Sunday, March 28, 2010

Week 7: Tourism Advertising







One of the most successful advertising campaign in the tourism sector is the Incredible India campaign. I studied abroad on Semester at Sea which travelled to 11 different countries, one of which was India. I remember seeing the campaign, which was launched in 2007, before I went on the trip and being mesmerized by the imagery. I think that is one of the most important tools that advertisers can use for a travel and tourism client. By showing a vivid and compelling photo, viewers are immediately drawn in and begin to envision themselves in that location. I know that those advertisements made up my visual opinion of India prior to my arrival and the country itself didn't fail to be incredible! I think that this campaign is also so effective because they have taken two simple words and made them into a recognizable brand. Instead of just India, the country has become Incredible India because the campaign has been so successful in bringing tourism into the rapidly growing nation. The campaign is not only shown in print (such as the 3 ads above) but has also been put to TV spots as well as a website for India's department of tourism (http://www.incredibleindia.org/index.html). Overall, the main purpose of tourism advertising is to make your audience want to travel to your country or go to your monument or sight, and I think the Incredible India does just that!

Sunday, March 7, 2010

Week 6: Long Copy Ads

This week, I will be talking about Long Copy Ads. These ads are somewhat rare in today's magazines because people are too busy to sit and read a bunch of copy. They do, however, thrive in newspapers, where readers are dedicated to reading the paper every morning instead of just glancing over the headlines online like the rest of the world. Here are three long copy ads that I think did a really good job at capturing the readers attention right away with the first sentence.




This ad for Panera is a perfect example of a long copy ad that rewards the viewer at the end of the copy. In this case, by simply having "Break Bread" at the end of the body, the reader understands the connection. It is also effective because you do not need to read the whole paragraph to understand the meaning of the ad. Right away, the reader understands that these are a bunch of enemies. Therefore, even if they skip to the bottom, Panera is still able to get the humorous message across.




This is another example of a long copy ad where the message is revealed in the closing sentence. It is not until the reader is finished with the copy that they realize that it's content isn't what is important. Instead, VW uses it to show that while they were reading, they were emitting the same amount of CO2 that the new Passat EcoFuel emits in one kilometer. I think this is effective because it is more original than having just an image of the car and some eco friendly tagline, which is what a lot of automakers have been doing recently.



Finally, this long copy ad for the New York Stock Exchange grabs people's attention by using different typefaces and colors to create contrast. Instead of just having one long paragraph in one color and typeface, this visually dynamic copy makes people more interested and willing to read it. I also think that it's even more creative because once you read it you start to realize that each typeface is connected to a company on the stock exchange. For example, "just do it" was the one that stuck out to me the most as both Nike's tagline and logo typeface. This also proves just how brand aware today's society is, so I think it was smart for the NYSE to take advantage of that trend.