POSTER TEXT – Attraction/stimulus

Its important for any designer to know what gets attention and how to use it for any type of work. The aim of most design is to get noticed and attract attention, and if it cant do that, it has failed especially in advertising. When looking at visual language in public spaces it is vital that this is understood by the designer on how to get to through to an audience.

Attraction

Attracting attraction may be composed of three main elements, namely unusual, emotionally salient and involuntary neuro-biological stimulus.

Involuntary biological stimulus can be counted as things that make us react in particular ways that we cannot control because our inbuilt instincts. The stimuli may include sound, image, physical objects, all of which will make us react in particular ways, to either engage us with it or change our attention.

In our current days, we are overwhelmed with all kinds of stimulus everywhere we go, a lot of which is produced by people, for attracting and convincing people of particular messages. Most of this we see from Advertisements.

“The purpose of advertising is to convince people that products are of use to them in one way or another. If people agree, they will buy them. However, advertising must do its job very quickly; it doesn’t have the time or the space to go into detail or explanations.” - Richard F. Taflinger, PhD -1996

Visual stimulus

Visual stimulus, is the most effective way of attracting peoples attention. As humans we are more receptive to visuals as, we have a much greater “Visual Memory” then we do for the stimuli areas. (Whitfield - 2008)

“For one, Advertising uses a lot of Sex, as it is the second strongest of the psychological appeals. 1^st is self-preservation. Its strength is biological and instinctive, the genetic imperative of reproduction.”
- Richard F. Taflinger, PhD -1996

This may fall under methods of advertising, which use arousal as a means of gaining attention towards an advertisement. This can be done in few ways. Some examples are

1• The display of attractive people, desired objects.

2• The use of colour, and shapes

Within each element there is reaction: “stimulus=reaction” - Ranulfo Romo & Emilio Salinas – 1999

 

There is apart of our brains called the Aymgdala, which is the central system of decision making, mostly in response to fear and what will be harmful to us. In other words, it is the part of our brains that make decisions for us, and reacts before we do.

 

In terms of looking at advertising, the brain also makes decisions quickly on how an ad is viewed.

If there is something within the ad that imposes any kind of threat, even on a deep subconscious level, bias can be formed, often turning the ads message against its self.  - Bar, Moshe, 2007

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Colour

Colour also plays a major influence on our judgment. Colour can manipulate perception on a range of levels, such as scale, form, taste.

Some preferences of colours are due to the upbringing of cultural learning, as well as sex and age. In the way of advertising, it is important to know what colours will attract your audience.

This can also be affected by whats known as “optimal stimulation level” which involves different groups of people and their (sensation seeking) needs. (Marie-Christine Lichtlé 2007)

People who may have a high sensation need will react strongly to vivid and colourful image.
Eg:• Young people prefer warm / vibrant colours and visuals such as red, yellow or orange.

Warm colours are more stimulating which marketers will often use to create arousal hence advancing attention drawn to advertising using sound, colours, rapid moving images.

Cooler colours are less stimulating which would be more attractive to people that don’t seek stimulation as much.

Eg: Older people prefer cool / calmer colours such as blue and green.

 

References

 Marie-Christine Lichtlé – The effect of an advertisement’s colour on emotions evoked by an ad and attitude towards the ad, – International Journal of Advertising 2007, Vol. 26 Issue 1, p37-6  - EBSCOhost database Communication & Mass Media – Viewed 2 April 2008

Tamara Deswart -01.27.2007: Colours play a role in our emotions.
Viewed 3 April 2008

http://www.tamaranda.com/documents/33.html

Bar, Moshe, 2007 – TO GET INSIDE THEIR MINDS, LEARN HOW THEIR MINDS WORK. – Advertising Age; 11/26/2007, Vol. 78 Issue 47, p16-17, 2p – EBSCOhost database – Communication & Mass Media Complete – viewed 6 April 2008

Petronio A. Bendito, Aspects of Visual Attraction: Attention-Getting Model for Art and Design, Journal of Visual Literacy, Spring 2005 ,Volume 25, Number 1 67-76, EBSCOhost database Communication & Mass Media Complete, item: AN 17604476

Leone, Christopher, D’Arienzo, Justin, Dec2000 - Sensation-Seeking and Differentially Arousing Television Commercials. – Journal of Social Psychology;, Vol. 140 Issue 6, p710-720, 11p – Psychology and Behavioral Sciences Collection – viewed 6 April

Richard F. Taflinger, PhD -1996 – Taking ADvantage
You and Me, Babe: Sex and Advertising – viewed 19 April 2008 – http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~taflinge/sex.html

Activity and reactivity – Ranulfo Romo & Emilio Salinas – 1999
Sensing and deciding in the somatosensory system
Current Opinion in Neurobilogy, 9: 487-493 – viewed 12 April 2008
http://72.14.253.104/search?q=cache:4NR02z2cRcEJ:www.lce.hut.fi/teaching/S-114.4762/ActReact1.ppt+involuntary+neurobiological+stimulus.&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=10&client=safari

Alan Whitfield – 2008, National Institute of Design Research
Lecture: The hunter gatherer brain, viewed 31 March

Brands and cults – the persuaders continued

Brands and cults – the persuaders continued

“Find out why people follow cults, then apply it to your brand”

Its was also discussed in this video the following of brands, and brand loyalty due to branding. It just happened to be someone’s idea to investigate into the reason why people follow cults, being little sub groups of people that follow particular ideas or fashions. Some of these cults may be for example: Punk rock cults, or religious cults. For the same reasons that people may follow cults, people may also follow “a brand”. By making your brand in the same light as a cult, it may develop certain brand loyalties based around it.

