TV Advertising evaluation

TV Advertising evaluation

The brief for our advertising project was to re market or re-brand a Unilever product of our choice. The product we chose in the end was BRUT. We chose this as a group. We pitched our ideas and had a vote about which product re-branding idea we liked the most and it turned out to be BRUT. The current target audience for BRUT is middle aged men. We decided to appeal to a younger audience; Teenage males. We decided to choose teenage males because we thought it would be interesting to completely change the age demographic for Brut and see what a younger audience would think about it if the image of BRUT changed to appeal to them.

Feedback and the finished product

we collected the feedback for our advert in two different ways. The first way was we had a screening of it in our class to 12 people(most of which are in our target audience) where we watched our advert and the audience would comment on the pros and cons of the mise en scene and then comment on the pros and cons of the technical elements. the second way we got feedback on our advert was through using an Internet survey. I distributed my survey through face book and email and managed to get nineteen results:

Results Summary

1. Page 1

1. what is your age?
			Response Percent	Response Total
1	16-19		63.16%	12
2	20-24		21.05%	4
3	25-29		15.79%	3
			answered	19
			skipped	0

2. What gender are you?
			Response Percent	Response Total
1	Male		84.21%	16
2	Female		15.79%	3
			answered	19
			skipped	0

3. For the advert who do you think the target audience is?
			Response Percent	Response Total
1	Children		0.00%	0
2	Teenage Males		84.21%	16
3	Adult Males		15.79%	3
4	The Elderly		0.00%	0
			answered	19
			skipped	0

4. Have you ever used BRUT before?
			Response Percent	Response Total
1	Yes		42.11%	8
2	No		57.89%	11
			answered	19
			skipped	0

5. If above 'no' was selected would you consider using it after watching the advert?
			Response Percent	Response Total
1	Yes		87.50%	14
2	No		12.50%	2
			answered	16

We had 3 open ended questions one of which was 'which part of the advert attracted your attention?’ The answers varied. Different parts of the advert seemed to attract to some people and not others. Here are some examples of answers I got:

'The product it was advertising'

'The range of activities'

'I liked the music, it made it sound manly'

The second of our open ended questions was 'what was your favourite part of the advert?'. Although this is quite similar to the question above i think this question is more important as people remember adverts what they like so it was important to find out what part of the advert my audience liked. Here are some of the answers i received:

'Probably the slogan, it's memorable'

'The awesome effects!'

'The skateboard part'

The last of our open ended questions was 'what improvements would you make to the advert?' this, to me is the most important question as it shows me what we didn't quite get right with our advert. It tells me what our target audience thought was the 'dead wood' in our advert which helps us see what features our target audience want in an advert which is aimed at them. It tells us what we have to do to sell the product to them. here are some of the answers I got:

'I would maybe use a bit more colour, it's quite dull'

'More variety in the activities'

'A bit longer?'

Appropriateness to audience

I think that our advert was appropriate to our audience. The message that we wanted to get across was that BRUT can be a young person’s product as well as its current brand image of being an older man's product. I think we succeeded in getting this message across by showing the three 'younger' activities. I think that the comments I received on my open ended questions show that the advert had the appropriate impact on them.

Technical and aesthetic qualities

Mise En Scene: the mise en scene of our advert was done quite well in my opinion. The props that we had where all perfect for the advert. The skateboard, football, Frisbee, empty cologne bottle and the BRUT where the props that we used and I think we used and showed them appropriately. My main problem with the mise en scene was the setting for the bathroom scene. Although it was the most 'bathroom' looking toilet room on college ground it still seemed a bit institutionalised.

Cinematography: I think that the cinematography of our advert was overall very good. We had some great shots of the BRUT bottle and the skateboard shot does what we intended, we shot it at a canted angle to made it seem fast and intense. However I do think that the shot in the bathroom when jack is looking into the mirror is slightly less effective because there is a bolt from the mirror right in the middle of jacks face.

Editing: I have no problems with the editing of our advert. i think that the pace of the advert is very good. We needed to keep it fast and snappy to keep the viewers interested. I also think that the faded jump cuts when jack was putting on the BRUT was perfect, if they were normal jump cuts then it would have been a bit too choppy for the viewer. Another one of my favorite parts of the editing was when the slogan comes in from either side then the BRUT logo comes onto screen. It added a bit of manliness to the advert because it has the BRUT more or less crashing onto screen.

Sound: I liked most of the sound in the advert. I think that the music was perfect as it went very well with the product and the advert content. Also I really like the stamp when the BRUT logo comes on screen. It is like the advert is being branded with Brut and adds a very manly feel. However I did not like the echoe put on Jacks voice when he says 'damn its empty'. It doesn't sound right and it seems a bit jokey and I think I could have been a bit more enthusiastic when saying the slogan at the end.

Effectiveness of content

I think our advert does sell the product to our specified audience (teenage males 16-19 year old). I think because of the activities in or advert it does effectively appeal to our audience and according to the feedback I received through my survey people really liked the three activities (skateboarding, football and Frisbee) also it is very fast and snappy which will also appeal to our target audience because they don’t want to be sitting around for a few minutes just to watch an advert. to attract attention we kept to a code called AIDA (attract ATENTION, arouse INTEREST, stimulate DESIRE, and promote ACTION) we attracted the viewers attention by having fun fast paced activities in the advert. we aroused interest again by showing these activities. we stimulated desire by showing that the main protagonist was call enough to throw a frisbee without looking. and we promoted action with the short and blunt slogan.

Clarity of communication
The main message we wanted to get through to our target audience of teenage males was that BRUT isn't just as older man’s product. It can appeal to teenage men as well. We got this message across by showing a small montage of activities that are considered youthful. We also kept the pace up of the advert which will also make it appeal to a younger audience because younger people don’t want to be sitting around too long just to watch an advert. We also had an actor which was in our target audience so that he could be related to by teenage males.

Fitness for purpose
I think that our advert does look professional, it is the right length for a real advert you would see on the T.V and i also think that it advertises the product very well. Looking at the BCAP codes i think that we complied with them very well.

Pesonal Reflecton
Our final advertisement steyed pretty much the same as it did when we first came up with it. the storyboard reads almost directly parallel to it apart from we changed one of the activities. the third activity was originally the protagonist walking down the street towards the camera with two of his friends. however when we took it back to the computer to edit it it did seem a bit dull and boring so we changed it to a scene of the protagonist playing frisbee instead. and the results from the survey that a sent out shows that people really liked the frisbee scene. all in all i am very happy and satisfied with how the advert went, however i did not like the voicovers very much and i do think that the setting could have been a bit better for the bathroom scene. If i were to do it again those would be the two scenes that i would change because they do take a little bit away from the adverts tone. we all worked very hard on the project. my input in the group was quite large i believe that i had an input in directing, cinematography, pre production, and editing. we all had a large input in the project and i would not change the way the group worked at all.