In digital age, print ads still rule

No print, no inscription of history. No print, no publishing. No print, no marketing. No print, what is advertising?

Early human beings used symbols and carved their own alphabets in caves to communicate.

In ancient times, Filipinos printed a rich tale of culture on bamboos, leaves and bark of trees. With the invention of printing press by Johannes Guttenberg, lithography, rotogravure, offset and other forms of printing, advertising exploded.

And we thought print advertising would fade away when digital age beckoned. As new media and technology appeared and permutated in different exciting forms, print still lorded it over. And how.

“Print advertising is still king even when online versions of newspapers made us new-media savvy,” a top advertising media director says.

“While some newspapers’ circulation declined, new media offered advertisers a wider avenue for their products to be seen,” he adds.

“If you missed the hardcopy, you can see the online version anywhere you go where there is Wi-fi and on smartphones,” he emphasizes.

Imagine a book without words, a newspaper without typography, a resto without photographs on the menu, a website without software, a virtual page without links for us to browse and navigate on.

Imagine a world without the basics: pen and ink. Picture a billboard with nothing but a blank frame. Imagine if Rizal had not written his “Noli” and “Fili” manuscripts.

What good are androids and other sophisticated communication gadgets if we’re unable to read messages that give us information and brain power?

Without print, life has no news, a brand is without identity and advertising is like a man without arms and two legs.

How far has print advertising taken us with the changing times? Let’s take a brief refresher course.

For the benefit of marketing freshmen, multimedia advertising and communication arts students, Business Friday gives you a little background on this most effective marketing tool—what it is and how it is created.

Anatomy of a print ad

A print ad is a piece of advertising you see in a newspaper or magazine.

It is a primary medium (above-the-line) and has several sub-categories (below-the-line): Out-of-home (billboard, transit ads, ambient, etc.), merchandising collaterals (brochures, leaflets, menus, annual reports, direct marketing, etc.).

Print ads come in different sizes: from small (one column width) by “x” number of centimeters (height) to 9 columns by 53 centimeters—the full page of a standard newspaper.

All of them have one goal—sell a product, a service, or a brand.

The two main elements of a print ad are: Copy, the words you see, created by the copywriter, author of idea and messages in the ad, and Visuals (photographs, graphic designs or illustrations) laid out by the art director, the visual specialist who makes sure the ad is appealing to viewers.

The physical makeup of a standard print ad has:

— Lead-in—a teaser that introduces the main message to create excitement, usually found on top of the ad.

— Headline—the strongest element in the ad, always written in big, bold fonts like in newspapers, provocative, compelling, intriguing and attention getting.

— Subhead—reinforces the main message, usually contains the reasons-to-believe for your consumer promise, slightly smaller than the headline.

— Body—the whole informative content that carries all details about the product. It can be a one line or a paragraph.

— Tagline—a well-crafted catchphrase or slogan that capsulizes either the following: brand persona, what the product promises to deliver, a distinct point of difference written in a few, memorable words.

Slogans are not cast in stone. Top brands change their slogans all the time. There are good and great slogans. The great ones can stand alone without qualifiers or visuals.

There are no hard and fast rules in crafting, unless they offend. “Rules are what the creative mind breaks,” so goes the (advertising legend) Bernbach saying in advertising.

An ad can sometimes have no need for words or pictures. A powerful photo can be a ‘headline,’ and deliver the message without words, in the same manner as a picture can speak a thousand words.

An ad can be all-copy, with nary an image. It can be a great ad if the message breaks an existing belief and delivers a new truth or insight.

Crafting

It goes without saying that a great headline deserves an equally great picture. One less, the other is a letdown.

Want a bigger impact?  Use a picture that defies the ordinary. A visual that portrays what the headline is already saying is literally boring. One that strengthens the idea is remembered for a long time.

Partner with a great art director who has ‘eye’ for excellent photography, illustration, graphics and appropriate type style.

The look of your ad tells people who you are and the kind of product you are advertising. Badly crafted ads give impression of low quality.

See the value of white space.

Many advertisers do not see this. Filling every available space in the ad can spell the difference between crass and good taste.

Just because you paid for that media space doesn’t mean every periphery of the ad must have your footprint.

Believe that size doesn’t matter. A sloppy, unoriginal big ad with nothing relevant to say is a bigger waste of client’s money.

Definitely know that the win-win situation is: Big Idea plus Big Media frequency, (and big size if you can afford it) can never go wrong.

Lastly, remember another Bernbach line: “One great print ad can do the power of 10.”