Tiptoe through the tulips

I'm afraid that this post may have me sounding like a rabid Daily Fail reader, but sometimes I wonder what I'm still doing in this business.

I read that the ASA have banned the first two TV ads under the new rules put in place to "reduce gender stereotyping." Complaints had come in from the public to say that these ads "perpetuated harmful stereotypes." I took a look at the ads, expecting to see something outrageous. Offensive, even.

But I don't think I've seen anything so harmless in my life.

According to the BBC, three people (no, that's not a typo) complained that the VW ad showed women in a passive/stereotypical care-giving role. I'd assume those three people were taking the piss. But the ASA, in their infinite wisdom, have concluded that "this ad presented gender stereotypes in a way that was likely to cause harm."

Cause harm? To whom? In whose view? What possible harm could be caused by seeing a woman on a park bench by a pram for a couple of seconds in a TV commercial? What kind of a world is it where depicting someone as care-giving is "likely to cause harm"?

Maybe the woman in the ad finally had a longed-for baby after several miscarriages. Maybe she's a lesbian. Maybe she used to be a man. Maybe she used to be a wombat for all I know and care.

What on earth happened to imagination? I've posted before about the way everything seems to be taken so literally these days, with demands here, there and everywhere for people of all sorts to "see themselves reflected in advertising".

Please, please, please:

Bring back creative ideas.

Bring back universal human truths.

Bring back advertising as entertainment not a dull bloody reflection of real life.

All that will happen if this policing continues will be the emergence of new stereotypes which will quickly become as irrelevant and yawn-inducing as the old ones.

Who remembers the "new man" of the 1990s?

Should advertising always be a mirror?

I read an excellent article this week by Graham Booth, entitled Why your advertising should be MAD. Graham presents a reel of 15 ads that he's helped to create during his 30 years' experience and comes to the conclusion that all of these - though very different  - have something in common: a genuine creative idea. The ads are well worth a look, and I'm sure even someone not employed in the ad industry could say, with confidence, what the idea in each is.

By contrast, we're surrounded these days by idea-free advertising, as I bemoaned a couple of posts ago. But, as Graham says, "every ad should aspire to be more than the strategy put on screen, or the brand purpose spoken over generic visuals, or some reflection of the 'real life' of the consumer." Looking at his 15 ads, he remarks that they all employ metaphor, or exaggeration, or contrast. None of them "tell it straight." Hence the title - Make Advertising Drastic (or Daft, Dangerous, Dada ...)

But Graham is just an account man turned researcher. What does a creative director say?

Here's a creative director getting a bit mad, too, but in another sense. I suppose you do get mad when you have someonething telling you that you don't exist. But I do wonder when and where all this "demanding to be reflected" business started. For someone creative, it seems to be taking things terribly literally. I am sure that Graham Booth had plenty of respondents in his group discussions saying they didn't like the ad because the woman on the storyboard had blonde hair, and they've got dark hair.

"Representing diversity" is not a creative idea.

How does this creative director know that the woman in the trainers/chocolate/car ad isn't lesbian? Is sexuality of any relevance whatsoever when you're selling floor cleaner, anyway? Shouldn't we be looking at finding universal human truths that unite us, instead of being divisive?

I vote for getting away from these real life ads (which all look like what we used to call "mood videos") and get creative, and MAD.

But if you're going to do real life, do it well. This ad from Coke is a terrific example and, I'd say, uses a slightly MAD mirror.

This septic isle?

Thirty years ago, at the beginning of my planning career, I was working in the most famous agency in London on "the world's favourite airline." I don't think I need to name either.

Three decades on, that airline is celebrating its centenary (or at least the centenary of one of its predecessors). And, for the first time in six years, has created a brand campaign. Described as "a love letter to Britain" the ad shows scenes of BA employees getting ready for the centenary flight, as well as a cast of celebrities and everyday passengers travelling on the flight.

Nice as it is, I find it rather underwhelming. It's meant to show the creativity and pioneering spirit of Britain but there's nothing creative or pioneering about this ad. It's derivative of the Nike "Londoner" ad as well as any number of films that were put together for the 2012 Olympics (I expect Britain will continue to milk that one for ever, rather like the Battle of Britain or the 1966 World Cup). And where is the famous British humour? A no-show, apart from a weak joke about tea. What exactly is the idea behind this ad? It comes over rather like a safety video without the safety bits.

