What’s the value in “shock value?”

By Suzie Bilek on July 28th, 2008

An article in today’s Advertising Age touched upon a topic that’s been discussed recently here on F.A.D.S. More and more companies (Nike and now Verizon and Snickers) are pushing the envelope when it comes to getting noticed in the media. With more outlets and diverse audiences, it is a daunting task to have an advertising, marketing, or PR campaign that is so amazing/entertaining/thought-provoking/whatever become successful. Companies are looking for that one hit idea to help them rise above the competition and attain their goals.

Being on the cutting edge is important but these controversial campaigns are creating more headaches than celebrations.

Why create a potentially controversial message when you’re only going to have to backtrack and move into crisis communications mode or put on a little spin to cover your hide? It seems like a waste of time, money, and energy. Alternatively, bad news is good news for the media and even bad press gets a company’s name out there. What to do? Ad Age asks the right question: How do you cut through but not offend?

That controversial message isn’t going to make me run out and buy your product on the spot. Make me think, make me laugh, but don’t make me mad.

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This entry was posted on Monday, July 28th, 2008 at 1:51 pm and is filed under Ad Age, Advertising, Media Commenting, PR crisis, Public Relations, Publicity stunts, campaigns, crisis communication. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

One Response to “What’s the value in “shock value?””

  1. Eamon Says:
    August 1st, 2008 at 3:55 am

    Interesting article.

    I think that shock-value is kind of a desperate measure i.e plummeting sales / new project that hasn’t got off the ground and needs a kick.

    I think shock-value works best if it is entertaining (and doesn’t take itself too seriously). If a brand rides on the back of something that made someone laugh or smile, that particular person might think something to themselves (fair enough, I don’t mind them - the brand - taking a few moments of my time out of my busy schedule: they made me smile / laugh). But if an advert takes itself too seriously and can be seen to be obviously about just self-promoting the brand then the reaction from the audience will be pretty negative.

    So I think that there is a case to be made for shock-value but that it is a kind of desperate measure and should only be used in the context of entertaining the audience - nothing else.

    Eamon. Account Planner.
    http://www.spotlightideas.co.uk

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