Advertising
nowadays is no longer fresh as compared to the period of World War II. During
the period, the role of advertising is advocating propaganda in order to
embrave people protest their country. Today, in contrast, the role of
advertising is helping certain brand to sell product or service to consumer (receiver).
However, the great exposure of advertising in different media has already made
people feel bored of it. ”Everything what is ordinary, is not interesting for
us”, this is the motto of United Colours of Benetton. This is a confession made
by a brand, what they intend to do is making a breakthrough. Therefore, the
emergence of “No Pain, No Gain” advertising tactic change this situation.
Detailedly, this strategy consists of shockvertising (portmenteau of “shock”
and “advertising”) and prankvertising (portmenteau of “prank” and
“advertising”). To advertisers, “pain” as inducing negative emotion of
receivers, “gain” is attracting their attention. It is actually helping clients
(brand) to stand out against the competitors.
The term “shockvertising” is not a new
thing to us nowadays. Its main purpose is utilizing the notion of creating a
shocking visual in order to generate a brand awareness. In addition, it is usually
used in social marketing, and implemented in campaign against abortion, animal
brutality, social inequality and so on. (Kubacka, 2012) Advertisers nowadays do
not submit to having the safe, accustomed and stereotypical advertising which
is considered as the boring one, and thus apply this tactic to sell certain
product. So, it becomes the magic key of some advertisers. Undoubtedly, the aim
of advertiser is focusing on higher sale of brand, and becoming famous through
advertising certain brand. This is the connation of “gain”, but it makes the
“value” and “image” of brand totally different. In this paper, the thesis is
“No Pain, No Gain” advertising method affects the brand image, also create
problem to our society.
The relationship between advertising and
consumer merits discussion. The intention of advertising is to create a
connection between brand and consumer, but “better” or “different” of a brand
image looked like not the primary consideration. There are so many arguments
about stereotypical advertising, aesthetically and morally. Aesthetically, some
advertising does not really sell the idea of one product, but selling the
idealized positive image, such as happiness, rich, and health. These are not
fully true that a brand can offer to consumer. In addition, those relatively
few advertisements which do contain false statements do untold damage to
advertising’s image. As Oliviero Toscani said, “There are no shocking pictures,
only shocking reality.” It is the core of shockvertising, but how true is the
reality? (Visually, fear appeal) From
here we could know that an image of certain brand biases more toward to
“different” by visualizing the message purely shocking.
Creativity is the most essential element
in advertising field. However, in “No Pain, No Gain” strategy, it would be
called “distorted creativity” which induces problem to society. The
advertisement which aims to be known as a provocative one has to touch the area
which is considered as a taboo by most of its receivers. (Paluchowski &
Zadłużna 2004, 50.) Concerning about the
rule and regulation of advertising, each country has its self-regulation in
advertising, but all of them do have a common aim which is to keep order of the
society. Advertisers “deliberately, startle and offend its audience by
violating norms for social values and personal ideals, hit their emotional
levels at a much stronger level, just to break through the advertising clutter
and grab their attention and also to attract an audience to a certain brand or
bring awareness to a certain public service issue.
Similar to the notion of shockvertising,
the latest trend nowadays is prankvertising. Its effectiveness is more powerful
than the shocking advertising which presented in flat graphic. The emergence of
the shocking visual is used to prank on random and unsuspected consumer in reality.
It makes thing more unpredictable, especially when this entertaining method
goes wrong, becomes a trigger of bad consequence.
- Morally, advertising ‘consists of exploiting human weakness through language, and the worst, a wicked misuse of other people’ (Hoggart, 1968: 54).
- The contrast of positive and negative brand image that the advertiser creates.
References:
Uprety, N (n.d.) Shockvertising: Method of Madness.
Available at: http://www.abhinavjournal.com/images/Commerce_&_Management/Jun13/7.pdf
Kubacka, N. (2012) The Power and Role of Benetton’
Shockvertising. [Online] Available at: http://www.theseus.fi/bitstream/handle/10024/48098/Kubacka_Natalia.pdf?sequence=1
[Accessed: 9th February, 2014].
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