What Is Most Important - Copy Or Pic?
When, some little time ago now, I first descended upon the advertising scene, we were a good deal more concerned than most people seem to be today about the nature of the business we found ourselves in. We were always holding debates - in the saloon bar of the Coach & Horses in New Bond Street, to be tiresomely precise - about the meaning of advertising, the significance of advertising, and the past, present and future of advertising. And an unconscionably serious lot we no doubt were. Not to mention drunk. Among the hardy perennials of our debates was the relevance of sex in advertising, and also the question of whether the copy element in ads was more important than the visual or vice versa. Of course, these were the days when it was possible for agency personnel to slope off round the pub during working hours and nobody on the management side of things turned so much as a hair at our absence. Just so long as the work got done on time, nobody gave so much as a tinker's cuss whether you were doing it in the office or down at the dog track. These days, agencies are a little more sanguine in their approach to creative people; and I recently heard of a designer being sacked on the spot for turning up at a client meeting wearing jeans - and I kid you not. But back to our hardy perennials. The 'sex in advertising' question was a hotly debated topic, mainly because the copywriters and designers in my milieu were always anxious to attend the relevant photo-shoots, and not because sex was liable to help sell anything. Thus, we were constantly coming up with speculative ad campaigns that featured semi-clad females so that we might catch a glimpse of a naked thigh or better. Few of these concepts saw the light of day, but it was always worth a try. As to the copy versus pic argument, this has still not been resolved to this day. Then, as now, I was on the side of the angels, holding that around 80 per cent of ads could, at a pinch, do without illustrations, whereas only about 2 per cent could do without words. (In regard to the other 18 per cent, you can make your own arrangements.) Such an argument, as you'd expect, was met with widespread alarm by the designers, who saw that I was presaging their redundancy. Then as now, they would do everything they could to give their illustrations the prominence they thought they deserved. This usually resulted in a design in which the pic took up four-fifths of the ad, while the copy was relegated to eight-point solid and rendered practically illegible. My attitude, obviously, was simply a debating stance - true though it undoubtedly is. I am not suggesting for a moment that 8 out of 10 ads should be wholly typographical. But if you take a dispassionate look around you, you might agree with me that a whole lot of ads (and brochures and websites, too, come to that) carry pictures for pictures' sake; and that in quite a few cases the pictures, far from helping the transmission of a message, actually hinder it. The biggest offenders in this respect are what might be describes as semi-industrial ads. Just leaf through a trade mag (or brochure or website) and you'll see irrelevance in illustration well carried out. You'll see, for instance, pictures of the factory or, as they call it these days, the production operation. You'll see pics of two obvious male models in white coats staring idiotically at a computer screen or a blueprint. And you'll see pics of two obvious male models, plus a female model, in white coats staring idiotically at a computer screen. The female is included in the latter pic because the designer had originally planned for her to be shot with her clothes off. Here's what I think. With today's wonderful digital photography opportunities, with an instant replay of whatever has been shot, one might hope that illustrations in ads, brochures and websites might be made more relevant. They might actually show the product in action - demonstration is, after all, the soul of advertising. But, no, we still get pics which have nothing whatsoever to do with the product or its benefits. I don't mind admitting that there can be few people in the whole wide world who know less about photography than I do. What I do know, however, is that promotional material is far better off without an illustration if that illustration does not augment the sales message. So, in this respect, copy is more important than illustration. Mind you, there is a lot of copy around that doesn't augment the sales message either. But that's another story. About The Author Patrick Quinn is an award winning copywriter with 40 years' experience of the advertising business in London, Miami, Dublin and Edinburgh. He publishes a FREE online monthly newsletter, AdBriefing, designed for those who have a very real interest in producing good advertising. Subscriptions are available at: http://www.adbriefing.com j.p@markethillpublishing.co.uk
MORE RESOURCES:
Advertising - Google News |
 |
|
|
RELATED ARTICLES
