Howard Gossage, the “Socrates of San Fran” was a man beyond his time.
In his book titled “The Book of Gossage” he has some great insights into the world of advertising. One of my favourite quotes from him is:
“People don’t read advertising. They read what interests them and sometimes that’s an ad.”
It’s helpful to remember when you’re spending countless hours in a pointless meeting debating the merits of why every single product benefit should be featured in an 4 x 5 ad.
He also wasn’t a fan of billboards. Gossage believed that billboards merely littered our environment mainly because they served no other purpose except for displaying an ad.
If he was alive he would probably say the same for those stupid trucks that roam around the city as they haul an ad. What a waste.
But what if a billboard could serve a greater cause? What if there was a way to also give it function?
Here’s a great example of how this can be done.
NedBank of South Africa with their campaign “Power to the People” asked what if a bank actually gave back? In a way that actually made a difference. NedBank’s brilliant answer was to develop one of the first solar powered billboards. The solar power collected by the billboard helps provide energy for several buildings including a school.
Here’s a short video on the campaign (which also won a Grand Prix at Cannes - which is like winning an Oscar in the ad world).
- NishÂ
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It’s interesting that Gossage complains that there is too much of advertising. Talk about biting the hand that feeds you! I wonder how he would view today’s world, where new mediums seem to be popping up every 30 seconds.
Of course, perhaps he wasn’t down on the mediums (such as billboards) so much as the message. If you’re just selling a brand and not telling a story, I can see how it just looks like white noise.
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