That Gormandizer Man

What Steve Hadfield thinks about marketing and advertising

Number Four: Steve Hadfield

Your name: Steve Hadfield
Your age: 57
Your location: Hartlepool, UK
What you do for a living: Site Manager
How you know me – if you do: Me dad.

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Q1: What do you think about advertising?
A1: It's required to sell products. It's the only way to sell things. I wouldn't know about a lot of things without it.

Q2: Which ads have you liked recently? Why?
A2: I like the ads with funny characters in them because it takes the boredom out of it. Meerkat and Argos with the 4 aliens are good. It gets my attention more because it's funny. But I saw a Halfords one earlier that wasn't funny, and that got my notice because I needed a sprocket set so I watched it. I go to the [social] club and I always ask people if they've seen the funny ads on the telly.

Q3: Can you remember any ads from the past? Which?
A3: Brooke Bond Tea with the chimps. Mashed potato with the little metal things. I can't remember the brand though.

Q4: In a sentence, and without googling!, describe what you think a brand is.
A4: An item.

Q5: Which brands are you loyal to, or passionate about now? Why?
A5: [Dad didn't think he was loyal at any, but then I pressed him knowing there was one brand he always goes for] Oh yeah - Carling! I like Carling. It's the taste I like. I know the ads have been on, but I couldn't describe them to you, I can't remember them.

Q6: When was the last time you took advantage of an offer? Who and why?
A6: Halfords. Sprocket Set earlier today. There is 50% off an it's a good quality set. I saw the ad then went online earlier and looked at other peoples reviews. The reviews were good so I spent more on that one than a cheaper one because of the reviews online. I copied the name of the Halfords one and then googled it to see people's reviews. The cheaper one was £20 cheaper but the reviews weren't as good. So when I found out that was the one I went on the Halfords website and reserved it, then we popped in earlier to pick it up.

Q7: Do you think advertising and marketing is good for society?
A7: [Pulls a funny face] I've never really thought about it...

Q8: Do you think advertising helps sway your opinion on whether to buy something or not?
A8: It doesn't sway my opinion but you do look at the product and work out if it's going to be a good deal. I never watch ads and think "I'm going to buy that" but I do think "Oh I'll look into that" and then it's in my head.

Q9: If you worked in advertising, how would you do things differently?
A9: It's something I've never really though of.

Q10: Would you like to ask the advertising industry any questions?
A10: It's not that I don't care about advertising, but I'm just happy to leave it to other people.

What Other People think about Marketing and Advertising

So I started a new section of the blog a while back where I asked normal people what they think about marketing and advertising. The purpose for this was just to remind myself once in a while of the real people on the street.

The industry is great at discussing and sharing new awards, new technologies, new hypotheses and personal egos with all and sundry. So much so, I think, that lots of people within the industry completely lose sight of the fact that there is life outside of it.

That's anathema to the way I think, and the way I believe a good planner needs to think in order to do their job properly.

Anyway, I started this new series and my friend Tom Harle emailed me and said he liked it and asked if he minded if he could do something similar. Not at all. Tom has started his series over on his blog over here and it's very interesting - you should give it a read.

What Emma Scutt thinks about marketing and advertising

Number Three: Emma Scutt

Your name: Emma Scutt
Your age: 40
Your location: London E17
What you do for a living: Freelance mural artist
How you know me – if you do: via Twitter
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Q1: What do you think about advertising?
A1: To be honest I think there's too much of it around. There's a bewildering amount of advertising from all angles these days, there's no escape! Whether on television, radio, on-line, magazines and newspapers, there's constant bombardment. I understand that it's necessary for brands and products to get their messages out there and attract the attention of potential buyers, but I sometimes feel it's a little overwhelming.

Q2: Which ads have you liked recently? Why?
A2: Most adverts go in one ear and out the other, but there's a few that have stayed in my head for a while. I wouldn't say "like" is the right word, but I thnk the NSPCC "stop" campaign was extremely effective at getting it's message across. I like the apple iPod ads as they're fun, colourful and punchy. And the Sony Bravia ads with the colourful rabbits/bouncing balls/paint were beautiful.


