The Consumer Is Clueless

My friend Benny mailed me this link a while ago...Have a dekko!

1. It proves yet again what I firmly believe, perhaps you might as well!!
That consumers can be mostly misleading when it comes to evaluating a half-cooked creative stimulus. They are clueless. But we can't entirely blame them!

2. Yet, clients(almost all) will hang on to every word of the 6-8 guys(who make the FGD group) who pop-analyse the creative thread-bare as if all of them were seasoned critics...Even though at the back of their mind they might know that the FGD guy is a 'frequent participant' from Amar Colony/ Lajpat Nagar(if you are doing the FGD in Delhi:-)

3. The often hurriedly assembled narrimatics, animatics or other aha-I-managed-to-kill-the-creative-matics are as different from the final creative as chalk and cheese. Yet, this fact is brazenly ignored by the research agency and the client.

4. With almost all the persuasiveness and memorability of the ad dependent on the final execution and the special effects of the finished product, I fail to understand what benefit do we gather by the rigorous analysis of the half-cooked creatives...

Finally, however unscientific it may sound, there is little substitute to creative judgement and trust between the client and the agency...

More than 20 years after this 1984 Apple TVC, the 'life of a creative campaign' around the globe is still hostage to the tyranny of the FGD - the pop-pontification of the 'career FGDist'!