It's not clear whether this is an ad for Britain in general, or for the carrier. Is it meant to make people feel good about British Airways, or Britain?

I know I'd feel better about Britain if I had a clearer sign that despite all the Brexit crap, the spirit of innovation and creativity is alive and not just well, but kicking.

Like a commercial that will still be remembered in thirty years' time.

The most wonderful ad of the year

Together Forever, the commercial for Ancestry is my Ad of 2019. I've been rattling on this year rather a lot about political or cause-related advertising that doesn't really connect with the product, but here's a great example of a commercial that does.

Where shall I start? The idea is insightful, clever, topical and makes me want to go off and try the product by getting my DNA checked out. The end-line is one of the best I've heard for a long time: We may be leaving Europe, but Europe will never leave us.

Then there's the execution - super casting, use of music, all of which adding up to a film you want to watch again and again - and talk about.

The ad was created by Dan Morris and Charlene Chandrasekaran at Droga5, London. I gather, in the interests of international alignment, the account will be leaving to go to a new agency, but with an ad like this, I wonder if it'll also be a case of the old agency never really leaving the client.

Five build an awfully tough-as-old-boots brand

Nothing says childhood summer to me stronger than the works of Enid Blyton, and specifically, The Famous Five. Even if they didn't start off being famous, over 75 years ago, they certainly are now. I'm not a huge fan of calling fictional characters (or authors for that matter) a "brand" - I don't know why, but the reduction of a human being (albeit a fictional one) to the level of a packet of washing powder seems demeaning. But bear with me - this is more about what brands can learn from this frightfully long-lived five-some.

The original book, Five on a Treasure Island, was published in 1942, and others in the series soon followed, accompanied by games, birthday cards, stationary and, of course, jigsaws.

(c/o www.enidblytonsociety.co.uk)

The books remain in print, and are still extremely popular, although the cover designs and illustrations have changed over the years. From the print medium, it was inevitable that the Famous 5's exploits would soon transfer onto film, and so it was, with the first feature film appearing in the 1950s, and TV series running in the 1970s and 1990s, complete with the associated annuals:

In marketing, we often talk about a brand becoming part of the culture, and a sure sign of this happening is when the jokes, parodies and T-shirts become part of the social fabric. Who, that was young in the 80s, will ever forget the Comic Strip's Five Go Mad in Dorset?

As brands get long-in-the-tooth, their managers begin to fret: are we keeping up to date? Are we still appealing to today's young generation? Is it enough to change the shorts and long socks of the original illustrations to hoodies and sweat-pants? The text of the books has been subject to a little bit of correction, some of it practical (decimal coinage) and some of it political (tweaking attitudes that are not acceptable today). 

As the Famous Five moved into the digital age, a new spin-off cartoon series was created, featuring the 5's offspring, right up-to-date with all the latest technology:

The parodies continue, and anyone that has been in a UK bookshop in the last year or so can't have failed to notice this and the others in the series:

Some brands get terribly huffy about parody and spoof. I don't know if there were any legal battles surrounding Brexit Island and Co. but as an outsider, it's easy to see how this bit of affectionate fun hardly damages the "brand" - rather, it reinforces it. I wouldn't be at all surprised if sales of the original books have taken off again since these take-offs hit the shelves.

Which all brings us nearly up to date. Where are the Famous 5 off for their next adventure? Well, in marketing terms they're doing a bit of a co-operation. Or is it a celebrity endorsement?

Mine's a meat paste sandwich with lashings of ginger beer.

DO shoot me - I'm the piano player, or composer, or somebot

I've remarked on these pages often recently about the modern tendency to throw pull-on-the-heartstrings plinky piano music into advertising to evoke the "made me cry" reaction.

Here's a prime example, and here's the plinky piano music's depressing partner-in-crime - the ominous cello music. And here's an ad that takes the mick out of it all.

Seems I am not the only one who's crying with inappropriate laughter at all this tear-duct-squeezing mawkish music.

Here's what could have been a clever creative idea, ruined by the execution, particularly the plonky-plinky soundtrack. As the writer says, "best use of Generic Sad Piano Film Trailer Score #647" - could be a new award. There are enough contenders.

