There was a time when clients valued effective creative solutions and adverts that helped move brands from sameness. There are a few clients who still value such work and have high standards and demands for quality and effective creative solutions and adverts.
Many Agencies seem to have adapted to the template advertising style that makes brands in the same industry all sound the same. From the tone of voice to creative executions they are all soaked in the water of sameness.
A few creative agencies have however developed trust in clients for creating solutions and advert that serves both the client’s interest and that of the business to create an identity for the brand and generate sales.
Many Clients are probably not seeing marketing and creative solutions as an investment and a core part of their business strategy. It is an investment that requires adequate training of talented and potentially skilled marketers to perform their job.
This lack of training has lead to the breeding of marketing Communications professionals who don’t really know what the job entails but are just doing the job cause it is necessary for their survival. Another issue clouding the creation of creative solutions is the emphasis on competitors instead of consumers.
This aggressive emphasis has to lead to imitation at every phase of marketing and Communications. All we now see is template advertising and Communications that is created in sameness with those of your competitors.
Agencies are not spared of the blame, many recruitments are not based on embracing creative misfit, there is no acceptance of chaos in the recruitment. Many recruiters just want people who can easily fit into the way the agency is designed thereby not seeing the benefits of that misfit who would help make the agency evolve.
The sad part is how clients see agencies as just executor instead of solvers of business Problems through creativity. Both sides are responsible for this issue however many agencies seem to enjoy just the execution part so they just do whatever the client asked for without working on convincing the client otherwise.
Agencies adopting this template advertising method are violating two important schools of thought when it comes to brand building and advertising. The first school of thought violated and trampled upon is differentiation and the other one is distinctiveness.
The former deals with distinguishing or differentiating your business or brand from your competition while the latter deals with embracing what the industry benefits and uses to customers and communicating it in an interesting way that builds memorable associations and both schools of thoughts are being disregarded.
This act of template advertising can be seen in social media post and messages during special occasion and one of recent was the Valentine day where everyone was saying the same thing.
There were messages such as it’s a masked Valentine from Sterling Bank and show love stay safe from Heritage Bank (See below), two brands from the same industry almost saying the same thing and if a deeper inquiry is done one would probably find out that there other brands communicating exactly this way.
Happy Valentine’s Day from all of us at Heritage Bank Plc 💚…
Remember to stay safe while showing love ❤️.#HeritageBank #TimelessLove #ValentinesDay#StaySafe #HBValentineGiveaway pic.twitter.com/sBuwJUkuxV
— Heritage Bank (@heritagebankplc) February 14, 2021
He’s tall, dark and handsome.
She’s bold and beautiful.
We know you’ve met your spec but do they use their masks, wash their hands and maintain social distance?
If no, then your spec might not be your spec.
Let’s stay safe and love responsibly.#StaySafe pic.twitter.com/gnU0lM7zWX— Sterling Bank Plc (@Sterling_Bankng) February 14, 2021
Agencies and Clients doing actual creative work should be applauded as their reward is in how customers recognize them and actually easily make use of them.
