ads'. Now that really is pornography.
if you have cable or satellite, you'll probably have access to the comedy channel. you may have even come across a show called 'badly dubbed porn'.as the title suggests, each episode consists of some low budget porn film overdubbed with amusing english dialogue. often the absurd 'plots' (such as they are), bizarre costumes, sets and locations are played upon to good effect. very funny.
not so the increasing prevalence of badly dubbed foreign adverts on our tv screens. not very funny and actually rather irritating for a number of reasons.
the trend towards using foreign locations and actors appears to have come out of the growing obsession of the euphemist term 'out-sourcing' – better known as 'the exportation of british jobs to cheap foreign workers'. you know what I'm talking about. try phoning bt customer support or any of the major banks and you're unlikely to talk to anyone based in the uk. you're even less likely to resolve whatever you were trying to sort out because the person on the other end lacks even basic english skills. Ironic don't you think for customer support. maybe that's the idea. the experience is so appalling that you just won't bother to try again.
growing 'globalisation' and the growth of the eu means a wider market for corporations and this inevitably means rationalisation of marketing strategies across a number of languages. so what started out as a cost-cutting exercise has transformed into a tool for marketing execs. to easily repackage the same ads for multiple markets. prague is apparently the favorite low-cost location for glade. which is fine if you market your product across europe. much of europe has a common landscape, both architecturally and culturally.
there are, however, issues when you try to use the same ads in the uk.
architecturally, the uk is quite individual. not only do we drive on the left side of the road, our buildings are a product of our unique history. past isolationist policies prevented large scale european influence on our culture. being an island nation also played its part. our landscape has been sculpted by a combination of geological effects and ancient farming practices. our history is written on the countryside, as well as on our towns and cities.
not a consideration when filming the latest barclaycard ad in rio de janeiro. it's quite plain to any viewer that the location used isn't anywhere in the uk. So… Barclaycard are trying to sell us a uk product, aimed at the uk market with advertising that is foreign. literally. why? well, we all know the answer to that one, but there are basic advertising principles being ignored here. the most basic is the prospective customer being able to relate to the product.
the easiest way to do this is to place the product in the environment of the prospective customer. Easy. this creates an instant affinity to the product. it's possible for the potential customer to see this product in their life, in their home, in their environment because that's where it's been placed. if you replace that environment with one that is literally 'foreign', that instant empathy is lost. location! location! location! as they say. because of this geographical anomaly, the product becomes detached from the target audience in a way similar to a crowd watching a football game instead of playing on the field. spectator instead of participent. Getting consumers to feel like they're part of what's being sold to them is half the trick of advertising. what surprises me is how popular that ad actually is. i'd rather eat glass than see it again.
don't get me wrong, i'm not against lavish foreign locations, as long as they're appropriate. barclaycard's previous campaigns were set in various foreign locations that worked because of the creative concept of being on holiday. They also featured british actors and dialogue. this current campaign is nothing more than a cheap vehicle for the waterslide concept.
car manufacturers face more specific problems when trying to 'port' foreign ads to the uk market. that's assuming they care enough to try and hide their origin. the most obvious being that uk vehicles are right-hand drive. one european car manufacturer recently released an ad obviously shot in europe, but with uk plates on the vehicles shown. so someone thinks it's important to make us think that this is taking place in our own environment. not very subtle though. it also requires creative photography so that vehicles aren't shown as being left-hand drive. tinted windows are one trick available. vauxhall use uk spec vehicles but in foreign locations. road markings and street furniture are another important consideration.
probably the most obvious problem is language. it's really very simple. english bears no resemblance to any european language. Pretty obvious you would say. The facial expressions physically caused by speech in any other language are almost impossible to match to english dialogue. well, obviously not a problem to these marketing execs who think that they can just dub english over what is plainly a foreign ad. it's painful to watch. the sound comes out, but the lips don't move! the current prime offender is the new mr muscle ad. apart from being appalling in every possible way from creative to execution, it is one of the worst examples of what I would call 'language rationalisation'. the original dialogue is so obviously foreign that the pathetic attempt to pretend it's english is just insulting. And this is my point.
marketing managers and executives think that people in the uk will buy a product that has been marketed primarily for the european market, with the uk only as an afterthought. as a consumer, i want to see manufacturers making an effort in their communication to me – or risk alienating me with lazy, cost-cutting advertising that is neither properly targeted nor tuned to me culturally.
this is particularly true in these tough economic times. cutting costs might seem like a good idea at the moment but it shows a basic lack of understanding for the target audience. does some suit sitting in a plush office somewhere really think I'm going to buy something on the recommendation of someone whose lips don't even move when they're talking?
of course, most people won't even notice these details and you might well might say "why does all this matter?". well, it does. these people are trying to sell me things 24/7. the least they can do is acknowledge where i'm from. perhaps we're all supposed to be 'europeans' or 'world citizens' now? Well, as a consumer, i don't want to be treated like a fool. "no-one will notice it's in rio de janeiro" isn't good enough. we all need to be more critical of the advertising that increasingly invades our lives and more discerning about the products and corporations we let into our lives and develop relationships with, increasingly, involuntarily.
so next time you flinch or cringe at some poorly crafted love scene you may have 'inadvertently' come across whilst in front of the entertainment machine, just wait until the advert break and settle back for some 'badly dubbed ads'. Now that really is pornography.
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