What is the long term damage from a Sexualised Ad Campaign?

Caben

Firstly, did you open this tread because you seen the word "Sexualised" in the business section? (please tell me, to weigh up pros V cons)

Secondly:

I am not trying to offend anybody with this tread and if you are offended, I apologies in advance

Thirdly:

I have a service that is normal and wholesome, but like with anything if you put a "way-hay" here and a "how is your father" there, you can easily imply a sexualised statement. Our eye is usually caught by a good double entendre and we remember it longer than standard adverts (if done well).

But what is the long term damage to the company? The "Hunky Dory" ad campaign is a reasonable likeness to what I am thinking of, but with no pictures of semi naked bodies.

Some thing like "that's a big one!!" in big, bold letters, underneath in smaller font "do you know how to use it" and the image has a man holding thickly padded wallet with a Leap Card sticking out of it.

In short, smut turns heads (makes sales is up for argument) but if Microsoft, for example, had an ad campaign early in their existence would it now have an effect on the company? Or would we forget it with time and only remember the wholesome "I'm a PC" ad campaign ie. their latest.

Thanks in Advance for your input

The Apprentice

Well the fact that it was in the business section made no difference to me as i would have read it anyway. BUT -- to put this add up anywhere else the fact taht it was sexualised as you put it i would have paid special interest in it.
1. Because i do take a special interest in All marketing because that is/will be my field..
2. Probably because im a perv maybe and i do like to see risque ladies and smutty jokes

Sex sells, youve heard this before and metrics will tell you its true. Hunky dory's sales campaign did more than than 40% increase because of this.. Something they would never have achieved arguably with their current budget. In this case its not sex, its a few scantily clad ladies playing rugby. Ireland has become to pc when it comes to this type of advertising and it annoys me, You should check out some of the austrailian tongue in cheek adverts.

Damage Limitations .. ?? hunky dory ad was mentioned the other day in the pub, having a few beers a friend and his jersey was tight, there was a bit of banter/slagging saying he was a new spokeswomen with the caption hunky.. Might be a problem shaving his legs do. This is the type of scenario that gets ultimaly brand salience for hunky dorys. People know, trust and will ultimely commit to the brand because of ads like these. I remember hearing the Ceo of hunky stating that this add would again be replicated and done again in the near future despite calls from busy bodies about the adds, Sexualizing women and that jazz.. I remember the time when i couldnt pick up a paper and not see someone talking about the new hunky add ... (Pr spin O leary would agree any advertising is good advertsing). Instant country wide advert - ?? Include some ladies in shorts !!

Cons of a campaign like this ..
http://www.designyourway.net/blog/inspiration/sex-in-print-advertising-campaigns-57-sexvertising-prints/


I think there is that line that you can cross even for me, i have seen bad poorly timed products ranging from watches to advertising after 9/11 (when u need to be somewhere else caption) to other horrific ones. Levis add was also particularly poor timing on their behalf, they had a riot depicted wearing their jeans (go forth and conquer) and in England people were rioting. Limited sucess on the internet but i dont think it went down well at all. Advertising in poor taste really doesnt work!!
As long as you get your point across of what your selling, the benefits and so on i dont really think u can go to far wrong with some hunky builders or some hot ladies..

Something tongue in cheek perhaps with georgia salpa or (insert other high profile chick)
Sends guy a text come on over etc, checks wallet no money, uses leap card, gets their with movie and some stolen flowers along the way. "Insert caption" " leap card - never leave home without it"

Same scenario only he doesnt make it this time and georgias upset "insert Caption "Life sucks without a leap card" " Life will never suck with a leap card"
"Sucks to be you without leap" "Take a leap or enjoy being single" "You,ll leap out of Georgias life quicker if you dont sign up"

I could go on for hours but you get my drift .. Depends how naked you want her
I,ll look forward to see something good

Caben

Thanks The Apprentice for your input.

2 quick things

1. Do you think in the long term the HunkyD ad will damage the company if they started to advertise to kids (lets say) in 2 or 3 years time? In short have they in avertedly reduced their target audience just because at present they are selling to men?

2. Sorry to say the product is not Leap Card, just example, but I would enjoy that ad if it came on the telly. Although anything has to be better than a man carrying English looking coins on his back (great marketing their). I think you should sell your idea to Leap.

