“The Subject Was Roses.” That was the title of the popular Frank Gilroy play and the movie by the same name. It's also the focus of this issue's column.
The ad is trying to sell Bayer (yes, Bayer the aspirin folks) Advanced All-in-One Rose and Flower Care Concentrate, which fertilizes, controls insects and guards against disease.
But you'd never guess from the headline that the subject is roses or what the customer benefit is. Since the ad is about scientific advances and formulas, the copywriter got the bright idea of presenting the headline as a pseudo-scientific formula scribbled in chalk on a blackboard:
Sometimesu just/have/to {Stop} + smell/the Scientific - Advances.
And this can be paraphrased as what? I don't know.
It's a takeoff on the familiar saying, “Sometimes you just gotta stop and smell the roses,” meaning forget all those petty annoyances and enjoy the wonders of life and nature.
So we know the ad is saying something about roses. And the picture of a rose blossom directly below confirms that.
By a three-step thought process that I greatly disapprove of in ad making because it slows down instant comprehension, the reader begins to figure out that the subject must be scientific advances which make roses smell better — which is not the case, actually.
So what's the promise? Well, presumably something about scientific advances in rose growing. But that's pretty vague and feeble.
Next comes a problem with the illustration.
When we think of roses, we think of happiness. Cheerfulness. Romance. We sing along with Ethel Merman, “Everything's coming up roses.” We croon that golden oldie, “Moonlight and roses bring wonderful memories of you.” We think of the bright colors of red and yellow roses that light up a room.
But the ad designer — one of those people who frequently write to Direct to fume that I'm a rank amateur, a disgrace when it comes to ad design, and don't know what I'm doing — chose to render the rose and most of the rest of the ad in deep, dark, gloomy blue.
What does that make you think of? Drawn shades? Funeral parlors? Feeling blue? Certainly not the joyousness of bright-hued roses.
As is so often the case, the copy down below, for readers who get that far, is quite efficient and workmanlike.
Try Bayer Advanced All-In-One Rose & Flower Care, with a 3-in-1 formula that provides heartier, more vibrant flowers. [Note that it says nothing about making them smell better.] One easy-to-use product fertilizes while it protects from insects and disease. No spraying means less effort; simply mix the formula with water, pour it around the plants, and let the roots do the rest. That's the beauty of better science.
Better Science. Better Results.
And that's it. No reason is given why the reader should visit the Web site.
For my makeover, I started by thinking about what I wanted my ad to sell. I decided it boiled down to four things: benefit, news, joy, and approval of others.
The benefit is not just perfect roses, but an abundance of them.
The news is that Bayer now has a way to achieve this — implied in the headline and stated in the subhead below the picture.
The joy of such an achievement is expressed in “Wake up and smell the roses,” which usually means enjoy what's in front of you.
And the approval of others is pointed up in “So abundant and perfect your friends will marvel!”
I debated with my consumer panel for a long time about the right last word. Your friends will gasp? Be amazed? Rub their eyes? No, too exaggerated, not credible. I finally hit upon “marvel” as the most believable way of putting it.
But as in the original ad, words and illustration working together can say more than words alone. How could I convey a promise of not only perfect roses but an abundance of them? And the joy of admiring them?
There's a limit to what my modest home office can include as illustrations in my makeovers. But when I'm lucky I can find what I need on the advertiser's Web site, and this time I found the ideal one on Bayer's. It illustrates not only abundance but depicts enjoyment and provides an appealing human element. Other things being equal, people like to look at people in ads.
For my body copy, I simply used theirs, which, as I have stated, was quite adequate. And instead of their rather junky product shot, which attempts to show the entire line of Bayer Advanced garden care products but which are too small to make out, I chose just a single shot of the featured product.
But then, at the end of the copy, I included a feature that I modestly claim is revolutionary.
Regular readers may remember my frequent call for print advertising of brand-name products and services to sell the Web site while selling the product, thus doubling and tripling exposure and involvement with prospective customers who respond.
Let's say that out of every 100 readers of the magazine or newspaper where your ad appears, only five are drawn in by your headline and illustration. Your advertising cost per subscriber or newsstand buyer may seem quite attractive, but your advertising cost per reader/prospect will be 10 times as much.
If you can do a better job of flagging down and pulling in prospective customers in the audience and get 10 of them to spend a minute or so reading your ad instead of five, you've cut your advertising cost per reader/prospect in half.
But if you can then get half of those solid prospects to visit your Web site and spend as much as 10 minutes there, just think how that changes the arithmetic! You've spent a lot per respondent on advertising to get them to pay you a visit, but you may get up to 10 times as much involvement, persuasion, education, motivation and brand recognition.
So my modest revolution in this case was to devote even more copy to the Web site than to the product.
I follow the product copy with this extensive promotion of Web site content:
Visit Our Web Site and Learn More. Find out where and how to use this product for optimal control of plant diseases and insects. Get and share gardening tips on noted gardener Lance Walheim's blog. Join in the discussion on our Lawn and Garden Forum. Find out how you can qualify as a volunteer master gardener. Interactive tools include insect, weed and disease identifiers, how-to-videos, and a ‘what to do now’ calendar.
How often have you seen a click-response ad for a brand or service promote its Web site with this much detail? But doesn't it make sense? And wouldn't it give print advertisers much more for their money?
THOMAS L. COLLINS (thomas.l.collins@verizon.net) has been a direct marketing copywriter, ad maker, agency creative director and co-author of four books on marketing. He is currently an independent creative and marketing consultant based in Portland, OR.
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