Logan Wilmont, executive creative director at Cheil UK, discusses what he thinks makes a fabulous Christmas ad, and what makes him go 'bah humbug'.
Apparently, the perfect Christmas ad has lots of kids sitting round a roaring fire, singing some 70s one-hit wonder, laughing hysterically, with a couple of celebs thrown in for good measure. Ok? Well there’s the brief, now off you go and write a great one.
As any advertising creative will tell you, the Christmas brief is one of the toughest you’ll ever get. And while it was reassuring to see how much mums look forward to our festive offerings, it was also slightly disturbing to see that they picked every cliché imaginable when it came to the make-up of their own perfect Christmas commercial.
Mums can be forgiven, but sadly it’s what most advertisers do at this time of year too. Normal rigour goes up the chimney and in its place we’re subjected to a glut of ‘look-a-like’ commercials on our screens. In some categories, it’s like a Christmas party game of ‘spot the difference’ only with retailer ads.
Surely we owe it to our clients to stand out and be relevant at all times of the year, but most especially during the most important shopping season of the year.
How do we do that? What are the insights and strategies that lead to the kind of ideas that set brands apart from all the reindeer, snowflakes and Santas?
The ads I like are the ones that touch the true emotions of Christmas, those that drop the cynicism that usually dominates our business and which find ways to capture the childlike anticipation, genuine excitement and heart-warming magic of the Christmas season.
Because I couldn’t find much in this year’s batch, here are three ads from the last couple of years that say it best for me.