Q3: Can you remember any ads from the past? Which?
A3: The Guiness ads are works of art in their own right - the "white horses" surfing one was stunning and always seems to crop up in best advert awards. Also the recent Cadbury ads have been fun and innovative. I thought Cadbury were brave to go down that road, as the actual product didn't even feature in the ad, yet the adverts were such a talking point that the brand awareness must have increased hugely.


Q4: In a sentence, and without googling!, describe what you think a brand is.
A4: A brand represnts the visual identity of a product, and it's core values.


Q5: Which brands are you loyal to, or passionate about now? Why?
A5: Apple - To me their products instantly represent quality, style, and beautiful yet functional, innovative design.
John Lewis, Boots and M&S - Traditional, tried and trusted dependable British brands which consistently offer excellent quality and value for money.
Heinz - I've tried the cheaper supermarket own-brand versions and I'd never go back.


Q6: When was the last time you took advantage of an offer? Who and why?
A6: Apart from Sainsburys/Boots BOGOFs which I take advantage of every week, it was probably Pizza Express - they send me regular emails with discount vouchers.

Q7: Do you think advertising and marketing is good for society?
A7: Difficult question. If they didn't exist, I have a feeling the world would keep on turning, and people would somehow manage to find the products they need. I think it's probably better to have it so that there's an awareness of what's out there, though not sure if it's "good" for us exactly? If anything, I think the bulk of advertising encourages people to spend money they don't have on things they don't actually want or need. Also the preference by the industry for using only thin/young/beautiful people to advertise absolutely everything can have a massively negative psychological impact on both sexes.


Q8: Do you think advertising helps sway your opinion on whether to buy something or not?
A8: Well I'd love to say no, but I think that would be extremely naive! Whether I like it or not, perceived brand messages and values are hardwired into my head, and definitely affect whether I do or don't buy a product.


Q9: If you worked in advertising, how would you do things differently?
A9: I'd just be honest. I don't believe there's any point in exaggerating the benefits of a product, as the truth will be exposed at some point anyway. I think most people appreciate honesty and integrity, and will reward with loyalty - especially these days when there's less money to spend, so people would rather get value for money and not be ripped off.


Q10: Would you like to ask the advertising industry any questions?
A10: Yes! Why don't you use more "real" people in your advertising?

What Liz Grant thinks about marketing and advertising

Number Two: Liz Grant

Your name: Elizabeth
Your age: 36
Your location: London
What you do for a living: Work in education
How you know me – if you do: Through football originally

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Q1: What do you think about advertising?

A1: That depends on the advert – if it is a good advert (intelligent, funny, unusual) then I think it’s a great thing, but too often advertisers are quite lazy or verging on deceitful. Take adverts for makeup or haircare – I can’t think of an advert where the model (and its always models or model like celebrities, i.e. not real people) are enhanced to make the product look better. Telling me in tiny writing that Cheryl is styled using extensions and they are why her hair looks so good, not the shampoo is insulting... Same with statistics – which confuse the majority of people – 45 people out of 74 thought that this product was good – hardly scientifically statistically relevant....

Q2: Which ads have you liked recently? Why?

A2: The Innocent Flash/fruit smoothie adverts were good fun as are the Cravendale ones (particularly the old ‘milk!’ ones), even though I cannot abide the thought of it as a product... Not many stick in the mind from the recent crop though.

Q3: Can you remember any ads from the past? Which?

A3: Loads – watched far too much TV as a child... Perhaps the use of jingles was more prolific, as it’s amazing how many jingles stick with you.

Q4: In a sentence, and without googling!, describe what you think a brand is.

A4: something that identifies a product or range of products easily, and allows people to see (or hear in the case of the Intel jingle) that a product is made by a certain manufacturer.

Q5: Which brands are you loyal to, or passionate about now? Why?

