To start a conversation, engage first

          

 

You are quickly browsing through the New York Times pages probably on the way to work or on a lunch break. You turn the page and voila! you see a huge scribble or a cryptic image followed by rather dull headline and a massive block of corporate copy.

These IBM ads are part of the ”Conversations for a smarter planet” campaign. Would you feel interested enough to stop in your tracks and dip into the lengthy message?  

The idea of a “Conversations for a smarter planet” green campaign is brilliant and well intentioned, the execution… in my opinion, not so much. Ad images are meant to be relevant and engaging, grab your attention and draw you into reading the copy, and hopefully you will take some action such as visiting a website. But these images, although eye-catching, in my opinion, are neither relevant nor engaging. Would you invest your time in figuring out the meaning of a scribble or an abstract icon?

IBM if you want to engage and “educate” your audience, make it easier for them to understand your message. Make sure the reader actually wants to read your message.

However well intentioned, these corporate-sponsored environmental claims are unlikely to be taken too seriously these days.

Joe Makower from The Energy Collective wrote an insightful story about this IBM ad campaign that explains its goals and strategy and includes interviews with Rich Lechner, IBM’s VP of Energy and Environment and John Kennedy, VP of Integrated Marketing Communications.

Tags: , ,

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 7th, 2009 at 2:21 am and is filed under Art Direction, Branding wars, Green Branding, Social Responsibility . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

6 Responses to “To start a conversation, engage first”

  • MarisolH Says:
    March 7th, 2010 at 4:04 am

    Obviously this campaign “updates” rather literaly those old great ads made by Paul Rand. But then again, there is a great difference between imitation and interpretation, too bad they didn’t understand it.

  • Marina v K. Says:
    March 16th, 2010 at 8:37 pm

    I disagree on the visuals. I think the images are great and capture the essence of the IBM initiative For a Smarter Planet. However, I do think there is way too much copy in these ads. Who wants to read this?

  • Javier Says:
    March 21st, 2010 at 1:20 am

    Thanks for your comment. If you are a designer or somehow appreciative of art you might enjoy the graphics but in my opinion for the average consumer or business person the graphics are way too abstract and I don’t think they clearly communicate Smarter Planet and most people won’t take the time to read the copy to understand them. Have you tried to show the ad to a couple of people and ask if the get it?
    Thanks again,
    Javier

  • Javier Says:
    March 21st, 2010 at 1:33 am

    Agree, the ads to me are unfortunate attempt to create an iconic campaign. Although the overall Smarter Planet is great the ads in my opinion fall short.

  • clug Says:
    June 23rd, 2011 at 12:24 pm

    I strongly disagree. These are the first long copy ads I have read in years. They are brilliant.

  • admin Says:
    June 25th, 2011 at 6:02 pm

    The copy itself maybe brilliant but the image leading to the copy seems meaningless and not very smartly conceived.

Leave a Reply