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Creating a memorable advertising campaign isn’t for the faint of heart — yet Progressive Insurance has been able to do that for decades. With the creation of Flo the insurance agent, viewers have watched Progressive’s story unfold on their TVs in a sitcom-like fashion, which just so happens to be something Progressive asked their ad agency, Arnold Worldwide, to do. But it’s their latest character who is now resonating with viewers. If you’ve watched network television lately, you may have met Dr. Rick and his gang of misfit new homeowners who are slowly turning into their parents. Dr. Rick claims to specialize in helping prevent people from turning into their parents, or parentamorphosis, after they purchase a home. The goal is to entice viewers who may have bought a home to purchase home insurance, subtly promising to solve one issue while revealing a truth living inside all of us: that we will one day become our parents. How Progressive Keeps Winn The Simplicity — an
humor to communicate Apple’s strengths and features. The ads were so memorable and effective that the company unanimously won a Grand Effie at the 39th Annual Effie Awards — and slays other companies in the market today. 3. A Lesson From Volkswagen : Be honest and direct. If you watched
the TV show “Mad Men,” you may remember the episode in Season 1 when the ad men at Sterling Cooper go nuts over Volkswagen’s “Think Small” and “Lemon” ads.
These ads were brilliant in their simplicity, honesty, and directness. As Business Insider put it, “Where other car manufacturers blithely boasted of spoiler fins and other luxury features, Volkswagen focused on the utility of its smaller, more durable cars in a series of simple ads that openly acknowledged their purpose as a sales tool.” In the “Lemon” ad, Volkswagen even critiqued one of its own cars as a lemon because its glove compartment was flawed, setting a new standard for honesty in advertising and cementing a fad term for faulty cars we still use today. Take a leaf out of Volkswagen’s book and your advertising just might pop up in TV shows in 2060. 4. A Lesson FromDos Equis: Solve a problem readers care about. The best way to sell a product is to show your customers how it will enhance their lives. In 2006, the beer brand Dos Equis did this to great effect with its “Most Interesting Man in the World’’ campaign. Using its key character (a man so cool “sharks have a week about him”), Dos Equis showed its male viewers how it would solve their problem of feeling unsophisticated, unattractive, and uninteresting. The message was clear: “Drink Dos Equis, and you could be this guy in 20 years.” Over the nine years the campaign ran, Dos Equis almost tripled its business. Who doesn’t want those results? 5. A Lesson FromDe Beers : Paint a desirable picture of the future. What Dos Equis did in 2006, the diamond company De Beers did better in 1947. The company’s slogan “A diamond is forever” painted the ultimately desirable picture of the future for its customers: showcasing perfect, everlasting relationships. De Beers used that ad to popularize diamond engagement rings and monopolize the diamond market — obtaining an almost scary level of business success. If you take a lesson from De Beers, though, be careful as you craft your vision. Sometimes companies go overboard trying to show their customers the future they want — if overdone, they can end up exaggerating too much. The fast fashion brand H&M did just that in ads for its Conscious Collection and quickly came under legal fire for greenwashing. When in doubt, go back to Lessons 1 and 3.
Apple releases a shiny new iPhone twice a year, and these days, new email platforms seem to pop up nearly as often. The latest shiny object in the email universe is Superhuman, a sleek, minimalist platform that claims to be “the fastest email experience ever made.” Superhuman splits its emphasis between aesthetics and performance. On the aesthetic side, the inbox is clean and clutter-free, decorated with cinematic nature photos and cityscapes. Most navigation in Superhuman is done with keyboard shortcuts rather than mouse clicks. “On average, we all spend three hours a day in email,” the Superhuman website reads. “When you use something for that long, it should be subtle, delightful, and gorgeous.” On the performance side, Superhuman believes every interaction on its platform should take less than
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