In terms of the commercial world of products and advertising, the cults would be loyal to the “NIKE” brand or the “PESPI” brand. “Joining a cult is just like joining a brand”.

But this isn’t the only thing that will get peoples attention and loyalty to a brand.

Now emotions have to be attached to all of these products, for it to have any attraction to us, or at least, what marketers are using in order to appeal to us.

Things need to be “Inspiring, or Magical”, someway to connect to the consumers appeals, is through the heart, to make people feel better about what they are about to buy or become involved in.

Someone in this Video also mentioned the Idea of something called a”LOVE MARK” which is like an iconic place that you can relate to with particular products. The product has some connection to be able to reach into your heart: that you can build story’s from using the product, you can share it with you loved one’s, It reminds you of home… and so on.

But then again, how much needing to be “INSPIRED” can we actually take. The first time someone would have tried this would have seemed like a massive move for advertising, when actually emotionally connecting to people, then come all the other EPIC campaigns, and everything becomes the same. INSPIRATION is no loner relevant to the consumer and what they think they will be able to get our of the product, as in the long run “the shoes aren’t going to make you feel loved….. its just a shoe”.

 

“once a culture becomes entirely advertising friendly, it ceases to be a culture at all”

 

“Something that once moved you in theatre, music – is now used to sell Pepsi – Nike”

 

Technology

As technology changes, so will the strength and power of advertising. A lot of our advertisement viewing is at home in front of the TV set, where we aren’t moving back and forth from work or home, we probably take it in most in this time.

But now that technology has advanced so much, TV is changing where people can skip ads altogether and only just watch their programs. Advertising agencies spend millions of dollars on campaign that are effectively working less then they may have before.

If you can’t make advertisements that people wont see, then what can you do? PLACE THE BLOODY THINGS IN THEIR PROGRAMS”. Product placement is something that’s used a lot in TV, such as fashion shows “Queer eye for a straight guy” where fashionable brands are constantly mentioned. Movies do this a lot as well, if you ever notice a MAC APPLE logo panned whilst in a scene with the actor talking away.

Other Movies that almost base their whole theme around a brand could be:

• I AM SAM – starbucks

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Cast away – Fed ex express

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

http://30gms.com/images/uploads/CastAway_2000_39_001.sized_thumb.jpg

The Persuaders

In terms of the kinds of research I am looking at currently “advertising and it’s effectiveness”. I was given a suggested title to view called “The Persuaders” when my group had discussed our research topics to our lecturers. The video discusses views on persuasion from mass media to the general public. It asks the question “Is our society too overloaded with advertising”? Everywhere we look, in elevators, up in the sky with sky writing, on buses, in golf holes at the golf course, IS THERE NO END to the mass spread of media and advertising? There is virtually no escape.

This problem of mass media and its sheer scale, with the amount of messages out there on every possible advertising medium trying to reach us, its seems now that the media and marketable space is running out, things don’t get our attention as they once did. Sure when the first bill board had been erected, no one would have seen anything of such scale before, hence getting all the attention. Marketers then took advantage of this by competing and putting up there own billboards. Eventually there are hundreds of these things around, are they so interesting now?

“The more messages advertisers create, the more they have to create to reach us”

Its just a vicious circle of clutter, when an advertising firm claims that they can 

“break through the clutter”, if you think about it, all they are doing is just adding to the clutter.

 

Research

For every advertisement and campaign, there is a lot of research involved into who the advertisement is going to be used for. In order to do this, the marketers must know exactly what the target audience will be attracted to.

Focus groups, surveys, field research, anything that will accumulate enough information to be able to describe who the target audience is. Once this research is conducted, the best way to understand exactly who the target audience is, is to actually make a (made up) physical profile of a user, their wants/needs/desires are.

Most of the time though, not enough care actually goes into where these ads are going and who they are targeting. “Ads are made for the people who are making it, not for the people who are the consumers. They are often made and used to build peoples port-folios or to make more money, or to get a better job, NOT for the consumers”.

 

Advertising Techniques

 

An old technique that was used, in almost every advertisement, was to use these BUZZ words that were constantly HAMMERED into our brains. The aim of ads were to try and out do others by using these words. The product always had to be “BRIGHTER, CLEANER, SMOOTHER, CRISPER”, anything to persuade us that it was better then another product, but then you hear it too much, and these words then become meaningless. HOW CAN ANY PRODUCT BE BETTER THEN ANOTHER?

 

Now, its not just about what the product did/does, but what it means to the consumer.

They call this “sudo-spiritual” marketing.

Example of this can be seen in NIKES marketing, depicting transcendence of spirit through sport.

 

http://www.adrants.com/images/TSA%20ESPNMag%2010-22_Running_2.jpg

 

 

Or even the STARBUCKS campaign and idea, that it didn’t need to be just another coffee shop, it became “a third place” as a communal meeting place that wasn’t work or home.

http://thomashawk.com/hello/209/1017/1024/Night%20Starbucks.jpg

ITS ABOUT THE INNER BRAND MEANING