Is the content of your advertising working hard enough?

At FMS we have a fascination with ‘content’ and subscribe to David Ogilvy’s view that ‘What really decides consumers to buy, or not to buy, is the content of your advertising, not its form”.

Good creative is crucial - whatever the media - particularly in the current environment where budgets are under pressure to work that much harder.

It will help ‘outpunch’ the weight of the associated media campaign and will, at the very least, make it more effective. Conversely, poor creative can hamper a well planned and well executed media strategy.

There can be an imbalance in the relationship between media and creative - it often seems that the focus is on media (rather than creative) because this tends to be the lion’s share of the budget.

We believe that good creative work is worth investing in, and should be subject to at least the same level of attention as media!

We use a simple but effective set of criteria to evaluate the creative work we produce. It is grounded in our understanding of brands, consumer behaviour and market dynamics and our ability to get to know our clients, their brands, and the way their brands work.

In our view a good piece of creative work should:

• Express the essence / personality of the brand / concept
• Engage with the audience it is intended for
• Communicate the proposition quickly, simply, powerfully and effectively
• Have ‘stand out’/ be distinctive
• Be scalable
• Work across all media channels

If it ticks all of these boxes, it’s likely that your message will be working at least as hard as the media in delivering your campaign objectives.