The Apprentice

In a word no Caben

Yorkie "Not for girls campaign" has a bigger sales audience of girls than it does for men so that althought unbelievable is true and kind of blows that out of the water. Although kids will grow into adults men particularly, young adults/teenagers will relate to that and will eventually become consumers. Similar to the way coca cola target kids they are capturing audiences from a younger age to create salience again.. Similar to the way macdonalds target kids with bright colours to captivate. The macdonalds logo is globablly more popular with 4-6 Year olds than the Christian Crucifix.. Scary :P

And to relate to young girls/women, can u tell me any young girl who doesnt aspire to be beautiful, perfect skin, figure etc ? Although some may not want to be a "sexual" object in some form but the idea of being beautiful can be more of an incentive to purchase a product. Not for girls again being an example of a strong women, you could throw a million buzzwords at this - confidence, powerful and again CBT, tell someone its not for you and it will sell like hot buns on a cold day. Similar to redbulls campaign i beleive. Do you think any of us are doing snowboarding, kitesurfing, dangerous activities day in day out. Its a feeling or percieved sell that you are indeed "james bond" of life, which is why they target the niche danger kid scene that everyone isnt part of but wants to be.. Not everyone is beautiful but wants to be .. like sports stars or basketball players. Not everyone can play but wants to. People know clearly that they will never aspire to play or do extreme sports but in some way drinking a product or buying it can someone hold on to the dream that they are apart of it in some way.
Im an avid energy drink drinker (lol) and really.. tastes like ****in muck but i still drink it, with a perceived image that its somehow bad for me just like extreme sports. If you tell me its bad i will purchase it everyday until im dead. Just like those fancy pills the doc tells you dont drink alcholol with, and your out the same night drunk as a monkey. Again cbt.

Who are redbulls target audience in ireland ?? High activity extreme sporters ??? Well that narrows it down to about 5000 people but clearly its the opposite who drink it... The white collar buzz worker in the financial district who is so far removed from the actual target audience - go figure i suppose. Again the benefits of redbull is the easy sell to these people, highly cafeinated product.. but in your leap case i would have to think a little harder

2. Lol sorry i made an assumption it was, but thats ok. Na my ideas are so mad i dont think anyone would pay me for them, i would appreciate a redbull or two for them but thats just dreaming :P


Cheers buddy

highlandseoghan

I dont think hunky dorys will suffer any damage from these types of ads. When I first saw the ad I thought it was excellent. It grabbed attention and got you looking at the ads. There was so many busy bodies giving out about the ad that they generated even more publicity for the brand.

Once the ads are done properly like the hunky dorys ad i dont think any product would suffer.

Axwell

The Apprentice wrote: »

Hunky dory's sales campaign did more than than 40% increase because of this..

More like 12% according to this - http://www.alternatives.ie/about_us/marketer_of_the_year/

Good article on the social media response to that campaign

http://olearyanalytics.com/634/is-everything-hunky-dory-examining-the-social-media-response/

The Apprentice

It was the ceo or Chairman that stated sales were up 40%.. lying sac :P

Some good articles axwell, interesting reading. From my own perspective an effective campaign but those mentions on facebook seem to be very low ?? , but indeed as mentioned brand awareness goes for many many months and it seems years after .. So obviously a hard metric to value and to put a cost on.

Food for thought !

Tangled

For me there's tongue-in-cheek such as http://www.bishopsfinger.co.uk/adverts/index.htm and there's offensive, such as the hunky dory campaign. From your description it sounds like you want to go more along the first route but there is a fine line and it would have to be executed really well.

Obviously Hunky Dory's got a lot of press and exposure due to the ads and their market share increased but it did change their whole brand image and does close them off to a segment of the market.

FWIW I'm female and won't buy Yorkies, Hunky Dories or lately McCoy's (for their "Man Crisps" campaign), I know others who feel the same so I guess it depends on who your target market is, can you afford to completely alienate a demographic.

arbitrage

Its far from original but successful 99% of the time to use a gorgeous girl to market a product consumed mainly by males.

The vast majority of people can't remember an ad they last seen 6 months ago so any long term image damage is extremely minimal.

As regards the hunky dorys ads, anyone who is offended to the point of not purchasing a bag make up an extremely small segment of their original consumer base.

End of the day they increased sales.

Tangled

arbitrage wrote: »

Its far from original but successful 99% of the time to use a gorgeous girl to market a product consumed mainly by males.

It's the most lazy-arsed, unoriginal way to sell, to just stick a gorgeous girl in the photo. But this doesn't sound like what the OP was talking about, more about a tongue-in-cheek campaign.

arbitrage wrote: »

The vast majority of people can't remember an ad they last seen 6 months ago so any long term image damage is extremely minimal.

As regards the hunky dorys ads, anyone who is offended to the point of not purchasing a bag make up an extremely small segment of their original consumer base.

Which is why I said he needs to look at his target market - if it's a group who are likely to be alienated by the content then don't go for it.

I was involved in a launch last year where a 'gorgeous girl' was rolled out - I was disgusted, not because I'm a prude or offended but because it cheapened the brand, was not in line with the brand image we were promoting plus had the potential to alienate a segment of our potential audience. Lots of people, both male and female, were a bit miffed by it as it didn't stand for anything the brand represented. I remember asking one person what they thought of it and the reply was "I just yawned / rolled my eyes at the same time" - there's a sense of the here we go again to these things too.

