It is a simple concept. People don’t read ads, they read what interests them. So if you are going to create compelling and persuasive advertising, you are going to have to study some of the best persuasive advertising examples.

You know, the ones that consumers want to read.

And, oh by the way, it must be more interesting than the millions of other advertisements out there. Now that is a daunting task, isn’t it?

Check out our thoughts on creative marketing.

Does it have the power to encourage the right sort of conversations? We’ll discuss this point in a bit. To get you started here a short video on persuasive ad design.

It has been said that advertising is the price to be paid for being unremarkable. That may be true, but I have noticed, despite the growth in on-line marketing, that even remarkable businesses also advertise the old fashion way. It is a key component of your marketing campaign, for awareness or consumer education of your value.

According to Nielsen, there are 27,000,000 pieces of content are shared each day. And Statistic Brain says that our average attention span has dropped from 12 seconds in 2000 to 8 seconds. That is one second less than a goldfish!

We check our phones 150 times per day. We check our email up to 30 times an hour. And the amount of information in the world continues to double every 18 months.

All this available information and data is creating a battle for customer attention between brands, publishers, and every one of us. But more importantly, its forcing businesses to think and act like publishers and creative designers.

Ever written an advertisement, or thought about it? I’ve done marketing for my clients in small businesses for the past 4+ years. I’ve learned a few things about making advertising look professional even on a tight budget.

Many small businesses don’t have a lot of time or resources to have ads professionally made. So what’s a small business to do?

If everyone is creating content, how does a business break through the noise? How do we reach our customers in a way that engages them?

Here are 6 creative steps we recommend you follow to create or critique your advertisements:

Define you theme

There are many themes to choose from. These include visual design, attention grabbing, music, and emotion, just to name a few.

There is no better theme as a means of influence or the power of persuasion than emotion. Hands down the best, in our opinion.

Experiences that trigger our emotions are saved and consolidated in lasting memory. Why? Because the emotions generated by the experiences signal our brains that they are important to remember.

Persuasive advertising … build the message

Focus on customer needs end state and not the means. The end state is the only priority. Make the message as clean and simple as possible.

You cannot over achieve on the simplicity of the message. A message that the reader will quickly understand. Keep in mind that pictures are far more valuable than words.

A good example is this Prudential’s billboard ad. This commercial definitely considers the end state needs of its customers. The retirement needs of target customers are the commercial’s objective.

Reminder advertising … ask a thoughtful question

You can always depend on asking thoughtful questions to grab attention of your customers. Getting attention by getting them to think.

A good example is the recent Prudential commercial. Have you seen this ad design?

You know … the one with the visualization design central to their story. Quite clever isn’t it, and likely one you will remember. And maybe even talk about, right?

The ad starts out with the commentator asking people a simple, yet thoughtful question:

How much money do you have in your pocket right now?

After he collects everyone’s answer, he asks a second, more probing question:

Could something that small make an impact on something as big as your retirement goal?

Connect the dots

Your ads should connect the dots with other elements of your integrated marketing campaign. Remember to stop interrupting what people interested in, and be what people are interested in.

It was in early 2009 when IBM began its Smarter Planet marketing campaign strategy. At the time, the strategy seemed very ambitious. One that was maybe even a bit risky, even for IBM. But their success was based on a strategy to build out a long term campaign.

To do this they defined a theme around their vision (Smarter Planet). They used the theme to craft a marketing strategy connecting and integrating as many smaller marketing objectives and tactics as they could.

They also linked their core competencies to this theme, vision and challenge. Obviously, they made sure they were all obvious to their customers.

This very successful campaign continued for 5 years.

Persuasive advertising examples … a simple story

A good story has a beginning where a sympathetic character encounters a complicating situation. It has a middle where the character confronts and attempts to resolve the situation. And it has an end where the outcome is revealed. It does not interpret or explain the action in the story for the audience.

Instead, a good story allows each member of the audience to interpret the story as he or she understands the action. This is why people find good stories so appealing.

It is why they find advertising that simply conveys facts and information boring.

Persuasive advertising examples … create a visual analogy

Look for ways to illustrate your messages with visualization. Visual analogies are even better.

A great example of this technique is the recent Prudential commercial we discussed previously. You know … the one with the visualization design central to their story.

To make this point with a visual analogy, the commentator points to a series of dominoes, smallest to largest. When he makes his point on putting away investments consistently over time, he knocks over the smallest domino.

This causes the chain reaction to topple all the dominoes. A great analogy to the retirement goal being achieved. As the dominoes fall the emotion rises.

Key takeaways

I’m not as much surprised as saddened that such nutty beliefs and misconceptions about advertising. Marketing overall can lead otherwise smart, creative people to squander their effort, money and the patience of consumers.

I’m sure there are binders full of rationale for why it’s stunningly brilliant stuff. There’ll be metrics that declare the spot a wild success.

But believing those arguments, or valuing those outcomes, requires that you swallow the message hook line and sinker. Not me.

So if you remember one thing from this article, remember this:

Marketing or advertising, you need to create information that your customers find interesting.Information worth talking about and remembering. And standing for things that potential customers value.

We believe an effective ad is interesting, entertaining, and stands for things viewers can stand behind. We believe it is persuasive and certainly creates the right kind of conversation.

What do you think?

Heard enough? I rest my case.

So what’s the conclusion? The conclusion is there is no conclusion. There is only the next step. And that next step is completely up to you.

It’s up to you to keep improving your innovation and creativity in ad designs. Lessons are all around you. In many situations, your competitor may be providing the ideas and or inspiration. But the key is in knowing that it is within you already.

All you get is what you bring to the fight. And that fight gets better every day you learn and apply new lessons.

When things go wrong, what’s most important is your next step.

Test. Learn. Improve. Repeat.

Are you devoting enough energy improving your innovation design?

Do you have a lesson about making your innovation better you can share with this community? Have any questions or comments to add in the section below?

Digital Spark Marketing will stretch your thinking and your ability to adapt to change. We also provide some fun and inspiration along the way. Call us for a free quote today. You will be amazed how reasonable we will be.

More reading on marketing strategy from Digital Spark Marketing’s Library:

Mike Schoultz is a digital marketing and customer service expert. With 48 years of business experience, he consults on, and writes about topics to help improve the performance of small business. Find him on Facebook, Twitter, Quora, Digital Spark Marketing, and LinkedIn.