I blame all those clever people who suddenly discovered that human beings don't make decisions primarily based on their rational thoughts, but on their feelings, ergo we have to make an "emotional connection."

But why do emotions always have to be morose and mournful? Whatever happened to the jolly jingles of yore? I still remember them decades afterwards, and if that's not an emotional connection, what is?

So go ahead, shoot that plinky piano player. And I don't feel in the least bit mean or cruel saying that as in all likelihood it's just a robot anyway.

Not-so-smart addiction

Yesterday, I nearly got into a fight, or at least a slanging match. A man crossed the path of my car (yes, I was on the road), glued to his SmartPhone, not looking, oblivious. If I'd been paying as little attention to my surroundings as he was, he'd be dead or seriously injured. Yet, he seemed to think I was in the wrong.

The news (which most people probably read on their SmartPhone) is cram-full of articles about SmartPhone addiction (or is it social media addiction, or internet addiction? And does it matter?) and as long ago as 2014, the McCarthy Group's Trust and Attention Survey found that, for millennials, access to the internet is more important than access to their best friend. The word Nomophobia has been coined to mean "the fear of being without your phone."

We're not just heading for the dystopia depicted in this cartoon (inspired by The Fleischer Bros.' Bimbo's Initiation), we're active - or passive - participants already.




The Googles, Facebooks, Instagrams and YouTubes of this world are responding by a focus on "Digital Wellbeing", building take-a-break features into their services, amongst other measures. This move towards "responsible devicing" feels familiar - rather like the booze companies encouraging responsible drinking. A little bit "nanny knows best?"

The man on my local street aside, it's difficult to say how much of this is real and how much is media hype. And I wonder if just as much anxiety and mental distress comes from well-meaning and "look at my perfect world" posts as it does from hate speech and the like.

One thing is for sure: the (social) media companies dealing with the problem head-on isn't new.

One famously-long TV program title from my youth was Why Don't You Just Switch Off Your Television Set and Go Out and Do Something Less Boring Instead? 

A stitch in time

I have always been fascinated by the Bayeux Tapestry - not just for its awe-inspiring ancientness, but also from the juxtaposition of the medium and the content. An action-packed bloody battle depicted through that most ladylike, refined and patient of crafts - tapestry, or more exactly, embroidery.

There's a similar juxtaposition going on with the BBC's FIFA World Cup 2018 launch commercial, created by their in-house agency BBC Creative, and Blinkink. The thrills, spills and action of past World Cups have been captured in 600 individually embroidered frames. The style of the embroidery and the soundtrack to the resulting film are inspired by the host nation, Russia.

A 7m long tapestry will live on after the winner has hoisted the trophy in July. This is only 1/10th the length of the Bayeux Tapestry, but it certainly reflects the tagline of the film: History will be made.

I'm sure there are other interesting and creative ideas for combining medium and content in unexpected ways that this could inspire.

And will it perhaps still be there to marvel at in 1,000 years?

The hating gene

A bit of a mini-trend that's been going on for a year or two is the idea of getting your DNA analysed. This plays into human narcissism, of course - certainly a step better than all those personality tests or getting your colours done or blood group analysis. And it's been used creatively, usually in the form of those 'social experiments' where a tough, shaven-headed and tattooed bloke with nationalist leanings is horrified to find some of his ancestors coming from the Indian sub-continent (for example.)

But now this trend has been used in what may be one of my favourite TV spots of the year so far, for one of my favourite brands - Marmite. In a wonderful piece of not-quite-science, The Marmite Gene Project has taken cheek swabs from over 250 individuals to try and find if there are genetic markers for loving or hating the gunky savoury stuff.

To the sounds of Elgar's Nimrod, we have a collection of characters -  the expectant new parents, the stroppy teenager, the nervous young man, the affronted wife and many more - reacting to the results and those of their nearest and dearest. Beautifully acted, some lovely observation and a bit of a mickey-take of all those po-faced 'social experiment' ads.

It makes me proud to be British. Thank you, Marmite and Adam & Eve/DDB.

Now, the clever trick here is this: the agency didn't latch onto a random piece of pop culture and force-fit it into the brand, or try and 'claim it.'

What they have done is to start with the brand truth and show and tell this in a fresh new way using current pop culture.

I love it!

