Researching Advertising Approaches

NHS smokefree adverts
These NHS ads disgust the viewers as a way to shock them. Because this is an anti-smoking campaign its trying to steer people away, so I think showing something disgusting will do this by making them remember the advert when smoking again. For this kind of advertising its perfect,but it isn't always appropriate to show at certain times. If a young child saw this it'd probably scare them. That means the advert has done it's job but a child doesn't need to see it,so I think showing an advert like this is good to show at 9pm on TV when a child won't be watching it. I think there is a certain line though that adverts shouldn't cross to shock an audience,using something like excessive gore or isn't really necessary to get a point across and can be too much for people to watch and actually get the message from.

The Sandy Hook school shooting advert is another example of shock advertising. It subverts expectations with the sudden ending which creates a very powerful message. This doesn't use gore like the NHS adverts so its not visually disturbing but the shock is still there. Its done to make the advert and the message stick in your mind. I think this might be fine to show at most times as its not graphic but is probably better suited to a channel with a teenage and above audience because the content isn't so relevant to younger children.

Using these adverts and my research on Nespresso adverts I can tell that more information and safety based advertising is more likely to use shock as a tactic than regular products do. This is because they want you to remember a message,but products want you to buy them. They do this by using celebrities that show off how good the product is or that they can afford such big names thanks to their quality.

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