How to Develop Good Ads

Resist the Temptation to Start with Concept, Copywriting or Visuals

Sep 11, 2008

Here's a five-step process that has been well-tested and recommended by some of the best ad makers in the business. It's summarized in the acronym RAISE.

When an organization needs an ad or commercial, it is often tempting to start by trying to develop a concept, to write some clever copy or to visualize some great artwork, photography or video. But folks at BBDO, which is one of the world’s largest advertising agencies in the world, discouraged that approach years ago.

In his book, Then We Set His Hair on Fire, (Portfolio, 2005, 304 pages, $24.95), the late Phil Dusenberry described a five-step process that he and others used at the agency. The former chairman of BBDO North America referred to the process as RAISE, a "linear matrix" consisting of research, analysis, insight, strategy, and execution that is used, in one form or another, by many businesses.

To Dusenberry, "insight" was the key step in RAISE. In fact when his book was republished, it was titled "One Great Insight is Worth a Thousand Good Ideas." An idea, he said, can inspire an ad. An insight can inspire a thousand ideas and thousands of ads.

We Bring Good Things to Life

"An insight," Dusenberry wrote, "states a truth that alters how you see the world." It inspired slogans such as General Electric’s "We bring good things to life."

But as he pointed out, insights do not come easily. They do not just pop up as they do on AMC’s "Mad Men" program about ad agencies, or just turn on like a light bulb. They evolve from very careful research and objective analysis.

For people trying to produce ads, research may be the toughest of the five RAISE steps to do properly. For one thing, most business and organizational people probably believe they already know their product and don’t need to spend much time or resources researching it or its market.

Insight for Anti-Smoking Campaign

Dusenberry’s book, however, is ripe with examples of surprising research discoveries that led to crucial strategic decisions. In England a research assistant found that young women talked about their appearance more than anything else. That provided the insight for an anti-smoking campaign that focused not on health or addiction, but on what cigarettes do to a girl’s teeth, complexion, skin and breath.

Emphasizing that not all research has to be expensive, Dusenberry said the smoking research was conducted by a research assistant who sat in a café for five days and made notes about what she overheard women discussing at nearby tables.

Focus on Customer Complaints

He also wrote that BBDO focused much of its research on customer complaints because people are more candid when complaining than they are when they are simply asked to describe a product or service. It’s the difference, he said, between a bank customer saying "service" is what she wants from a bank, and complaining that the bank lines are too long.

Analysis, the second step in the REACH program, is primarily an organizing of the research into understandable and usable information.

Research and analysis lead to the third step, insight, which might be compared to the development of a company’s mission statement. Once insight is achieved, the advertising strategy emerges and the creative juices can flow freely into ad concepts, copywriting, graphics, artwork, video and execution of the ad program.

The copyright of the article How to Develop Good Ads in Advertising is owned by Carroll Trosclair. Permission to republish How to Develop Good Ads in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.