Last night’s Super Bowl showcase of horrible ads reaffirmed my fear of getting into the advertising career that follows my degree. Here are some reasons why:

Here’s Steve Kopcha’s definition of creativity:

Using communication to create a desired reaction with some predetermined audience.

I saw a very, very small amount of that last night.

• Advertisers mostly have 30-60 seconds to explain their product or service’s benefit. What I’m trying to say is just get to the point. Gags and puns usually take too much time and effectiveness away if done incorrectly (which is mostly the case).
• The unique selling proposition should be unique. It’s not unique if everyone else is using it.
• It usually takes more than one time to sell something. More commercials should be done in integrated campaigns to get the message across, not flashy one-timers.
• “But 100,000,000 Americans watch the Super Bowl! That means 100,000,000 Americans can buy my product or service.”

– Misguided argument.

True but 100,000,000 is one of the worst target audiences I know of. Some of those Americans are old, young, black, white, parents, unemployed, CEOs, convicts, surfers, churchgoers, painters…the list goes on and on. America is full of different folks with different strokes. Advertise to those whom you know are willing to give your product or service a sensible try and politely disregard those whom you know won’t.

• There are now multiple, cost-effective ways to reach consumers than the boob tube. Thank you technology.

I’m glad for human innovation and technology to brainstorm big ideas such as digital marketing, guerilla marketing, search engine optimization, etc., to bring about an era of advertising more suited for this generation.