A5: I don’t tend to buy clothes or makeup/skin care according to ‘brand’, but often do in terms of food and some household items. These range from simple (like always buying Heinz ketchup because I like the taste above any others) to tending to prefer Bosch appliances because of a perception of build quality. However, the proliferation of review sites online mean that individual brand loyalty is much less likely than buying on the basis of informed information.

Q6: When was the last time you took advantage of an offer? Who and why?

A6: Innocent veg pots at the supermarket! I like Innocent’s other items that I’ve had so far and a colleague has these at lunch, so the reduction in price was a good incentive to try.

Q7: Do you think advertising and marketing is good for society?

A7: Not per se. It is good that people are made aware of choices in the market, but advertising and marketing is often more about the glamour (in the old fashioned sense of the word as well as the more obvious one), than really giving people honest information about products and services.

Q8: Do you think advertising helps sway your opinion on whether to buy something or not?

A8: Yes, but possibly not as much as it does for the majority. I’d like to think I’m fairly savvy about how I choose what to buy and less likely to be swayed by an advert.

Q9: If you worked in advertising, how would you do things differently?

A9: Ha! I would want more honesty and less focus on the ‘buy the latest shiny thing’ side of it. But that’s never going to go down well....

Q10: Would you like to ask the advertising industry any questions?

A10: Can’t think of anything specific.

What Adam Sweeney thinks about marketing and advertising

I've decided to start a new series of posts where I ask random people some questions about marketing and advertising.

There is no science to this.

I'm doing it as I'm interested in widening the scope of my thinking - of our thinking - beyond people like us. People who get the industry. People who work in it. People who know the agencies behind the ads.

That's because we're a niche.

And people who don't know about marketing and advertising, people who don't care about marketing and advertising, are massively the minority.

So next time we're sat there debating how we can prove the case for a social media campaign, or when we're slapping ourselves on the back for the amazing new technological first that means someone can download a jpg to their phone (if they've downloaded the app first) then we can put our self-congratulations into context.

I'm going to post the answers verbatim so we can get a true reflection of the interest or indifference to the subject. So, without further ado - here's my first Q&A.

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Number One: Adam Sweeney

Your age: 25
Your location: London
What you do for a living: Information Analyst (Social Research)
How you know me – if you do: Via twitter

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Q1: What do you think about advertising?

A1: Advertising has a pretty bad rep for nefariously introducing desires in people that they didn’t already have; bolstering status anxiety, making us want high-cholesterol foods and cigarettes, being at the root of all sorts of social ills, etc etc.
But people in the advertising industry are constantly trying to find out how to get people to like something, to want to buy it…and coming up with no conclusive answers (although doing a damn good job of it).
Perhaps in former times advertising was seen as a way to frighten, cajole or even downright deceive people in order to create commercial compliance. But things have moved on, and advertising isn’t anything new.
Propaganda is a form of advertising, and that’s been going since before the printing press. In addition, great advertising contributes to culture – linguistically, visually, and in the more subtle way of finding a synergy between the people who view it and the time they live in.
On the other hand, bad advertising is a nuisance that makes consumers aware of the price-tag on the world.

Q2: Which ads have you liked recently? Why?

A2: a.) A digital ad for a wine brand. It occurred in the right-hand column of a site.
The picture depicted a wine glass slightly trembling on a kitchen worktop to the pulse of muffled party music. The ad invited you to turn up the volume and see what happened.
I rarely interact with digital ads like this – but the motion in this continuously caught my eye (falling as it does in peripheral vision which is more sensitive to motion – one of the reasons I enjoyed it’s cleverness). As you increase the volume, the glass shook more and more – until eventually, the music was loudest and the wine glass toppled over, not only spilling on the work surface but all over your webpage. It was a bit of a “wow” moment at the boundaries that this thing crossed. Unfortunately I don’t think it can have been terribly effective, as I can’t remember the wine brand – in fact, it might have been for a cleaning fluid.
b.) The Cadbury’s ads from last year were purely brilliant. So much has been said about them already - I won’t say any more.

Q3: Can you remember any ads from the past? Which?

