I am a big fan of humorous ads made in Thailand. Thai people have a very long tradition of creating ads which are humour rich. Recently, I got a chance to strike a conversation with the creative director of one of the very well known advertising agencies in Thailand. He revealed that the entire concept of developing humorous ads in the country is intrinsically linked to the philosophy of Buddhism and the laughing Buddha.
To me, Thai advertisers are master marketers and very adept at creating a buzz so people buy at a feeding frenzy. They know that human emotions are a powerful motivator for people to spend money and many of the advertisements are quite good at doing that. So when it comes to humour, Indian ad-makers surely have a chance to learn a trick or two from Thai ad makers.
As far as the Indian ad industry is concerned, I think that the share of humour has gone down to a certain extent in the past few years. I cannot remember a very funny ad that I might have seen recently. There was a time in the early 2000s when TV spots were filled with a series of funny ads like that of ‘Ye deewar toot ti kyun nhi?’ by Ambuja Cement and some creatives from Fevicol. But this is no longer the case today. I think one reason for this is that everyone is trying to play safe. No one wants their jokes to go bad. As a result, no one is ready to experiment with this genre of advertising. You cannot make people laugh again and again using the same old tricks. It requires a lot of experiments and risk taking. I think that someone needs to take this lead as humour is a very powerful and potent genre in ad world.
Modern lifestyle has made our lives extremely stressed. We are under tremendous pressure to live up to the expectations of various stakeholders aroundus. In such an environment, if a brand is able to bring in some good humour, it helps us release stress and as a result enable us to engage with the brand in a better manner.
Hence, it is important that the story is a very strong element of the humorous ad. If you can recall old Bengali films, they were the true reflection of a deprived society. People facing those situation were able to connect with these movies very well. Same goes with ads. It is for similar reasons that social beliefs have a huge impact on the scripts of both movies as well as advertisements.
While using humour in advertising, one needs to be extremely careful. It is a craft which needs to be used very intelligently. As a subject, it is very sensitive. Once a joke turns ugly, it is not easy to undo the damage. Only those brands which can master this art are the ones which people really remember for long.
Creative people need to ensure that humour in their ads has got to be responsible as well as creative. You cannot afford to be funny at someone else’s expense. Integrating the brand message with the joke is key to a successful humorous ad. The ad has to be liked by all.
If you remember the movie ‘Munnabhai MBBS’, it came at a time when people were fed up with formula movies. Same old action; same old underworld; same old romance. All of this had become too boring. Hence, the light jokes in the movie, which were different from this monotony, were liked by all. As ad-makers, we need to understand our target audiences and scan the prevailing socio-economic environment.
A genuine joke may turn bad if one does not take these factors into consideration. While I do see the evolution of humour in movies, I do not see a similar trend in advertising.