Creative direction by numbers?

I've already bemoaned - or at least questioned - the use of 'predictive software' in the film industry, both here and here. And I see the phrase 'data-driven decisions' everywhere I turn, it seems.

The latest company I've become aware of plying their wares in this are is ScriptBook whose tagline is 'Hard Science. Better Box Office.' Moving on from the 'Hard Science,' they have quite a hard sell - 'subjective decisions lead to box office failure.' And they have the data to back it up. 87% of films lose money.

Now, there may be something wrong in the logic that making a film involves subjective decisions, and most films lose money therefore subjective decisions mean failure, but anyway. What ScriptBook  offer is Script2Screen, which employs artificial intelligence to analyse screenplays, delivering an objective assessment of a script's commercial and critical success. Out with hunches, intuition, bias, gut feeling and in with fairness and objectivity.

Not only do ScriptBook promise commercial and critical success, but innovation and originality, too:
'At ScriptBook, we believe that by unifying technology and storytelling, we will enhance innovation and bring back originality in film and television.'

Eh?

Do tell me how a 'predictive algorithm' which works by looking at a database of existing scripts can bring back originality? Unless it means oh, RomComs are successful and so are Zombie films and Historical Biographical, so let's have Gandhi meeting a zombie for a madcap affair.

Let's go back to the data-driven decisions. I remember a few years ago, panic about how e-commerce would destroy existing bricks and mortar retailers. But what's happened is not an 'either or' situation. Everyone is going multichannel in retailing.

It's the same with data. In the same way that Millward Brown and other pre-testing research agencies used to claim to 'predict' the success of your TV spot based on the analysis of their database of tested commercials, companies like ScriptBook are no different. it's just that there's even more data, and what we can do with that data is ever more sophisticated.

Perhaps data-informed is better than data-driven. 'Driven' suggests someone cracking a whip at a herd of cattle. As Netflix CEO Reed Hastings said, while speaking about House of Cards: 'We start with the data ... but the final call is always gut. It's informed intuition.'

Before we leave this subject, here's some light relief for my German-speaking friends. Who needs artificial intelligence when you have monkeys? Comedian Jan Böhmermann composed this smash-hit single with the help of monkeys who chose which of either the four most frequent words in German Chart Hits ('Menschen' 'Leben' 'Tanzen' 'Welt' ) or phrases from TV commercials should come next in the lyrics:

A brand is not just for Christmas

Anyone who ever says that TV advertising is dead should just take a look at what happens in the UK - and other markets - at this time of year. The John Lewis Christmas ad, with its resulting discussions, polls and parodies, has become as much a part of the British advent tradition as Love, Actually on the TV.

And it's not just John Lewis. There's a shop-load of retailers out there all fighting it out over laughter and tears, and who can bag the most. Waitrose's homesick robin probably wins the Kleenex prize this year, while M&S have gone all-out on middle-aged girl power with Mrs Santa Claus. I have a sneaky suspicion that they probably wanted Emma Thompson for this role.

Now to the bad, sad, bizarre and ugly. Argos have speed-skating day-glo yetis, while Sainsbury's have got a cringemaking song and a tired-looking animation that ticks all the diversity boxes but failed to charm me. And finally, Aldi features an intrepid carrot called Kevin who is variously seen awaiting the John Lewis ad and clambering over a Christmas dinner that will be stone cold and congealing come Christmas Day. I think I prefer the seriously weird German Aldi advertising.

The other thing that occurs to me about this yearly Christmas laughter-and-tears contest is that in some cases it smacks of fiddling while Rome burns. M&S along with a few other retailers are in serious financial trouble this year. Wouldn't their time and money be better spent improving their offer, experience and service?

But my favourite TV ad so far isn't for a retailer, it's a French ad for Milka directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet. The story of an advent calendar with more than a nod to H.G.Wells.

Fantastique!

A winning idea?

As we're right in the thick of holiday time, I thought I'd look at a couple of ads associated with airports. The first one is First Flight, Heathrow's first ever TV ad, to celebrate the airport's 70th birthday. Using the tried and tested John Lewis formula of a cute kid and music to pull at the heartstrings, this is the story of a first flight through the eyes of a little girl with an owl trolley and a very fetching pilot's cap.

