Scalable Intimacy

Branding in the age of social media.

The Collateral Damage of Old School Advertising

Posted on | June 28, 2009 | Comments

7aI drive a BMW 7-Series. It’s the car I wanted my whole life, and when I could afford one, I went to my local dealer and paid cash for the most loaded one they had. It was a gift to myself, a celebration of success after decades of hard work, and every time I get into that car I feel special.

Like other 7-series owners, I received a beautiful hard-cover brochure – more of a coffee table book, really – for the new 7 coming out in 2010. The car is truly magnificent, and given the emotional wrapping paper of this particular make and model for me, I rifled through the pages with the heart-pounding anticipation of a 14-year old with a Victoria’s Secret catalog.

On page gorgeous, I was greeted by a leather-and-old-growth-walnut porn shot of the driver’s side interior, framed by 3 words of headline copy:

“Sensory rejuvenation chamber.”

And the spell was broken.

“Sensory rejuvenation chamber?” What kind of bullshit is that? What copywriting genius came up with that gem? Which agency suit presented it, and which style-less, Bananarama-loving client approved it? Has this been a car for old farts all along? I feel used. And not in a good way.

Why did I react so strongly to the innocuous, omnipresent ad copy bullshit I’ve seen in hundreds of self-important car brochures over the decades? Because now I know better. Because instead of sacrificing a tree at the alter of some frustrated screen writer’s creative vision, BMW could have mined the fertile ground of my and my fellow 7-owners deep emotional associations with these cars as a way of welcoming the new flag-bearer into the family. The could have let us in. They could have let us sell each other. Instead they created an “Us” and a “Them” by talking to us in a way real people never talk to people they like and respect, and in doing so revealed themselves as both tragically shallow and criminally un-with it.

We’re getting to a place where “old school” advertising – long harmless background noise for those of us more interested in authentic communication – actually has the potential to extract value from brands. To render them antique. To disconnect them from the people who really own them, the people who cherish and pay for them one purchase at a time.

We’ve crossed some kind of threshold into a time where wasted advertising is no longer the worst kind of advertising. Today advertising caught in a transparent attempt to wrest control of a brand from the people out there who hold it in their hearts and minds is fatal. We have seen the birth of “anti-tising,” the communications equivalent of hyper-processed junk food, fighting a pathetic and losing battle for the souls of overweight, overspent consumers growing tomatoes in their own backyard with organic fertilizer.

Be careful, brand stewards. Be cautious with the time-honored tools of your trade. They just might be starting to work against you.

And have you seen that new Jaguar?

————–

UPDATE: Link here for an update on Mercedes-Benz’ effort to build a community of advocate owners. Not to say their brochures are any less pretentious, just an interesting juxtaposition of techniques.

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Comments

  • Good point in this Blog post Mike but I really hope that there is something else in your life that makes you feel equally if not more special than your car.
  • Thanks, and there is. Just nothing I could buy.
  • Wow. You just made the top of my good list.
  • "Why did I react so strongly to the innocuous, omnipresent ad copy bullshit I’ve seen in hundreds of self-important car brochures over the decades?"

    I think it's because the nature of reading that BS has changed. In the past, we each would have consumed this message separately. We still might have gagged on it a little bit, but the overall positive impression would linger after the offending words had vanished from memory.

    Today, media is simultaneously more ephemeral and more permanent. Idiotic self-importance is particularly prone to being mashed up and sent up.

    The second you read the words, you know that somewhere out there somebody might have already picked up on the "Sensory Rejuvenation Chamber" crap and started making something hilarious out of it.

    There has always been a back fence where we laughed about dumb things. Now that the back fence is digital, the laughter is louder and longer.

    What does this new interaction mean for advertising and brands? I'm not really sure. Would make a fascinating case study, especially for a PR company.
  • Interesting.. you see this sort of thing all the time and suspect most of us usually just glaze over it. What has BMW done for you to create a We? Not just around point of purchase, but well after that has passed. Anything?
  • totally agreed... old advertising is a weird kind of art, not marketing any more...
  • I wonder if David Ogilvy is turning in his grave...

    You raise a great point Mike. Cars do exhibit a higher degree of brand loyalty than most products and it is a shame more ad firms aren't more aware of this, especially for a premium brand like BMW.

    I'd rather a poor advertising firm than a poor product. Mercedes-Benz have no-one to blame but themselves and the shocking downwards slide of their cars over the last 15 years.
  • Brad_B_Mc
    "leather-and-old-growth-walnut porn"

    Brilliant..
  • things like this make me nervous... i am as appalled as you; however time and time again i have been asked to produce this "sensory rejuvenation chamber" copy...

    as a writer you have to be able to write as the brand dictates, even if that brand is a shallow asshole.
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