A3: I remember the Milky Way advert with the two racing cars. I must have been very young when this was on, but I enjoyed the animation (still true today!) and the song – without getting the highly-dubious “health” message whatsoever.

Q4: In a sentence, and without googling!, describe what you think a brand is.

A4: Brands: difficult to pin down without reference to the marketing and advertising that constructs them, but: a brand is a mass personality, which interacts on a huge scale and typically has some species of commercial interest. Under this definition, unique communities, nations and political movements are brands (which indeed I think they should be).

Q5: Which brands are you loyal to, or passionate about now? Why?

A5: a. The BBC. I take advantage of so many of their services, appreciate so much of their work both past and present, and pay so little for them it seems absurd. The value derived from the BBC is preposterous – from broadcasts during the war, to innovating on digital content, to R4’s Today programme. I am loyal.

b. Sainsbury’s. Why? They were my supermarket whilst a student, so by geographical positioning had more of my loyalty than any other supermarket. They have a range of products such that I can treat myself to something expensive without breaking the bank, but also buy extremely cheaply if needs be. They aren’t quite the bullying bastards of Tesco, nor the toffee-nosed Waitrose. And they’re available everywhere.

c. Nigel Slater. All these are about food aren’t they?

d. Carluccio’s (another food one). Their dedication to food is inherently obvious, and the delicate, strong design in everything from the restaurant layout to the menus to the food packaging makes everything about them delightful.

e. Zara. They make some of the suavest yet durable clothes I’ve ever owned and they’re somehow priced affordably.

Q6: When was the last time you took advantage of an offer? Who and why?

A6: Predictably, Pizza Express. It’s a special offer that doesn’t seem that special but somehow is just rare enough to still be exciting.

Q7: Do you think advertising and marketing is good for society?

A7: a. I don’t think any advertising or marketing is inherently bad for society. It’s part of the broader form of communication via culture which occurs ANYWHERE that humans exist in numbers greater than 1. It’s easy to see how a well-run anti-smoking campaign is not bad. It’s perhaps more difficult to see how the ads from former times glamourising cigarettes and emphasizing their health benefits are good. But those ads were often at the mercy of knowledge, not some mendacious need to deceive and sicken the population.

b. Therefore, marketing and advertising in themselves are not-bad. But are they good? To my mind the cultural contributions are small fry compared to the technological innovations that have really taken off in the last few years. These things have been revolutionary in the way we live our lives and media and advertising have been instrumental in their sudden development. And what else? Great adverts make our lives more interesting and exciting – although this is only a small percentage. And campaigns which invest in doing good things for people and consumers alike are inherently doing good things.

c. Their positive economic impact cannot be argued with. But morally, socially speaking - I think on the whole they are a benefit, though it’s easy for many advertisers to cross below the benchmark of socially positive work.

Q8: Do you think advertising helps sway your opinion on whether to buy something or not?

A8: I don’t think it does, but it almost certainly does. In fact that’s the symptom of outstanding brand, ads and marketing combined – when you don’t perceive a choice in selecting a particular brand.

Q9: If you worked in advertising, how would you do things differently?

A9: a. Context. Web banners are useless ass are facebook ads. Why? They lack context. Think of the spatial aspect of a webpage. Ads are just noise - occasionally well-targeted noise (ironically, the ones that are less well-targeted are often more interesting by virtue of their unprompted presence). Banners – I can probably count the number of times I’ve clicked-through on one hand. Advertisers might consider not spreading their ads all over, and instead invest in contextualizing a particular webpage – not sponsorship, or corporate sites as such, but just taking some control and innovative space within the internet.

b. This works for outdoor ads just as well – look today at a story in the metro about the zombie movie ad placed net to a funeral home. The industry needs to start paying attention to how much context affects people’s perceptions.

Q10: Would you like to ask the advertising industry any questions?

A10: a. There are many examples of great adverts, yet so many of them continue to be poor, annoying or downright missable. Why is this?

b. Is the advertising industry maturing / developing a more sensitive approach?

c. Is digital spinning out of control? Does advertising know what’s coming next?