Humor
Let's go back to our favorite basic need: sex. Ask anyone on a dating site what they are looking for in a potential partner, and a common theme will be humor. Everyone wants to be with someone who will make them laugh, because when we laugh, we feel good, and when we find someone who laughs at the same things we laugh at, we satisfy our social need to feel connected.
Similarly, when we find something that makes us laugh, we want to share it with others we have connected with, to make them happy and to reaffirm our status as someone who knows quality entertainment when we see it. As Russell Scott said in his recent iMedia article, "Make 'em laugh, and you can make them do anything." This includes supporting your brand.
Entertained but not pitched. While academic literature has not seemed to make a definitive connection between humor and advertising success, there's no arguing that we remember things that make us laugh. And this potential for recall is key when researching our purchasing options. An additional benefit of humor in advertising is that we feel less manipulated and pitched-to with humorous campaigns. If a brand goes to the trouble of entertaining us, we have a greater tendency to believe that this is the prime motivation, rather than the cold, hard sales pitch.
Recently, some brands have done an excellent job of putting funny first, including Hanes' recent battle against the wedgie. Women across the world can relate to this spandex-induced struggle, and thus have found a good reason to share the humorous -- and brand-promoting -- struggles of actress Sarah Chalke.
Apple has also embraced its warm and fuzzy side, with its series of spots featuring "Mac" vs. "PC". These humorous viral campaigns have been updated and altered to coincide with holidays and OS updates, and have spawned numerous parodies, including those from shows like "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" and "South Park."
Nostalgia
As evolved as we are as a people, there are always some things we look at as not changing for the better. New Coke, the buzz of the Blackberry when we are on vacation and suburban sprawl are just a few things that come to mind. Some things were just better in the "good ole days," when we were carefree kids who didn't have to worry about bills, responsibilities and ROI for the great idea we convinced our skeptical clients to shell out additional budget for.
This is where nostalgia comes in, and why its use is so powerful when marketers look to connect with consumers and get them to pass messages along to their social circles.
Ask any hipster: Retro culture will always be a powerful touchpoint because once we are far enough removed from the embarrassment of things from our childhood (like pet rocks and parachute pants), we realize that they are part of our pool of experience, part of our personal history… part of the innocent days where advertising was a novelty and not so much of an assault on all media fronts.
Geico's recent Ben Winkler ad revisited the days of the Cabbage Patch Kid in an effort to relate to 1980's-loving Generation X-ers. Moving in a less cuddly direction, but still capturing the power of the past, Orville Redenbacher Popcorn brought its iconic company founder back from the dead (literally), in a new series of ad spots.