Mar 01 2009
DTV Switch Commercial
The commercial above is about the switch from analog to digital TV that was most recently supposed to happen February 17, 2009. As of this post, however, the switch still has not happened and it is unsure what the new tentative date is (probably June 12, 2009).
The commercial is straightforward. It talks about how digital is considered to be better than analog and when it was supposed to happen. It also talked about a government coupon program to get a converter box. Finally it mentioned the website to go to in order to get the coupon. The visual part was mostly white and orange (although there were other versions with other colors) and very clean and simple.
The Lesson of The Day: This commercial has all the important elements of a complete advertisement: Attention grabber, message, and a call to action (go to the website). The call to action is the part most commercials tend to either leave out or not do properly. One reason for that is the viewers are just not that interested in the product or service. Another reason is the commercial did not send a clear enough message as to why it is important for the viewer to go to a website or call a phone number or go to a certain store/location.
The type of commercial that tends to do a good job with the call to action is the shop at home commercials, such as the ShamWow! This commercial was for a government coupon that only certain people needed, so it did not have to be the best, but it did do a good job.
