It’s still on TV. That Head and Shoulders Jenson Button ad. Sports men and women in adverts are generally not a good thing. Just when one of these particularly annoying ads has finally removed itself from our airwaves a new ad comes along; a different sportsperson but with an equally vacuous and robotic-like demeanor. But it doesn’t have to be this way. Sportspeople and advertising can be a harmonious match, as some companies have worked out.If you haven’t seen the Jenson Button ad I mention above then you can truly consider yourself to be one of the lucky ones. This now seems like a poorly chosen moment to ask you to view the clip below if you haven’t yet seen it. I feel like I should have started off by lying and saying that the ad was really good just so I could have gotten you to watch it and then been able to start my rant afterwards. But I couldn’t have done that. Firstly, it would be downright dishonest and secondly, and most importantly, I couldn’t risk anyone only reading the first paragraph or two and then leaving the blog thinking I actually do like the ad without discovering it was only a ploy.
This ad is particularly mean on its audience as it puts them through several key stages of viewing displeasure. The first of which is perhaps the most damaging of all. When he says the word ‘racing’ followed by ‘spacing’ you immediately know the formula the ad is going to take. You know that the ad is going to show him in a series of situations which he will describe with just one word which will probably rhyme with the others used. It’s a bit like that deflating moment when you’re watching a play and one of the actor’s lines rhymes with the previous one; you know another song is about to rear its ugly head and there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it.
The next stage of frustration is how the advert fails to even do what it’s supposed to be doing. The words are set-up to rhyme, ‘racing’ is followed by ‘spacing’, which in turn is followed by ‘bracing’. Fine. This is then followed by ‘amazing’ and you think, OK, a bit disjointed perhaps but OK. But then the next word is ‘lie-ins’. Lie-ins?! This makes no sense. From this point onwards any feeling of connection between his little juxtaposed scenarios is completely thrown out of the window as the next words in the sequence are ‘rubber’ and ‘stuff that works’.
The next irritation is the sheer length of time the ad goes on for. By the time he says the word ‘winning’ you think to yourself ‘surely this is nearly over now, surely’. But it’s not, and in his prophetically ironic words of choice, you realise that no-one is ‘winning’ in this advert, everyone is losing.
The final stage of frustration with this advert is when he says ‘little perks’ when being surrounded by beautiful women. The profoundly understated choice of wording ‘little perks’ making this flocking of members of the opposite sex seem on about a par with a cup of tea in the afternoon perhaps with an extra cheeky biscuit on the side.
There are an awful lot of things annoying about this advert but I think it’s reasonable to assume that if the exact same terrible ad formula were given to anyone other than a sportsperson it wouldn’t be anywhere near as bad to watch. There is something about the sportsperson thrown in front of the camera that lets you know it’s going to be a train-wreck before it even starts. The thing is I don’t blame the sports people at all. To be fair they largely don’t pretend to be good at anything outside of their sport. I’m sure Jenson Button doesn’t claim to be a good actor. He probably got the offer to do the ad, thought ‘yeah, cool, that sounds like a nice little earner’ and got himself in front of the camera as quickly as possible. I would definitely do the exact same thing in this situation. It’s the advertisers I blame. They are the ones wanting to put these people in front of the cameras. This seems to be a tactic that I can only assume would be detrimental to the advertisers themselves. I say this because I just simply cannot image anyone being able to get over how annoying ads like this are to be able to then take on what the actual message of the ad is supposed to be.
To prove that the Jenson Button ad is not the only example of irritating ads centering around sportspeople have a look at the clip below featuring Kelly Holmes doing a breakfast cereal ad with patronising overtones-a-plenty.
And remember, that as an Olympian, Kelly Holmes knows what’s best for YOU! I would argue that the reason the advertisers don’t question their own tactics in getting these sportspeople to do their ads is probably because the types of products they’re usually advertising are complete ‘cash-cows’. These are the types of products that sell themselves. They are huge, well-established brands that everyone already picks up walking round the supermarket anyway. Even if the ads for these types of products featured someone simply screaming at the audience not to buy the product it probably wouldn’t really have any major effect.
What it probably really comes down to is crass generations from advertisers about target demographics and the belief that certain groups will be impressed enough by sportspeople to forgive appalling acting. In the current graduate climate can we not please see more drama graduates being put into these ads as there is no doubt whatsoever that they would do a better job a thousand times over. Also, the target demographics for these ads probably wouldn’t lose any admiration or identification with the brand in not seeing a celebrity sportsperson cast in it. In fact, the absence of such celebrities would probably makes them listen to ad more they ever have done before.
If the advertisers really want to insist on using the sportspeople in their ads though there are definitely better ways of doing it than the above examples. Manufacturer of pens, Sharpie, decided to use David Beckham in one of their TV ads. Now footballers are probably the worst group of all for lacking in the personality stakes in front of a TV camera. So how do you solve this problem? Simple, just remove the need for them to talk in the ad. If the pulling power of the ad is simply the presence of the celebrity alone then I guess there often isn’t a need to make them read from a script. I’m sure Sharpie’s weren’t worried about David Beckham’s acting skills in this ad. He probably would have done a good job, but the silent presence seems to work surprisingly well.
The other way of utilising sportspeople in advertising is to actually concentrate on what it is they do well; their sport. It’s a simply idea but for some reason one that’s often overlooked. It makes sense to get someone who’s famous to do what they are famous for doing. It could be argued that Nike Golf realised this in using Tiger Woods in their great TV campaigns.
This ad is perfect. The idea behind it is simple; film Tiger Woods being awesome at Golf to sell Golf stuff. The ad isn’t too long and it’s ‘trick-shot’ fun style means it doesn’t bore people who don’t like golf. Well done Nike.
Maybe Head and Shoulders could take a leaf our of Nike’s book here and have someone being awesome at shampoo?! Hmmm maybe not. Or I guess if they really want to use Jenson button then they could make use of his talents and have him zoom round a racetrack while someone sits in a seat behind him applying shampoo.
By Chris Fiander