Cable TV Advertising; Mobile Detailing Customers If you own a mobile detailing business or mobile car wash company you should have the local cable company as one of your clients. You may even find your self with some free publicity. How to Write Ads that Pull Orders If your ads aren't paying off then you need this quick method in writing ads that get orders. Step 1 - Write a headline that will draw attention to your product or service. Add More Pizzazz To Your Ad For More Profits I recently completed a Marketing Makeover for an Adthat wasn't generating results for the owner of a Piano Tuning Business.Here is the original ad:========================================A BETTER PIANOA well tuned and adjusted piano is a beautiful instrument. The Power of... You certainly must know that Many Big Marketers consider COPYWRITING to be the most important skill you need to be earning online.There's a lot of good copywriting around. Radio Advertising - Is it for Your Business? - More Small Business Power Tools If you're a typical small business, you've probably been approached by at least several different radio station sales representatives. In most cases, he or she comes armed with all the latest rating information demonstrating, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that his or her station is number one among just the kind of people who would buy your products or services. The Man With The Grasshopper Mind The title of this article also happens to be one of the "20 Greatest Headlines Ever Written."Did you know, just changing the headline has been known to dramatically improve the effectiveness of an ad or sales letter by up to 1700 percent? Yes, headlines are that powerful--and that important!However, over the last few years, I've noticed a proliferation of badly written--or just plain weak headlines--both online and off!Particularly disturbing is the copycat syndrome. 16 Ways to Make Your Business Cards Unforgettable Every time you hear someone say "May I have one of your business cards?" you should get excited. I know I do. Is Your Yellow Pages Ad Putting Cash in Your Pocket... or Sucking Cash Out? Any idea? It's a question that more than a few Yellow Page advertisers ponder. If you are currently spending money every month to run an ad in your local directory, you don't want to wrestle with that question. Diamonds Are For Evil The task of executing successful advertising campaigns for products made exclusively for women is understatedly tempestuous. Any Average Joe consumer would relay the message that feminine product commercials put him under a great deal of stress and discomfort. How Can All the Radio Stations Be #1? Are you confused by all the information you receive from various radio stations? Do they all tell you they are #1 and you don't know who to believe? Most of them probably are #1 so believe it or not, they aren't lying to you. The question is, "What are they #1 in and is it a group of ears you want to reach?"Quite often a radio "Account Manager" or "Account Executive" which are pseudonyms for radio sales person, receives a call from someone who states they are gathering information for someone else, the real decision maker, someone who is looking at radio as a possible advertising medium. Testing Headlines A correspondent to AdBriefing, my monthly newsletter, has posed a very sticky question. How, she asks, can you tell whether a headline you have written is a good one?or not? What she means by this, I imagine, is whether the headline will actually help to make sales, rather than just act as a passing amusement to its readers. Using The Popularity of Celebrities and Currrent Events to Promote Your Business In this article, we want to explore the idea of using the popularity of celebrities and current event (news) topics to help market any internet business.The IdeaCelebrities and news events are not only popular topics, they are also popular "keywords" in the major search engines. 100 Excellent Words and 70 Action Getting Phrases for Ad Writing 100 Excellent Words Absolutely. Amazing. If You Want To Get More Customers, Heres 10 Powerful Stories To Improve Your Ads Remember, as a child lying in bed and listening to stories. Remember how engaged you were. Buying Radio? Read This and Dont Waste Your Money Pay close attention and make it work the best for you.No doubt you've listened to, and then quickly deleted, messages from account execs from your local radio stations. Why Hire an Advertising/Marketing Consultant? As a business owner, you have the option of taking several different approaches to handling your Marketing and Advertising. You may choose to handle the responsibility yourself, with the idea that no one understands your business quite the way you do. What Do Your Ads Say? Make a list of everything you think should beincluded at one time or another, in one of yourad, be it radio, newspaper or Little Jimmie'sclass play program.Everything. The Key To Marketing New Ideas! Imagine tossing a pebble into a crystal clear pond on a still day, & watching the ripples make their way to the shore. A tiny cause has a massive effect. Do Your Adverts Get You More Sales? Philadelphia retailer and US Postmaster General, John Wanamaker, once said, "Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don't know which half."If you're spending $10,000 a month on advertising $5,000 is going straight down the tubes. How To Write Eye-Grabbing Headlines That Catapult Your Prospects Into Your Ads If you're interested in improving the selling results of your ads, tweaking your headlines is a great place to start. Because your headlines influence the sales results of your ad more than any other element.
|
