Slice-of-life: Advertising idea or executional trap? - Part 1

Client (C): "We think it's about time we made a corporate sort of brand film."

Agency Representative No. 1 (AR1): "Umm… Okay…"

C: "Yeah, we need to enhance the image of our brand in the eyes of consumers, you see. Tell them how great our brand is and all that."

AR1: "Ah, I see…"

Agency Representative No. 2 (AR2): "What exactly do you want to say through the film?"

C: "Simple, yaar. We want to say our brand is the best."

AR2: "But that's what all our advertising has been saying all along, isn't it?"

C: "No baba, not that way. We want to appeal to the emotional side of the consumer. Tell her how we understands her and her needs, how we know India like nobody does... That's it. We want to show that we know India and Indians."

AR2: "Got it. You want a brand film on a national scale."

C: "We must also establish how our brand is consumed by a majority of Indians. Leadership position, you know."

AR1: "You mean show that we know India, and show the joy our brand brings to the lives of millions of Indians?"

C: "Exactly."

AR2: "What we could do is have this film where we show montages of happy Indians from different regions and walks of life consuming you brand..."

AR1: "Yes, yes. And we'll put in a nice hummable anthem..."

C: "You mean show some slice-of-life situations where our brand figures prominently? Golly, what an idea! Let's do it."

AR1: "Golly, let's do it!"

AR2: "Golly, let's do it!"

As most ad folk would already have guessed, we've just played out a hugely abbreviated, decidedly less ponderous and thoroughly fictitious account of a client-agency interlude. Hugely abbreviated and less ponderous, yes, but did we say ‘thoroughly fictitious'? One look at some of the corporate/brand image advertising that is currently on air (or has been on air in the recent and not-so-recent past), and we get the sneaking suspicion that our harmless little lampoon stumbled very close to what must actually have transpired - at some point in time - in most of the client-agency conversations that preceded these campaigns.

How else can one explain the whole bunch of commercials that seek to enhance corporate/brand image (often by showing pan-Indian appeal for the brands in question) through the use of slice-of-life situations? Commercials packed with feel-good imagery (schmaltzy anthem in tow) showing an assortment of Indian consumers getting the most out of life, all thanks to the respective advertisers?

What is remarkable about most of these slice-of-life corporate/brand image campaigns is their "sheer facelessness" (as one national creative director once put it), which primarily stems from the use of a certain type of imagery. The shot of the soldier in the frontier; the shot of rural women in the sand dunes of Rajasthan, the picture of the Gateway of India or India Gate (ideally with pigeons taking flight); the man wearing a Kathakali mask; the silhouette of a boatman in some backwater… Most of these images have wriggled their way into umpteen slice-of-life commercials with unfailing regularity - to the extent that if one substitutes one logo or brand/product prop with another, one often can't tell the difference between these commercials.

Speaking about brand props, another thing. Almost every brand image ad shows a motley bunch of Indians using the brand in question, that too in the most self-conscious of ways. So if you're a marketer of a tea brand, you show 15 different people from all walks of life drinking tea. If you're a marketer of a cellular service brand, you show 15 different people from all walks of life speaking on cell phones. And if you're a marketer of toilet paper, you show 15 different people… no, let's not get into the details here. The advertiser, though, has a point. Having shelled out big money to make the ad, he can't be faulted for wanting his brand in as many frames as possible, can he? Most obviously not.

However, the point being made is simple. Is the sight of 15 different people in an ad drinking a brand of tea or using a cellular service or driving a car more convincing than the sight of one person doing the same? Is the sight of 15 happy models, by itself, a good enough argument for consumers to go buy a brand? Can 15 slice-of-life situations substitute for core brand propositions and promises? And can the 15 situations override the tedium that the genre has heaped upon itself? © 2003 agencyfaqs!

(To be concluded tomorrow)