Thursday, June 5, 2008

Advertisements

Introduction
I took Advertising for my essay because I am very much interested in advertising and mostly it is the important tool to promote or sell any products. Maybe it can be a small or big product, it needs advertising for its promotion. Advertising is a marketing tool like other marketing tools such as sales promotions, personal selling or publicity. It is a form of communication to inform potential customers about products and services to obtain and use them. There are mainly two types of advertisements, ‘print ads’ and ‘commercial ads’. Advertising delivers the message through television, radio, movies, magazines, newspapers, internet etc. In this is essay Iam explaining about different types of ads, successful ads and influence of photography in ads.

Different Types of Ads – Print Ads & Commercial Ads

Print Ads

Print Ads are the most commonly used ads. It is delivered to the public through various Medias such as news paper, magazines, posters, billboards, ambient media etc. It can be done on telephone screens, shopping carts, skywriting, bus stop benches, human directional, town criers, sides of buses or airplanes ("logojets"), taxicab doors, roof mounts, musical stage shows, subway platforms and trains, elastic bands on disposable diapers, stickers on apples in supermarkets, shopping cart handles, backs of event tickets and supermarket receipts.

Commercial Ads

Commercial Ads can be divided into two types. It can be a television ad or it can be a radio ad.

Television Ad

A television commercial is a span of television programming produced and paid for by an organization that conveys a message. The vast majority of television advertisements today consist of brief advertising spots, ranging in length from a few seconds to several minutes. The effect of television advertisements is so successful among the audience because of the catchy video and songs in it, which will remain in the minds of the television viewers for a long time.

Radio Ad

Radio commercial is an old form of advertising which is promoted through the radio. It was a strong advertising medium when there were no televisions. The coming of television made it unpopular among the audience, but the emergence of FM channels made it popular again among the public. Still now radio is the only medium used to convey news and advertisements in some parts of the world.

How Ads are successful?

There are many elements to make a successful advertisement. They can be
Headline
Body Copy
Subheads and
Visuals

Headline
The message in the headline will account for up to 70% of the readership of an advertisement.
Body Copy
Body copy is the main text found in publications or it is the text of stories and articles telling the reader how a product or service can help them.
Subheads
It’s important to use big bold headlines and strong, benefit oriented subheads in your copy. If you hook your prospect with the headline, they'll next skim the body copy looking for a reason to read on. If you give it to them quickly and concisely through subheads, the reader will read as much more as you give them.

Visuals
Photography is the most important part in advertising. Photos are always better than illustrations in stopping power.

Modern Advertisements

In today’s modern competitive world, advertisements are of great importance. Almost all companies invest a lot of money on advertisements, in order to prove that they are better than their competitors. Nowadays companies are coming up with very creative ideas in order to attract the attention of the potential customers and grabbing them towards the company’s products or services. They are not following any particular rules and regulations that were followed until now, these companies are ready to adopt any possible method to attract the customers. The following are the best examples of such advertisements.













A good advertisement consists of three main elements:
1] concept
2] photography
3] slogans
But this is always not the same. A combination of two of the elements above can also make a successful advertisement, but it all depends on the medium that the company is using to convey the concept of the advertisement.
For example, in the following advertisement the company McCafe has only used photography to convey the message or concept.


Durex is the best example of how to create a strong advertisement by only using a strong slogan.




The following one is a social awareness advertisement created using vector graphic. This advertisement has made efficient use of it.