This business of ad creativity: What is it?
This business of ad creativity: What is it?
By S. Vaidyanathan
JAKARTA (JP): The creative department in an advertising agency is where all the action is. Its importance to an advertising agency can be likened to that of the heart to the working of the human body. The keen perceptions and the combined efforts of thousands of copywriters and art directors give form to and breathe life into the advertising that agencies around the world create for their clients.
Somewhere in every product are the seeds of a drama which best expresses that product's inherent value to a customer. Finding and staging this drama has been said to be the creative person's most important task.
Creative people can be described as individuals who, while being observant about life's little oddities, are themselves alive to the glamour in a product, although they may be unglamorous. These creative people have a feel for the inherent drama in a product without being overly dramatic themselves. They are hungry for refreshingly daring ideas without losing sight of believability, and are young in mind with an imaginative flair, as well as being ambitious.
Eleanor S. Modesto, Unit Head of Citra-Lintas, the agency ranked number one in terms of creativity of ads (as reported by Cakram in its March 1995issue) says, : "We try to look for somebody who is very curious about life ... because advertising is all about ideas, about a new way of looking at things."
Easy definition
The background profile of a creative department's personnel does not lend itself to an easy definition. The creative department is a mixed bag of talent. Many of the creative staff in agencies here are products of art schools or schools of journalism. However, it is quite common to encounter personnel with backgrounds unconnected with creative work.
For example, at Citra-Lintas there are those with an accounts background. Some senior creative personnel directors also have backgrounds like architecture or research.
At Matari, some of the people among the creative staff do not have an art background. They are put through an in-house training program to provide this knowledge.
Fortune Indonesia goes so far as to recruit staff with no previous creative experience and imparts training.
A formal university education is not considered mandatory to success in this field. Most agencies provide in-house training covering a wide range of information, such as advertising, media, creative, marketing, leadership and the agency's unique work- culture. Within the industry itself there are training courses offered by the PPPI (Persatuan Perusahaan Periklanan Indonesia).
Agencies with international tie-ups also have arrangements with their affiliates for training their creative personnel abroad. Moreover, seminars and conferences also provide opportunities as a training ground.
One of the biggest problems faced by the advertising industry in Indonesia is its ongoing lack of enough qualified personnel, particularly copy writers and directors. Expatriates occupy vital positions in the industry. This is comparable to the situation in the Philippines some years ago, when it was common to find directors and cinematographers from Australia and Hong Kong.
Abidin reasons that training in creative skills needs to be fine-tuned.
What goes on
The story of the planning and execution of an ad campaign for a product is also the story of the workings of the creative department in an advertising agency.
Before the creative work begins the strategy is determined. Strategy is essentially a statement of what the advertising is trying to do. It is to advertising what the foundation is to a building.
Although each agency has its unique way of approaching the problem of strategy-planning, it is common practice to address the following: the advertising objectives, target, consumer proposition, justification and tone. The client and the media planner of the agency are also a part of the creative team in the planning of strategy stage.
Once the positioning of the product and the basic strategy is agreed upon with the client, the other creative people like the commercial artist or copywriter get to work together with the art or creative director designing the most eye-catching ad possible, weaving the magic we see on TV with paints and brushes, words and wit.
Challenges
Creative strategies sometimes have to be reworked because the market for the product has become stagnant or because the current positioning is not bringing in the sales as expected.
Sometimes, reworking is also done for other reasons, such as in the case of Pepsodent, the largest selling brand of toothpaste in Indonesia. Its positioning earlier was that of a family toothpaste. However ,with consumers becoming more sophisticated and choosy, it was felt that the product needed to be more contemporary in order for this particular toothpaste to retain its number one position. While keeping the family idea in, the new ad campaign now spoke of it as a brand that brings research and technology into play in the production process. The new element in the campaign that gave this modern variant to the brand was the "Pepsodent Van". The van symbolizes technology, changing times, and changing consumer behavior. This creative strategy was especially adopted for Indonesia.
Sometimes a globally recognized brand can have a different positioning in different markets because of differences in formulations. Whereas in India, a personal hygiene product such as Lifebuoy is positioned as a sportsman's soap, here in Indonesia it holds the position of a toilet soap.
Banks as a category, began presenting a challenge to creativity when the government relaxed controls and allowed them to become more competitive. Banks were suddenly put into the up- scale category of clients for ad agencies. The creative concept had to take note of the banks' new image as providers of services that went beyond being merely cash dispensing or storing. Today, Banks are conscious of concepts like image-advertising.
Idea sources
Most consumer products advertised in Indonesia make use of creative concepts from within the country. Agencies servicing multinational clients however make use of concepts from outside as part of a global campaign for a global brand.
Ken Sudarto of Matari states that over 90 percent of his company's ads are created locally. However, he adds that as long as concepts conform to the local customs, traditions and values, ad agencies are allowed to borrow from the outside.
Indra Abidin of Fortune says that sometimes short-term considerations such as ready availability of materials may necessitate taking concepts from the outside. Other reasons could be considerations of efficiency or cost. This is particularly true of products or services having a worldwide market. He cited the example of Cathay Pacific to illustrate the point.
McDonald's, on the other hand,is an example of an internationally recognized restaurant, which makes use of internationally established values of tone and mannerism and adapts them to suit local tone and color. The creative concept for McDonald's Paket Hemat was the result of such an adaptation.
However, Abidin adds, by regulation, there is a holiday period of about a year before the foreign content must become local.
Pharmaceuticals and most food products are bound by this regulation. Exceptions are airlines and automotive firms.
Creative departments often look for strategy ideas in the culture around them, but to come up with something typically Indonesian is often challenging. The creative concept for Citra Beauty Lotion is an example of local culture being tapped to sell a beauty product.Citra means image. When an Indonesian bride prepares for her wedding day, she undergoes a ritual called lulur in which a herbal scrub is given for 30 days to produce a very smooth skin. The color produced is described as kuning langsat . The use of Citra lotion, while eliminating the inconveniences of the ritual, assured the same effect almost instantaneously, retaining the fragrance achieved through the ritual.
Ideas are also borrowed from other well known brands in a different product category. Cuddle in most parts of the world is recognized as a brand of fabric softener. The idea that bears are cuddly was used to project softness for the product. In Indonesia, the bear is associated with a range of baby-care products. In implying an association between the cuddliness and softness of bears and the softness of babies, a transition was made from the world of fabric softeners to baby-care products.
Failed strategies
Even the most painstakingly executed creative strategies can sometimes fail to produce the anticipated results. The case of Mirabella, a brand of cosmetics in Indonesia, illustrates the point. The product's unique selling proposition was determined to be its comparative price-advantage. Market leaders in this category at that time were priced higher. Accordingly, the campaign was launched. Five thousand billboards across the country announced the launch. Ads were also placed in the print media, including the most up-market magazines. This succeeded in arousing brand-awareness in a very short time. However, the strategy did not succeed in its second, most important objective: that of winning and retaining a large share of the market. One of the reasons was that the campaign did not identify the target segment properly. This was because, while it appealed to the lower income groups through outdoor publicity and the upper income groups through the fashion magazines, exclusivity was assured to neither. Today, it has finally found its own level in the overall market.
To be effective, an ad should be original. This does not mean that it has to rely on deception or be different just for the sake of being different. An ad should be at once refreshingly daring, while at the same time rooted in human nature. It should be fun to look at, listen to or read. It should possess a high degree of believability while remaining focused. An ad is considered to have done its job well if it motivates high consumer awareness and boosts sales.