In a world of satellite, cable and digital television, there are more and more adverts bombarding us on the TV screens. And with the increased number of adverts, comes a crisis: there are too many adverts and not enough people to make them!
It's time to cash in on the ad boom, and thankfully you don't need to know anything about making adverts to get into the industry. All you need is our simple guide...
The hardest part is getting the customers in the first place. Unfortunately we can't help you get them - you'll need to go out and get them for yourself. What we do recommend is that you start off by making some test adverts and showing them to potential clients. Video tape in hand, you can dazzle them with your amazing skills and abilities.
This is the hardest part. Actually writing and making the adverts is (thankfully) child's play in comparison, as it's easy to make TV adverts, as ads for various products always stick to the rules below.
Beware! Imitate! Don't innovate! Clients aren't interested your ideas. The only things they care about is patronising their potential customers enough to flog them enough of their product.
So just what are the rules for those products them?
Some would say these are the easiest adverts to make. All you need are the following ingredients:
Once you've got these, the rest is easy. All you have to do now is get your star to pose in various positions, whilst flicking back their hair - having made sure that it looks appropriate shiny. Feeding our star with a few cans of a high quality dog food should provide the glossy coat, I mean hair.
Indeed the only problem you may come up against whilst doing one of these ads is if your star isn't able to coherently pronounce all your pseudo-scientific buzzwords. In this case, she's obviously more in touch with your target audience, so give her a pay rise and get some deep voiced man in to do the 'science part'.
These are rarer, and fall into two main camps. The first is the anti-dandruff brigade.
To do one of these adverts, you basically need a lead male who doesn't mind you emptying a whole tub of talcum powder over his head, just seconds before you do a close up of his scalp. Then all you need to do is cut to a picture of his hair 'after he used the shampoo' (i.e. before you put the talc on his head), say how wonderful the shampoo is, and it's a wrap and you're a couple of grand
richer!
The other type is similar to the Women's shampoo advert described above. This time however you need an appropriate man with long hair (well that will be David Ginola then) and you will need to cut out the pseudo-scientific crap, as men are much less likely to fall for that rubbish. Just mention a lot how hard said male's hair looks now he's actually bothered to wash it.
Advertising to kids is a doddle. All you have to do is make your toy look as great as possible and leave it to sell itself. The pester factor is the way to sell things and your adverts will sucker them in big style!
The advert itself depends entirely on the type of toy your trying to sell, although they all revolve around some annoyingly cute and smug looking kids sat round having 'fun'. The different variations are as below:
Perhaps some of the cheapest adverts around to make, these basically consist of some actress pretending to be a housewife talking about special offers. These can either be set in a kitchen or in a supermarket. It's also worth noting that your actress should always buy branded products, most of
which are meat based. All should be 'amazing savings'!
Seasonal adverts for Christmas, Easter, St Andrew's Day and Nurses Day should always be made, and should always mention how many people will be coming round to dinner on these days, and should, in some way, always include the housewife picking up the largest frozen turkey in the world.
At Easter, don't forget to put in big letters the words 'CLOSED EASTER SUNDAY' on screen at the end, thus sending those watching into a purchasing frenzy because the shops will be shut. Your supermarket client will then find their takings quadruple as the punters rush through the store to buy
everything in sight.
Probably one of the easiest accounts to steal away from your rivals as these adverts as extraordinarily cheap and very, very easy to make - especially the way we're going to do them!
First of all, get a piece of cardboard and put the logo of the shop at the bottom of the screen. Cut out a hole in the middle and put behind that hole, a television screen. The TV should be connected to a video recorder.
There are now two ways to proceed:
Now all you need to do is stick a camera in front of you video/cardboard/TV arrangement, and record the action going on.
Once the video has finished playing, stop, and film a new caption featuring the price of the product, along with a nice picture of it. An easy way to earn megabucks.
Note: Your clients may begin to notice how cheaply your ads look and may ask for a reduction in your fees. Do not submit, but mention how expensive the clips cost to show on TV, as well as wear and tear on the cardboard.
Whilst we haven't covered every type of advert, you have enough to build a successful business. Further inspiration can be found by watching digital television channels which have several hundred different types of advert, all of which are cheap and exactly the same.
So get out there and put your new found knowledge to work!
Like the Gangster Rap article - published on the same date I think - this is entirely based on reality because ultimately, when it comes to advertising, stereotypes and clichés rule the world.
First published on Planet Bods on 22 April 2001.