It's a watchable enough ad, but I'm not sure it really captures the magic in the way it should. Is flying still as magical as it was when I was a young lass, when we'd go to the Queen's Building as a day out, just to watch planes take off and land? This film doesn't show anything of the crowds, the delays, the mangled and lost luggage, the confiscated drinks and children's scissors (I speak from experience ...)

But, OK. I still think it's a brave thing for Heathrow to do, especially in these times of terrorist threat. And it's marvellous to hear that Bowie track again.

My second example is something I saw on my way back from a week away on business, when I arrived back at Frankfurt. An ad for the Bad Homburg Casino in the baggage hall. I hope my pictures will do it justice:

A baggage carousel disguised as a roulette wheel. OK, again the cynical may say that putting your luggage in the hold is a bit of a gamble, but I don't care.

After a long and hard week away, this idea, involving no apps or digital cleverness simply made me smile.

Good one.

Partners in Crime

Two ads have come to my attention this week that use criminals/offenders/call them what you will to draw attention to and sell products. And while one of these certainly stole my attention, the other is a crime against advertising, as far as I'm concerned.

I'll start with the ad above - Free the Kids: Dirt is Good  from Persil. This film on an epic scale has been dreamed up by Unilever in conjunction with education advocate Sir Ken Robinson. No expense was spared in getting a top notch director and filming in Wabash Maximum Security Prison, Indiana. The idea, or insight, is that even these top security prisoners get more time outside than 'our' children - two hours instead of one.

I really don't like this ad at all. And not because it's controversial, or edgy, or anything like that. It's not. The faux documentary style is becoming a yawn these days, with all that slow motion, depressing music and that awful worthy and sanctimonious tonality.

Then there's the contrived link to Persil and 'dirt is good'. What on earth are they trying to do here? Finger-point at mums, saying 'you are treating your children worse than high security prisoners just because you don't want their clothes to get muddy, you selfish cow?'

And finally, this may make me unpopular but I really don't like the link between high security prisoners and children. These guys are not inside for stealing a packet of bubblegum or forgetting to pay a parking fine. I wonder how their victims feel about them being glamorised in a glossy ad campaign? And as for 'I'd love to take my kid to the park', my heart bleeds for him. Should have thought about that before committing whatever serious crime he did.

And now for the second ad - Shoplifters from Harvey Nichols. This is from adam&eveDDB and uses real security camera footage to promote the store's Loyalty Reward App.



This one has just won the Film Grand Prix at Cannes and, OK, it's directed at a completely different audience to the Persil ad but I think it's a great piece of film.

It's the opposite of yawn. I've never seen or heard anything quite like it before - it's quirky, funny, entertaining, clever. No big names, no heavy moralising, just a simple message about 'legal shopping highs.'

In this case, maybe crime does pay when it comes to advertising.

... but I won't do that

The TV ad I've chosen for this blog post may be an odd one, as I'm not a dad, nor do I have a daughter.

But I have plenty of friends that are, and do.

This wonderful ad has been created and produced for McDonald's Australia by DDB together with The Sweet Shop. 

What's so great about it? Well, for a start, it's based on a huge and relevant insight: Dads make plenty of sacrifices for daughters, but food probably ain't one of them. Having just come back from a holiday together with a meat-eating dad and vegetarian daughter, I can confirm the veracity of this 100%.

And this insight connects to the product they are advertising - the DIY Create your Taste which promises 'grown-up ingredients.'

But it doesn't stop there - the film is packed with little observational insights on father-daughter behaviour which makes the whole thing watchable, funny, warm-hearted and true to life. There are no stupid bogus 'social experiments', no ghastly pulling on the heartstrings plinky music (the Meatloaf track is perfect, and has a neat association with the product), no horrible manipulative messages about empowerment and other such crap.

It's good old clever unpretentious advertising - and almost makes me want to give McDonald's another try.

Small ads and Big Ideas

I read an article in the FT magazine from Ian Leslie recently, entitled How the Man Men lost the plot which rung a few bells for me. It starts off with ad man Jeff Goodby's observation that cabbies used to know about our ads and what we did, when the Saatchis were as big as Persil and 'we made famous stuff, and we made stuff famous.' The author poses the question: has the ad industry, through 'embracing the digital gospel... lost sight of what made it valuable in the first place?'

