Why do all these terrible video ads that have suddenly appeared all start to flash when you move them slightly off screen (temu and tiktok mostly)?
It’s driving me bonkers and I’m not sensitive to flashing lights!!
I keep reporting them for flashing images, but it seems to be a style/code thing as much as anything else?
(at least the weird phone games ones didn’t do this, you know, the one where the king is an idiot?)
Gap. Of course.
Thanks to research from the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute in Australia popularized in their 2010 book, “How Brands Grow,” savvy marketers now know the importance of “Distinct Brand Assets.”
This includes, logos, colors, fonts, voiceovers, slogans, characters, celebrities, packaging, and sonic branding.
The more a brand consistently uses a few select brand assets, the more those assets will be associated with the brand.
You can see this at work with auto insurers in the US. Brands invest a ton of money to become associated with yellow, red, blue, a gecko, an emu, a general, Jake, Flo, “Liberty Liberty Liberty… Liberty.” It’s obvious they’re all believers.
A study in 2020 quantified the relative power of these assets. “Creative Visual Style” was found to be more powerful that a logo, slogan, font, or color, but is a branding tool that isn’t used as much.
“In the case of video creative, it is of course often visual and audio assets that feature,” the study says, “and if combinations of such assets are used consistently enough, they can form instantly recognizable creative styles that can cue the brand within a story with very little mentioning or display of the brand, or any at all. A great example of this is the Red Bull ‘Gives you Wings’ creative, which has built over time a distinct style that often does not require the brand to be shown or mentioned heavily.”
Strong branding without seeming like you’re branding. That’s a worthy goal.
Gap stumbled onto it with their “Khakis Swing” spot in 1998 featuring a crowd of good looking young people dancing in Gap khakis to “Jump Jive And Wail” by Louis Prima. Matthew Rolston directed with choreography by Travis Payne for Gap’s in-house agency.
Gap wisely produced more of these. A bunch more.
And then around 2002 they stopped. They dabbled with this valuable asset off and on over two decades until they went all-in on a revival in 2024.
This one with Young Miko that launched last week is particularly fun.
The 30-second cut-downs, which are what most people will see, hold up just fine. Here’s one and the other. (And a behind-the-scenes.)
Come join me down the rabbit hole and scan the history of Gap’s music-driven spots.
Watching these in a row, it’s clear to me what stays within the boundaries of their “Creative Visual Style” and is instantly recognizable as Gap:
• A group of dancers
• A white or white-ish background
And it’s clear what veers outside the boundaries:
• A place or places rather than a studio
• Colors other than white dominating the background
• Only one or two dancers onscreen rather than a group
There are also probably a dozen spots throughout their history that have famous or unknown musicians on a white background singing while standing or sitting but not dancing. This is kind of in bounds. Kind of. I’ve included some but not all of these in my list. I think Gap is better off always having a group of dancers.
See if you agree.
ESTABLISHING YEARS
1998 “Come On, Come On,” by Smash Mouth
1999 “Blow Up A-Go-Go (Wild Elephants)” by James Clarke
1999 Remix of “Lovely Day” by Bill Withers
1999 Cover of “I Just Can’t Get Enough” by Depeche Mode
1999 “Dress You Up,” by Madonna
1999 “Mellow Yellow” by Donovan
1999 “Crazy Little Thing Called Love” by Dwight Yoakum
1999? “The Crystal Method” by Busy Child
1999 “Sleigh Ride” and “Ice Ice Baby” with adults 1
1999 “Sleigh Ride” and “Ice Ice Baby” with adults 2
1999 “Sleigh Ride” and “Ice Ice Baby” with kids
1999 “Cool” from “West Side Story”
2000 “Mambo” from “West Side Story”
2000 Cover of “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus”
2001 “How About The Boys” by Arling & Cameron
2001 Cover of “How About The Boys” by Arling & Cameron
2001 Various artists cover “Give A Little Bit” by Supertramp
2002 Cover of “Love Train” by the O’Jays
2002 “Stuff Like That” by Ashford and Jones
DABBLING YEARS
2006 “Back in Black” with footage of Audrey Hepburn cut out from a movie.
