What I liked

There really is something to be said about simplicity. And about stating the obvious. Work of this nature always manages to stand head and shoulders above the clutter. The recent Strepsils print campaign for its cough medicine is one of them. The promise is a cough medicine with no after-effects of drowsiness.

An extremely strong one for its category. Be that as it may, it is the execution that caught my eye. A classroom full of children busy at their work with one kid fast asleep and the tag line -- cough medicine ka asar? So simple.

So true. And most of all so identifiable. No heightened dramatics. No people in white coats spouting scientific jargon. Just a simple plain, true to life shot. Yes. It always works.

Bill Bernbach was one of advertising's kings of simplicity. His most memorable work were the ones that present exactly how people think and feel -- with no packaging. His strength lay in his power of observation.

The entire series of advertising that he created for the Volkswagen Beetle was exactly that. Right from admitting that the car was ugly. Remember the famous line, "It's ugly. But it gets you there."? And the picture in the ad was one of the earlier space ships that America had used for its pioneering moon landings.

He knew how his audience thought and, better still, he also knew what they wanted. His work shone with sincerity. And perhaps that is why they sold so much of the client's products.

What I've learned

There's a little admonition that my mother gave me very early in life. Something I wish I had adhered to more faithfully. Since I didn't, life had to be my teacher on this.

What my mother told me was, "When the sun rises every morning it never announces to the world how bright or not, the day is going to be. It lets people experience the warmth themselves." Marketers have honed in on the reality that the proof of the pudding lies in the eating, and not in anything else. When you are trying to sell to a sharp buyer, the only reason for purchase is performance.

Sounds simple and commonsensical, but yet it is what most of us always forget. And people in high places are extremely put off by big talkers. They somehow seem to sense that poor performance is what will follow. I had to learn this quite painfully during the course of a presentation that my team and I were making to a minister for a pretty high-profile brand.

In typical advertising agency style, we began the presentation by telling him how wonderful we were. Halfway through, the minister looked at me and, quite bluntly, told me, "AGK, you lost me."

Three words which served as warning signposts to let me know that I was travelling down the wrong road. On hindsight, I wish I had gone to the crux of the presentation first and kept the "Why our Agency" section to the last.

Since we lost a good opportunity because of a little bit of foolishness, we corrected ourselves for our subsequent presentations. But yes, it is a lesson, which has stayed with me for life -- let your work speak for itself.

AG Krishnamurthy, founder of Mudra Communications, MICA and Magindia, is currently the chairman of AGK Brand Consulting.

The views expressed in the article are personal.

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