The Apprentice

Well i can see your point tangled, horses for courses. Can i play devils advocate and ask you would u watch that add if it was specifically aimed towards women with men as the gag ?

Barbies are for girls im told just as were told yorkies are not for girls. Do men buy barbies ? Im guessing not as many as you would think but do women buy yorkies ??
Most definetly.. The point im making is that most people can see through the fancy adverts and see that its just a chocolate bar.

Tangled

The Apprentice wrote: »

Can i play devils advocate and ask you would u watch that add if it was specifically aimed towards women with men as the gag ?

Not sure which one you're referring to, but if it was witty, clever, tongue-in-cheek, done well etc then it wouldn't bother me whether it was men or women (see the Bishop's Finger link I posted above), if it's a roll out the pretty girl / boy then yawn.

The Apprentice wrote: »

Barbies are for girls im told just as were told yorkies are not for girls. Do men buy barbies ? Im guessing not as many as you would think but do women buy yorkies ??
Most definetly.. The point im making is that most people can see through the fancy adverts and see that its just a chocolate bar.

Promote something towards either men or women, sure. I don't think I've ever seen a Barbie ad that states explicilty that boys can't have them. Look at the current Snickers ads, obviously targetting men but not to the exclusion of women.

The Apprentice

yes but is it the fact that yorkie are excluding women ?? the reason that you wont purchase.

DubTony

All I have to offer here is that, as a guy who sold them at the time, there was a marked increase in sales of Yorkies to women when that campaign ran.
I made the odd "They're not for girls" comment, and generally got a look or comment back along the lines of "Well, I'll show them".

Very Strange.

The Hunky Dory's ads made little difference.

Caben

Thanks, all for your input. I have scrapped the idea for the year, but still am unsure if it will be a runner in the future. To clear up the thread as several ads have been discussed, the service I wanted to promote is Smart Phone Training (www.smartphonetraining.ie). We train business executives how to increase productivity through smart phone technology (so you know our market). The ads are:

Male

At a urinal advert:

Good looking woman looking in a downward direction with a caption like "That's a big one" followed by another saying "But do you know how to use it". The sales line at the end "Come to www.smartphonetraining.ie and I will show you how"

Female

Back of toilet doors:

Picture of a lady with a cheeky smile sits on a toilet (no rude areas shown). Caption reads "Vibration on or off, I can always get my business sorted no matter where I am". The sales line at the end "Come to www.smartphonetraining.ie and I will show you how to sort your business out"

I don't want to alienate any people from the campaign but the toilet areas is a location for reflection and if you can make people smile, then that will create brand awareness.

Pitfalls in my opinion:

Parent brings 7 year old child to toilet. Child asks what is a big one? or Why is the picture of the lady looking at me while I pee? or What business does that lady do? or Finally, why is there a picture of a lady on the toilet? (probably not the worst question I accept)

Any more input would, as always be great.

Regards,
Caben

DubTony

Caben, my first reaction on reading those was "Whoa!"
I'm one of the least prudish people you're likely to ever meet, but the ad locations just seem very risky, and for some people, quite inappropriate.

Caben

DubTony wrote: »

Caben, my first reaction on reading those was "Whoa!"
I'm one of the least prudish people you're likely to ever meet, but the ad locations just seem very risky, and for some people, quite inappropriate.

Thanks for your reply. As stated, it is a campaign that could cause problems and that is why I thought running it by a forum was best first. It is on the back burner at present, but the jury is still out. On a voting scale I'll take it as 1-nil against at pres.

Thanks
Caben

The Apprentice

€ your android price is weird.. should be just a plain euro sign .. ??

Chet Zar

DubTony wrote: »

Caben, my first reaction on reading those was "Whoa!"
I'm one of the least prudish people you're likely to ever meet, but the ad locations just seem very risky, and for some people, quite inappropriate.

My exact thoughts!

Mate, it sounds like a truly terrible idea, sorry. You couldn't even compare that to Hunky's Dory's, it just sounds totally tasteless and inappropriate.

Back to the drawing board and I reckon leave out the smut and be more smooth and professional - it sounds like a quite 'businessy' product / offering.

Caben

The Apprentice wrote: »

€ your android price is weird.. should be just a plain euro sign .. ??

Yes, I have noticed several errors on different browsers and a corrective launch of the site will be complete next Wednesday. I have been working on this offline for 2 weeks now. Tested in chrome and was fine. But errors occur on others, changing contact us page also.

Again thanks for all the input, this is my first company and I am having to learn on my feet.

Regards
Caben