THEME OF THE MONTH: CREATIVITY

The digital age brings many simplifications. But they don’t always mean a shift for the better. Orlando Wood, CEO of System 1 and author of the award-winning books Lemon and Look Out, points out that advertising effectiveness has been declining since 2006. This is mainly due to the way creatives have been gripped by the media, which since the start of the millennium has increasingly moved away from narrative storytelling towards a generic concepts without faces and emotions.

However, audiences are turning away from such advertising, which reflects how the left hemisphere of the brain works – it is directed ‘inwards’, which  makes it increasingly difficult for the ad to be seen and to capture the viewers attention. Thats why almost 75 % of online ads do not deliver the results they are expected to. And it’s precisely by connecting the dots on the creative – emotion – attention – effectiveness line.

“We need to create a spectacle to open the eyes and warm the hearts of those we want to persuade,” says Wood. It’s the large TV screen versus the phone screen that gives such advertising the space to shine.

Creativity plays one of the most important roles in delivering the results of advertising campaigns. So how should you design advertising in light of these findings to become more engaging and to help build brands?

And creativity plays one of the crucial roles in delivering the results of advertising campaigns. So how do we design advertising in light of these findings to engage and help build brands? Follow the creativity tag, under which we bring you the latest trends on this issue.

Karen Howe recently spoke about this too in a webinar for Canada’s ThinkTV. Check out the article from her talk.

ScreenVoice magazine uploaded an article dedicated to creativity in advertising too. See also a selection of inspiring articles in the “Read on the topic” section.