The internet has changed how the game is played, but certain rules still seem to hold. Mass marketing works. Fame works. Emotion works. And so does a long-term coherence in the sum total of what a brand says and does. All of these work to inject the brand into what the author calls 'the cultural bloodstream' - so that those cabbies know about the ads.

Reading through, it did strike me that in the past, we also had a mass of cheap, throwaway ads that even a member of the general public could afford and compose themselves. They were called small ads. But in those days, small ads didn't frighten the industry, neither did we try and use them for our clients, except in cases where we were being clever and disruptive and ironic. We concentrated on our skills, our talents, what we knew how to do.

We had big ideas, we used big, bold media that we knew would generate emotion and build fame.

Surely there is a parallel here?

Great Minds

60 years of TV advertising have recently been celebrated back in Blighty, with the first ever TV commercial - for Gibbs SR toothpaste - airing in September, 1955.

To celebrate, Marketing magazine has run a vote to find out the public's favourite ad from the last 60 years, and the marketing and advertising industry's choice. The results can be seen here.

No huge surprises, maybe, with Cadbury's 'Gorilla' carrying off the top slot for the public, Guinness' 'Surfer' from 1999 being voted No. 1 by Marketing readers, and 'Compare the Market' bagging second place for both groups.

What I find most interesting, as you scroll down the lists for both groups, vision bouncing off the usual suspects, old favourites and happy memories, is the similarity between the two lists. To some extent, this is inevitable, given the methodology (the public chose from a list, which had been generated via suggestions made on social media). But, apart from Smash 'Martians' on the public list and BT 'Maureen Lipman' on the marketeers', the same ads crop up in both.

What all these ads have in common is that they evoke a reaction in the viewer - you laugh, smile, giggle, think, wonder, maybe even cry. None of them are purely about pushing information into your brain or moving you along the attention-interest-desire-action customer decision journey.

They are all made by humans, for humans. And maybe that's the best pre-test of all - we probably know better than we think, through instinct, what makes for good advertising.

Is the internet the new TV?

The question in the title, and its answer, may seem obvious to some. Well, of course! Surely we've known that for some time now. But has it ever occurred to you that the internet is becoming more and more like TV in its nature, too?

Sometimes it takes being away from something to notice changes that are, to the rest of us, imperceptible. Which is precisely what happened to blogger Hossein Derakhshan, author of this thought-provoking and very readable article: The Web We Have To Save. Derakhshan was imprisoned, in Iran, for his blogging among other things, between 2008 and 2014. The year before he went to jail, I joined Facebook, which was still at the early adopter phase and a very different place to what it is now. I was rather late to blogging, starting with that in 2008.

Derakhshan points out a number of developments that have taken place on the internet during his incarceration, but that with the greatest impact is the growth of social media, especially Facebook and Twitter. As he says, "lots of people start their daily online routine in these cul de sacs of social media, and their journeys end there." What characterises social media is what Derakhshan calls The Stream - "...getting fed a never-ending flow of information that's picked for them by complex - and secretve - algorithms." These days, you don't even need to go via a browser - just press the Facebook app button on your smartphone and you mustn't even leave the confines of your cosy social media world. He adds: "... and not only do the algorithms behind the Stream equate newness and popularity with importance, they also tend to show us more of what we've already liked. These services carefully scan our behaviour and delicately tailor our news feeds with posts, pictures and videos that they think we would most likely want to see."

The anthropomorphising of algorithms aside (an easy mistake to slip into), this is a fundamentally important point. People want an easy life and they want to be entertained. Nothing wrong in that except when it's to the exclusion of the way people used the internet, predominantly, ten or fifteen years ago: "The web was not envisaged as a form of television when it was invented. But, like it or not, it is rapidly resembling TV: linear, passive, programmed and inward-looking."

The very expression "News Feed" says it all - the social media is feeding people a pre-determined stream of pap. Calling it "curated" doesn't make it any better.

And the internet is less and less about seeking out the obscure, the diverse, the non-conformist and the individual.

I wonder...

For the last couple of years, the advertising industry seems to have been intent on making the world cry.  Commercials that tug on the heartstrings have always been popular, but sharing on a worldwide scale means that your 60 seconds of schmalz can now be seen from Nigeria to New Zealand within a few seconds of its release. From P&G's Moms to John Lewis' Christmas weepies to the faithful friend comforting his widowed master in the Cesar spot to the dad who makes birds from the Extra chewing gum silver paper, every Hollywood trick is there.

