An advertisement campaign that has currently caught my attention is the new stream of commercials promoting STRIDE gum. In particular, the commercial promoting their newest flavor of the gum, STRIDE MegaMystery. In this commercial a man is recording a web blog, about to reveal what the mystery flavor of this gum is. Suddenly three men riding ostriches burst through the walls of the room to attack the man telling him to “zip it” and putting an end to his web stream. Pretty funny stuff. This advertisement is powerful in that it is so completely bizarre it catches everyone’s attention leaving them laughing and confused asking each other, WTF? It commands attention through this utter bizarreness as well as persuades people to go buy the product to see what in the world the ad was talking about.
One of the general advertisement appeals that we discussed in lecture was that of satisfying curiosity. This advertisement appeal usually aims to supply target audiences answers to key questions they might have about a product or gives them a solution to a problem they might have through their product, but other times the appeal to satisfy curiosity takes on a different tactic. One where the advertisement will do something so odd and unexpected that is raises curiosity about the advertisement and thereby the product itself. We see an abundant use of this type of “satisfy curiosity” appeal in many of the commercials that air during the super bowl. Everyone is fighting for your attention so the idea is to make your ad more bizarre than the last and it will stick in your target audience’s heads; they will be curious about your product. This is every advertisers goal; raise curiosity and get them thinking about your product. If they are thinking about your ad while shopping and pass by your product they will be more likely to pick it up and explore just what your product is. I know for me personally, as long as the price difference is not too large, I tend to choose my product purchases for nominal things such as chewing gum, razors, etc, based on which advertisements I like the best.
The advertisement for STRIDE MegaMystery chewing gum exemplifies this advertisement appeal to satisfy curiosity by shocking the viewer by the utter bizarreness of it all. Who in the right mind would think to have nerdy men in helmets ride in on the backs of ostriches and peck them to stop a “secret” from being told? Ha. Ha. I know for me at least, the ad left my asking myself, “what just happened?”. SRIDE thereby succeeded in making me curious of there product and answered my curiosity of why men on ostrich-back just stormed through the walls by letting me know that their gum flavor is a mystery and that it is important that it stay that way, so I will go buy some and try to figure out what the flavor is myself. I have attached the commercial for a good laugh. You’re welcome.
Just incase that didn't work b/c I'm not very computer savvy, here is the link:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jzLkRr2g3aA
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