What’s this all about?

by | Jun 24, 2013 | Marketing that works

Obviously the owners of the company who paid lots of money to run this advert in a glossy magazine thought it was great, but I wonder how many enquiries (and thus how much actual business, the real point of any advertisement) this one produced for them.

What's this about

Let’s look at what I reckon is wrong with it…

  1. The headline: The aim of any headline is to get the reader’s attention because it’s an advertisement for the rest of the advertisement. Sadly, I don’t think the headline they’ve used would have got anyone’s attention. Maybe something along the lines of “SMSF Investors: Don’t make this costly mistake!” would have been a better option.
  2. Body copy all in capital letters: Notice just how difficult it is to read… you’ll always find that using upper and lower case in the correct way is heaps easier to read. It’s just optically more pleasant. Besides, it goes against what we had drummed into us at school… capitalise the start of sentences and proper nouns. Some say that all upper case is shouting at your readers.
  3. White print on a black background (it’s called reversing white out of black) is devilishly hard to read… some authorities suggest that readabilty falls by about 30%. It does have the advantage that it stands out which means it should be used very sparingly, if at all. Dark print on a light background nearly always works better.
  4. No call to action: There’s no encouragement for the reader, if they have made it to the end of the advert, to act straightaway! You want them to pick up the phone or go to the website now coz when the magazine is thrown out so is the advert.
  5. Lots of unused space: Yes, they may have been trying to make the advert look pretty but there’s a ton of space going begging in which they could have provided lots more interesting, compelling and valuable information to inform and excite the reader and convince them to take the next step.

I’m a firm believer that, when you have sorted out the words, you should always give your copy to a designer who knows what they are doing. They will turn it into a great attention getting, easy to read, results producing advertisement.