All the Buzzfeeds and their ilk are chock a block with lists of "X commercials guaranteed to make you cry" while composers of maudlin music must be having a field day.

A lot of these ads are brilliant, and will go down in history as greats, but there are plenty that (for me) veer into being just that little bit cheesy - and don't necessarily have a strong connection to the brand. Tapping into emotions is a neat way to get remembered, and to associate your brand with strong and positive feelings.

But there are other emotions besides making you laugh and making you cry and I have a feeling that brands who want to stand out should look beyond these.

Perhaps one route that is a little neglected these days is that of wonder. Instead of making you cry, commercials that take your breath away, make you feel wow, a sense of awe, a feeling that I couldn't have done that. With the emphasis on CGC these days, I feel there is also room for brands to also spend their budget to surprise and enchant us - to produce commercials that are almost works of art.

My recent favourite is the latest IKEA commercial in "The Wonderful Everyday" campaign, from Mother and Juan Cabral. It's beautiful to look at, doesn't dumb anything down or seek a lowest common denominator and has tapped into cultural relevance with its echoes of the 2012 Olympics opening ceremony.

But back to all those weepies. Is it perhaps a big marketing ploy by Kleenex? This is the brand most often mentioned in all those articles about ads that make you cry.

Trust me, I'm a brand

Tomorrow, John Lewis will launch its Christmas ad for 2012 via social media, just a few days after winning the Grand Prix in the IPA Effectiveness Awards for the "re-energising" campaign of the last couple of years.

Amid all the speculation, it's interesting to have a look at the case history and the thinking that's contributed to the success of the campaign so far. Commentators are making much of how John Lewis has tapped into a cultural trend - the need for constancy in a changeable world. There's a lot of talk about how people are "re-evaluating life choices" to focus on what's really important. I can interpret that as follows: it's not enough to know what makes human beings tick - it's vital to know what makes them tick right now, in the current context.

Of course that's some of it. But there are plenty of ads that communicate constancy and "as good as we've always been" and "always there" without having the emotional pull and commercial success of John Lewis.

I think the key is in a phrase used in the paper: John Lewis is described as a "beacon of stability." Now, think about that - it's a paradox. What could be less stable than something that's burning, flickering, in continual change? It's a bit like the "cuddly colossus" that we sought for British Airways. Again, from this apparent paradox, the brand derives its energy. Yes, it's always there, but at the same time it's always inspiring, enlightening, dynamic. It's a million miles from a security blanket.

As an aside, it always amuses me to see what short memories people in advertising have. Yes, the John Lewis "Always a woman" is a great ad - and part of a great campaign. But I wouldn't describe it as ground-breaking: surely it comes from the same school technically and emotionally as the 2008 Hovis ad, if not the same agency?

Right - I'm off to re-evaulate some life choices if that's what we're all meant to be up to these days!

Top

I'm going to start the New Year with an optimistic cocking of the snoot (if you'll excuse me) at all those doom-mongers who declare that advertising, specifically TV advertising, is dead.

Here are Horizont's Top 15 TV spots. As well as the international blockbusters, there are German ads celebrating the German national obsessions of cars and football. And although quite a few of these are virals and cinema spots, rather than strictly TV, my two favourites are classic TV spots.

One is for IKEA so I'm a bit biased. The other is for Lieken Urkorn bread - not actually a dream client for creatives, you would think. But the film they have produced is breathtaking. A simple idea, beautifully executed.

Here's to a few more of those in 2011!

1. Nike World Cup

2. Audi A8 "Die Kunst, voraus zu sein."

3. Lieken Urkorn "Aus guten Händen"

4. Hornbach "Faces"

5. Mercededs Benz E-Klasse

6. Gelomyrtol "Welt ohne Schleim"

7. IKEA "Inbus"

8. 13th Street "Last Call"

9. Telekom "Liga Total"

10. Bud Light Viral

11. P&G Old Spice

12. Skoda "Glasmusik"

13. McDonalds viral "Uli Hoeness"

14. Internet Explorer "8 Experts" viral

15. Quirin Bank Image Spot