Advertising - for good and for bad

Well, there are good ads, and there are bad ads, no arguing there. But what makes an ad a good one and how do we tell the good from the bad ones?


An example of a good ad is the one from Nike to the left. It is bright, full of speed and containing Nike's logo and slogan. Nike being such a widely known company don't need to have the company name in the picture for people to understand who is advertising, but for smaller and not as well established companies around the world, the company name is a good thing to include in the ad. Nonetheless, what makes this ad a good one? First of all it addresses the target group well, being like I said, bright and full of speed. For the people buying Nike clothes, shoes and accessories are primarily sportsmen or people that are working out to an excessive extent. This is important for an ad to be successful. You need to have an assigned target group.
The next important thing is the company slogan. This is what people remember, and the slogan should symbolize what the company stands for and what kind of services they are offering; if it is quick home delivery pizza, retailing gardening supplies, or, in this case, selling light, stylish and sporty clothes!



With that being said, what makes an ad bad? Well, the picture to the right is a good example of this. this is merely a poorly planed placement for this specific ad and it might work well some other place, say in a magazine, but placed like this you get the entirely wrong impression. It might not be much, and at first you might not even notice it, but the small things and the proper planning and background research is what separate a good ad(or a bad one for that fact) from a great one!