T-Mobile Television Advertising - Essay Example

Television Advertising This paper explores the topic of television advertising while paying particular attention to its meaning and drawing examples from the T-Mobile television advertisements as well as the Saatchi & Saatchi advertising agency, and their work with T-Mobile. Television advertising refers to marketing approach of placing a commercial program on television; organizations produce and pay for advertisements to be broadcast on TV to convey certain messages for the sole purposes of marketing their products or services to the prospective consumers. Television advertising is almost similar to radio advertising only that it combines audio and visual information; a typical television advertisement would be ten to sixty seconds in duration (Entrepreneur, 2014). Television advertisements are often placed at strategic breaks in the course of the main programming as well as in the course of the last few minutes until the top of the next hour. For instance, a television advertisement broadcast during a live event such as the Olympics or the Super Bowl attracts the attention of billions of potential customers. Television commercials are generally more expensive to produce and broadcast compared to other advertising options but is more appealing to audiences and reaches a broader audience simultaneously since they are both audio and visual. Given that individuals spend at least four hours in front of the television and a majority of households own a T.V. set, television advertising remains one of the most effective marketing approaches, the prevalence of new media platforms notwithstanding. Television advertising entails two main tasks including creating a commercial that is acceptable by broadcasters on the basis of outlined broadcast standards as well as placing the advertisement strategically to reach the largest number of viewers possible. The intricacy of television advertising requires the professional input of production companies and advertising agencies with appropriate experience in the two tasks outlined above. Television advertisements increasingly feature songs or specific musical themes that are designed to hook audiences and to be memorable so that they can remain in the minds of the audience even long after the ad campaign has passed. Many television ads also exploit humour as a creative tool, since it is strongly associated with advertising persuasion; psychologists have attempted, in numerous studies, to explain the impact of humour on advertising persuasion. T-Mobile television advertisements Headquartered in Germany’s city Bonn, T-Mobile International AG is a holding company that belongs to Deutsche Telecom AG’s numerous mobile communications branches outside Germany. The T-Mobile brand exists in 11 European countries including Austria, Poland, the UK, as well as the US among others and its subsidiaries have a combined nearly 230 million subscribers. Based on subscribers, T-Mobile International is the 15th largest mobile-phone service provider all over the world; it ranks as the fourth largest multinational corporation after the UK based Vodafone, Airtel of India and Telefónica of Spain. The company has conducted a rigorous television advertisement campaigns in the past, thereby firmly stumping its foot as a leading brand in global markets. The company has succeeded in pushing its cell service with its TV commercials, with the help of a host of celebrities and known personalities; for instance, a recent T-Mobile television commercial featured a local band by the name Faux Ferocious, the Nashville garage-rockers and the song “Striking Distance” (Boyer, 2014). During the 2014 Super Bowl, T-Mobile aired a commercial featuring Tim Telbow, the NFL player (Just Jared, 2014), which also attracted the attention of many viewers since it was broadcast strategically in the middle of the game. Saatchi & Saatchi advertising agency Saatchi & Saatchi is a communications and advertising agency that has representatives in nearly 76 countries all over the world (Saatchi & Saatchi, 2014); this agency was found 1970 in London and its headquarters are in New York City. Initially, the parent company of this agency group was referred to as Saatchi and Saatchi PLC; this agency has been on the listing of firms on the London Stock Exchange up to the year 2000, when the Publicis Groupe eventually acquired it. It was the collaboration of brothers Maurice Saatchi and Charles Saatchi in 1970 that lead to the beginning and subsequent growth of Saatchi & Saatchi into a full-service advertising agency. The Saatchi brothers embarked on a ferocious business acquisition spree back in the years, even long before their creative reputation soared. The agency has been famed for several advertising campaigns during its existence over the years; for instance, the agency was noted for its “Labour isn’t Working” campaign during the 1979 UK general election, on behalf of the Conservative Party. The agency has been responsible for high-end creative work in the advertising industry with its bold attitude and highly talented individuals that have ended up becoming stars in their respective industries. The agency has worked with numerous leading global brands all over the world, including T-Mobile; for instance, the T-Mobile ‘Dance’ advert was created by the Saatchi & Saatchi agency. This bold guerrilla style campaign ad was filmed at Liverpool Street Station in London and it features a cast of 350 dancers dressed in normal work attire (Utalk marketing, n.d). The cast suddenly breaks into a dance right in the middle of the busy station moving to a mix played via a loud speaker thereby bringing business to a standstill and attracting a host of onlookers some who even join in the well-choreographed performance. Hidden cameras within the station were used to capture the spontaneous reactions of ordinary commuters to the dancers’ performance; the ad lasts for about 3 minutes and is part of T-Mobile’s ‘Life’s for Sharing’ campaign. Saatchi & Saatchi also worked on T-Mobile’s ‘Sing-along’ advert; this commercial was recorded at the Trafalger Square and aired during the British Got Talent show (Utalk marketing, 2014). This particular commercial is also part of T-Mobile’s ‘Life’s for Sharing’ campaign and it captures a crowd of about 13,500 people singing Hey Jude with pop star Pink; these two ads have attracted millions of viewership on You Tube since they were launched earlier this year, thereby creating a major impact for T-Mobile. References Boyer, E.J. 2014. How a Nashville rock band landed a T-Mobile TV ad. Bizjournals. [Online]. Available at: http://www.bizjournals.com/nashville/blog/2014/03/how-a-nashville-rock-band-landed-a-t-mobile-tv-ad.html?page=all Just jared. 2014. Tim Tebows T-Mobile Super Bowl Commercial 2014 (Video). [Online]. Available at: http://www.justjared.com/2014/02/03/tim-tebows-t-mobile-super-bowl-commercial-2014-video/ Entrepreneur. 2014. Television Advertising. [Online]. Available at: http://www.entrepreneur.com/encyclopedia/television-advertising Saatchi & Saatchi. 2014. About Us [Online]. Available at: http://saatchi.co.uk/en-gb/network/about/ Utalk marketing. n.d. T-Mobile Dance advert. [Online]. Available at: http://www.utalkmarketing.com/pages/CreativeShowcase.aspx?ArticleID=12880&Filter=0&Keywords=&Order=LATEST&Page=1&Title=T-Mobile%20%27Dance%27%20advert Utalk marketing. 2014. T-Mobile Sing-along advert. [Online]. 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