Elf and Safety gone mad?

Or inspired advertising?

Check out the British Biscuit Advisory Board campaign for Fox's Rocky biscuit bar.

And be careful out there!

Stupid?

McDonald's have started a series of ads with punny captions e.g. 'Gherkin or gherkout'.

I was amused to see the 'painfully thick' milkshake poster (although I'm not sure if they're talking about their product or their customers).

I think they're trying to compete with the classic Economist campaigns. Just do a Google image search and you'll see how cleverly it's been done before.

Carpetweasels

Usually, I write about words. Today, I'm writing about numbers. Pay attention now.

CarpetRight ads proudly proclaim 'UP TO 50% OFF, THEN AN EXTRA 20%!'

To the untrained eye, this looks like a whopping 70% discount.

Look again.

£100 x 50% = £50 off

£50 x 20% = £10 off

i.e. 60% off the original price.

Is this a trick you can use?

Today's winner of the 'odd exhortation' award

So the Government want us to reduce CO2 emissions by discouraging driving. They've done some calculations and reckon that asking us all to drive 5 miles less each week will make a useful difference.

Drive 5 miles less

Trouble is, this objective doesn't make sense.

'What, I have to stop and park 5 miles before I reach my destination? Not bloomin' likely,' thinks Ms Average.

If the message was about cutting out one short car journey per week, it might be more effective. Why? Because ad campaigns ought to use the same language that real people use.

Sainsduds

Last week, my local supermarket (guess who!) gave me a voucher for double loyalty points on my next trip.

This week, I presented my voucher and they refused it for no apparent reason. 'Computer says no.'

Collecting loyalty points is not the biggest thrill in my life. But having my hopes raised and then dashed again is worse than never having them raised in the first place.

Today's tip: If you are running any kind of loyalty scheme, make sure it works before you launch it!

Aha!

Thanks to the new GHD 'twisted fairytale' Rapunzel ad, at last I know what GHDs are!

Good Hair Day hair straighteners.

Not that I plan to buy any. I'm a curly girly (and proud of it).

SAUSAGES!!!

There was a lot of fuss when Kennedy's, the family butchers, finally closed its doors. People wrote to the local paper to complain about how much they would miss their favourite sausages.

Cleverly, my local sausage shop saw it as an opportunity. They're great at PR. Whenever you see anyone trying to make sausages on TV, it's probably them.

They analysed the traditional Kennedy's recipe until they were able to produce a comparable sausage called Ken'n'Eddie's. Local people are now flocking to Villager's in Beckenham High Street.

And guess what I'm having for dinner tonight!

"You can't sack this!"

I love the delivery a la David Brent.

The other great thing is the offer. If you don't find love in 6 months you get the next 6 months free. Not sure it would work for customers. But it works for the advertiser!

What can you do to take away the risk for your new prospects?

Interaction

Ant and Dec are the perfect pair to front this Nintendo campaign for the WiiFit. Their relaxed interaction with the public makes the ads a joy to watch.

It works because they look as though they are genuinely enjoying it. Mind you, so would I, if I was pocketing £1 million out of the deal!

Run, rabbit, run!

The Duracell bunny has evolved. What used to be a cute fluffy bunny banging a drum is now a swarm of animated bunnies that rush over a cliff edge like lemmings then morph into a sumo wrestler, an elephant and other 'powerful' shapes.

Trouble is, it's not cute any more.

Read the history of the Duracell bunny.

Have you noticed how cheesy everyone is?

Happy £1 Bargains
Watch the ad...

I've never been to Iceland. But I don't believe it's as full of happy shoppers as this ad would have us believe. Do you?

Sigh.

The huge Tesco store in Purley has several large signs around the store reading:

"November see's the biggest roleout of Tesco Clubcard."

Isn't it depressing when even the biggest companies with the biggest budgets can't put a little punctuation in the right place.