Cutting Clutter with Technology

“I want the ad to stand out of the clutter” says the client to his ad agency, this remark has the agency guys going back and trying to figure out how to make the ad stand out. At other times the agency boasts before the client “This ad will cut through the clutter”. How does one cut through the clutter? How do you get your ad noticed and remembered? This has always been the concern of most advertising professionals anywhere in the world. Today technology can be used to get your ad noticed and cut through the clutter.

In September 2010, in India, readers of The Hindu and The Times of India in the cities of Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore, Pune and Chennai experienced a ‘talking newspaper ad’ of Volkswagen Vento; this ad created a sensation and truly stood out of the clutter, I am sure that the other ads in the newspaper that day hardly got noticed; I had written a post on this, please click here - Talking Newspaper, what next moving pictures in a newspaper? In my post I wondered as to what we will see next, moving pictures in a newspaper? A visitor to my blog commented that it is almost there, and suggested that I visit a website, I did just that and what I saw was a press ad of AXA Insurance coming alive, it amazed me and I would like to share my experience with my readers, please see the video below.

I learnt from a fellow blogger about how the principle of after image effect was used for a cinema ad for BMW. I need not explain since it is very well explained in the video below:

Another innovation is the QR code- QR stands for Quick Response, it started in Japan way back in 1994 and is pretty common there; it does not make an ad stand out of the clutter but, let me put it this way, it strengthens the ad since it helps the reader get more information on a product or service very easily on his/her cell phone via internet. In this way the ad is better remembered and recalled. This is how it works:

For example a press ad for a product carries a QR code, it is like a bar code but it is not the same; what you need to do is to aim your camera phone on the QR code and click a photo, an application in the camera phone then connects to a web site which gives more information about the product. These QR codes can be printed on virtually any surface, they can be used on hoardings, visiting cards and stationery, packaging, product tags, shop displays and wherever you think you may want to use them. Mid-Day introduced QR code a year ago and recently I saw a press ad of Ford Endeavour carrying a QR code.

Walking billboards have been in existence for a long time, it is nothing but people walking around wearing billboards. Now a jacket a person wears can act as a video screen showing commercials; however it has to be a really special jacket.

It is possible to transmit electricity wirelessly, this technology can be used to make your product stand out and get noticed; it also has many other applications. How does it work? I need not talk about it; it is best explained in the following video.

What is new technology today will became commonplace tomorrow and will further clutter the advertising space, now the problem is how do we cut through the clutter?