2006 “Holiday In Your Hood,” original song performed by Common
2007 Claire Danes and Patrick Wilson dancing to “Anything You Can Do” from “Annie Get Your Gun”
2017 Janelle Monae and a cover of “(You) Got What I Need,” by Freddie Scott
2017 Leon Bridges cover of “Now That We Found Love” by The O’Jays
2019 “Move Together“ by Ndidi O
2020 “Dream Baby Dream” by Karen O
2021 Juliette Lewis and Daft Punk “Digital Love”
2021 Katy Perry cover of “All You Need Is Love” by the Beatles
REVIVAL YEARS
2024 Tyla cover of “Back on 74”
2024 Troye Sivian and a cover of “Funny Thing” by Thundercat
2025 Parker Posey dancing to “Mama’s Eyes” by Mette
2025 Barbie Ferreira and “I Don’t Care” by Dutch Actors, 1
2025 Barbie Ferreira and “I Don’t Care” by Dutch Actors, 2
2025 Sienna Spiro cover of “The Climb” by Miley Cyrus
2025 KATSEYE cover of “Milkshake” by Kelis
when you’re listening to music and an advert starts with a song that’s in your playlist so then you get excited, and then you just hear a random person talking and you’re just like 😐
I have a special admiration for ads that don’t need headlines or taglines or logos. This is a beautiful example. And McDonald’s can run a jillion of these, localized for every market around the world. Great idea.
Some commenting on Andrew Tindall’s post complain that people wouldn’t slow down to get this. I disagree. Also, it would be great on a subway/tube train or bus shelter poster where people are stopped for a little while. The voyeur in us all would be drawn in.
Agency: Leo Burnett, London.
These commercials are pretty standard, but I still admire them.
Standard in that there’s a simple series of vignettes, each with a proof point and a joke.
But the set up grabs your attention: “I love my mom/dog/niece/friends. But they can cost a lot. So I’m going to spend less on them.”
Not the train of thought you expect.
Then Amazon saves the day with ways to spend less and your mom/dog/niece/friends can’t see the difference.
I’m not an Aussie, so I don’t know Steph Tisdell, “stand-up comedian, actor and author.” Doesn’t matter. She brings the scripts to life well whether you know her or not.
If this drives sales, Amazon should take it to other markets. Either with Tisdell or by casting local talent.
Agency: Droga5 ANZ. Director: Max Barden. Via: LBBOnline.
Is anyone else having problems with the Amazon ads on the Tumblr app?
They’re extra touch sensitive compared to the others and they keep opening my web browser and directing me to their website, making me lose whatever tab I was on before :(
reporting literally every shapes.ai and I see bc why is it the only ad im getting 😭 and it’s so frequent
Pad/tampon commercials:
“menstruaters” (kinda de-humanising, plus, not everyone that uses pads use them specifically because of their period - sometimes women also just use them due to some of the exess discharge that many women have during specific periods of their month/cycle)
“birthers” (yes, I have come across quite a few of those, quite horrifying ngl - because yes, of course, if you menstruate then clearly that means that you will have and birth a child at one point /s. Both de-humanising, and quite insensitive to to those of us that aren’t infertile by choice)
“female presenting” (not sure how I feel about that one, t-women, if you are bleeding down there, I would say go to the doctor immediately. It sounds like a serious problem if you’re bleeding in your (I’m going to be honest, I’ve forgotten the correct term for it. I’m sorry))
“afab” or “assigned female at birth” (I mean, there’s nothing inherently wrong with this one, but the times I’ve come across it in the script of adverts it is generally presented a bit weird and like women are something “other”)
It’s unfortunately quite rare that I’ve come across the use of “women”. I worry that the advertising companies were so terrified of being bean soup-ed that they just melted out of themselves and let the soul-less marketers try to figure out how to word things in non.dehumanising ways. Spoilter alert: they failed, miserably.
Condom commercials:
“men”
Ngl, this doesn’t sound or look like equality guys.
“THE ULTIMATE IN ALIEN TERROR” INVADES HOUSEHOLD TELEVISION SETS EVERYWHERE.
PIC INFO: Spotlight on a B&W print advertisement for the American science fiction horror film “The Thing,” directed by John Carpenter, promoting the film’s debut television broadcasting.
Jeep has just released a new spot smack dab in the middle of the week before the Super Bowl.
On an ad industry site, a global chief marketing officer of the holding company that owns Jeep says, “While we’re not airing a commercial in the Big Game telecast this year, we still wanted to show up with something to say. If there were a prize for the best Big Game commercial that’s not in the Big Game, this is the ad we’d submit.”
“We still wanted to show up with something to say”?! You’ll have trouble showing up anywhere other than an ad industry site because all the mainstream media wants to cover is SUPER BOWL commercials.
Jeep would have been better off saving this wonderful little film for a time when the market wasn’t flooded with FIFTY new spots.
Agency: Highdive. Director: Jim Jenkins.
