7 Rules for Amazing, True-to-Life Ad Campaigns
These rules will help you create a custom-fit, true-to-life ad campaign to attract customers who naturally gravitate to your values and way of doing business.
The Real Way To Build Your Business
You need 4 things… (1) A good steady flow of new customers. (2) A good steady flow of repeat customers. (3) Referrals. (4) Positive Word of Mouth (and this includes social media)
The Exaggerations that Tell the Truth
The more we treasure something, the higher our emotions run in relation to it. Tell a mother how ugly her baby really is and you’ll see what I mean. And this is a very useful phenomenon for the ad writer.
Hands Up…Who’s Hiring?
"Mike, look, the post office is hiring,” Bob tipped his head at the encased poster, “but you're past the age limit." "Hey Bob. Yeah, you wouldn't get away with a recruitment ad like that these days." Mike smiled.
10 Basic Truths of Advertising, Part Deux
The things we are hardwired to find unignorable and “fascinating” involve the (mostly social) triggers first discussed and popularized by Sally Hogshead.
Grow Your Business With a Courageous Offer
Yes a few customers will take advantage. Get over it. A Courageous Offer opens up the customer floodgates. The money of the many will wash away the bad taste of a few.
10 Basic Truths of Advertising, Part 1
America has always sorted its mail over a trashcan, and now just as ruthlessly sorts, filters, and dismisses every other incoming stimuli. Modern life demands it.
Are Your Ads Missing Hope? | Wizard’s Roundtable
You need all four... (1) A Big Idea (2) Nuts and Bolts (3) Entertainment (4) Hope. The last is the easiest to overlook… but it’s the most important.
No Parking on the Dance Floor of Your Mind
Are your ads letting the imagery and the story-logic do the persuading and selling? Or are they relying on whacky creative that’s actually counter-productive?
“How do we modernize our marketing?” [AMA]
There’s a real danger in the word “modernizing” your marketing because we tend to immediately leap towards thoughts like, “Well, I need to be on Snapchat.”
Naming the Disease
Nobody knew bad breath was a destructive social ill until Gerard Lambert pointed the blinding spotlight of his ads at the dangers of halitosis as a means of selling Listerine.
The Best Tool For the Job
That day, my dad gave me the tool I needed to successfully check the pressure of tires. On the same day, he also gave me the greatest tool for customer service. “Aaron, the best way to make better tips is to stop thinking about them.”
Money Follows Talent, and Talent Follows…
“Those who build great companies understand that the ultimate throttle on growth for any great company is not markets, or technology, or competition, or products...”
“In your experience what would be the most effective kind of advertising?” – Zoe H. Australia
Variables: (1) The population of your market. (2) The size of your ad budget.
Alsofocuson
A key element of any strategy is choosing what gets focus. When I present a focused strategy, sometimes I get presented with a made-up word: Alsofocuson. As in, “I like the focus, but can we also-focus-on this other focus?”