Have TV ads changed?

The short answer is that some algorithm somewhere thinks that you’ll respond to ads produced in that style.

Since most ad placement is profiled and personalized now, we’re all likely to see a different pattern of ads. That doesn’t just mean seeing different products advertised, but different styles used in those advertisements.

And failing useful profiles, the ads will reflect the expected demographic of what content you’re watching and how you’re accessing it.

And given all that, we shouldn’t be surprised that there are many agencies and clients saying “we want to reach those TikTok kids! Let’s ape that style in our own sterile, corporatized way”

Who knows whether that’s an effective strategy or just an experiment that’ll burn off or tune up after a while. It’s doubtful anybody will share real data about it here.

Personally, I only very rarely see the style of ads you’re talking about.

I haven't watched US TV since the last World Cup, but...

Could it be that they are using the same style of stock footage?

Dissolve - Authentically Yours

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GcjPKdsapTM

Dissolve - Generic Millennial Add

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KG_i7oWzTyU

> '...it isn't even clear what the product they are advertising'

Not noticed the TikTok influence so much in the UK yet but this satement certainly rings true.

I think advertisers, like the media, are suffering a severe disconnect from the people they are broadcasting to. Over here a common theme is portraying the average family as mixed race despite the fact that the vast majority of UK families are not mixed race at all.

I don't believe anyone takes much offence from this but it has become something of a running joke.

To the general question “have ads changed?” Yes. The style of ads generally evolve to match the time. Some of this is because the industry learns what’s effective and some is because trends and aesthetics change. In the 80s there were a lot of jingles and characters in ads, which you see much less of now. In the late 90s/early 2000s Apple started to include pop songs and the rest of the industry followed suit.

As to whether this is an effective strategy, it’s hard to say without knowing the specifics of the ad and the business, but as a rule for an ad to be effective it needs to be noticed and you need to connect it with the brand, so if it’s not accomplishing that it probably isn’t delivering on its intention (though it’s also possible that you’re not the target and if you were it would deliver). FWIW, I pretty strongly suspect that there’s too much sameness in the aesthetics and that’s hurting effectiveness. https://whyisthisinteresting.substack.com/p/why-is-this-inte...

A few books if you want more on commercials and mass advertising: - https://www.amazon.com/How-Brands-Grow-What-Marketers/dp/151... - https://www.amazon.com/Anatomy-Humbug-Think-Differently-Adve... - https://www.amazon.com/Seducing-Subconscious-Psychology-Emot...

In India, they are creepier than ever

https://rootprivileges.net/2022/03/31/tv-ads-are-becoming-cr...

teenagers don't watch tv but toddlers and younger children that want to emulate teenagers watch tv, because their parents have cable or re-subscribed to cable

a lot of children in a structured household get brief doses of unguided tiktok and social media due to parental controls, and the things they do see they want more of it

it kind of filters for those kinds of families, which typically have other forms of stability to accomplish structure, which means money.

>every other ad is what i would describe as "dancing happy diverse young people in colourful clothes" [...] , but with TV ads it isn't even clear what the product they are advertising

That type of advertising using "abstract visuals" has been going on for decades. It's basically what some call "aspirational lifestyle" type of advertising.

I wrote some previous comments about that particular type of aspirational communication style that deliberately avoids mentioning concrete details:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20034558

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9877422

I believe they are targeted to people between 35 to 55 years old, because they are not selling a product, they are selling the sensation of being young.

On the Cooking Channel, I often see ads that say "Don't get up! Just point your phone at the screen to go to the link". The ad is by Adam and Eve, an adult toy store. I certainly haven't seen those types of QR-code focused commercials before.

I say "often" because it seems like the Cooking Channel has a very small ad business, as this ad plays constantly in between ads for Discovery+.

My guess is that the advertising industry has stratified and now the advertisers are rarely self-producing content. Now they just buy stock footage from content producers and add narration, text, music, done. All of these can be sourced from marketplaces and put together cheaply, a consistent process making for a steady stream of content with varying degrees of blandness.

Many of the ones I see in airport bars in the US are for prescription drugs and go something like "do _you_ have metastatic breast cancer? ask your physician about cibrofambuloxivin" [graphics of a woman looking sad and then afterwards walking on a beach, also some extremely impossible to read small print] ...

Read Jerry Mander. Not much has really changed here.

TV ads may give you weird feelings, but they still get the ad implanted in your head.

What worries me personally is that the casual nature of ads being sponsored on individual's accounts on TikTok is more alarming. It's like we welcome these implanted messages like it's normal, and in fact it's so faux because those creators need money to survive too.

Do also pay attention to the emotions behind each ad, they are usually very uplifting for something very tragic or something very dark for something that's not even a problem to begin with.

Advertisers don't have to do much work anymore when they can pawn off their dirty work to people with established followings shilling product they themselves will never use.

I remember how TV ads were in Japan back in 2015, they pretty much remind me of tiktok today. Very quick, jumpy transitions and over the top acting compared to stuff in the west. Seemed also pretty common in South Korea at the time.

Vivid, more contrasting colors also made their way in line with today's flat design interfaces in consumer apps, but that seems common everywhere and I guess it was in reaction to the overuse of the hipster faux-vintage aesthetic.

It seems also that some companies have taken cues from the fashion world, seeing the way tv ads storylines are executed now.

I haven’t noticed many tv adverts at all - the last one I think I saw live was during the England vs Croatia in July 2018 which was sadly on ITV instead of BBC. I don’t remember much more.

I also tuned in on YouTube to watch the superbowl adverts (there was one with skeletor and heman), and I tend to watch the big budget Christmas adverts on YouTube at the start of December

I guess next adverts will be in December if England get through to the last 16 and the game is on ITV.

You are doing it wrong if you are still watching ads... or cable for that matter