Who cares if advertisers promote themselves?
The editorial from Industry Report No. 10 by Editor-in-Chief Anne-Friederike Heinrich.
"Advertisers", is the answer to the above question. The cobbler is known to wear the worst shoes; consequently, do advertisers also make the worst self-promotion? Not necessarily. Nevertheless, the industry gets very upset when advertisers beat the advertising drum for themselves - even if they do it well.
It happened with the publication of Werbewoche 7/2017 on Maundy Thursday, April 13. No sooner had we announced the contenders for the title of "Advertiser of the Year" 2017 than the advertising machine was running hot: Livio Dainese posted a fun picture showing employees of Wirz New Delhi allegedly trying to vote for him; Wirz itself circulated an election poster with Dainese's likeness and the claim "Hope. Dennis Lück tried something cute: With a baby picture and a unicorn motif, he campaigned on Facebook and presumably won mostly female votes. And Rod posted a complete commercial for David Schärer, starring Mike Shiva, singer Bligg and Beat Schlatter (Bit.ly/ WdJDavidSchaerer). Only around the music-loving Johannes Raggio reigned the Sound of Silence at all times.
In the social media, the candidates' womanizing was predominantly punished, "fie," "silly," "zero points," was the tenor. As the organizer of the award, Werbewoche looked on with amusement and was pleased to see a higher turnout than ever before. Self-praise stinks, because those who need to play themselves into the foreground are probably somewhere else. Self-praise has little style and, on top of that, is very un-Swiss, which none of us wants to be - on the one hand. On the other hand, in the advertising industry, awards are usually given exclusively to works, and thus to a certain extent also to the agencies behind them, least of all to their creators.
Personalities take center stage in the "Advertiser of the Year" competition. And they can and should draw attention to themselves and their achievements, turn the spotlight on themselves, and mobilize people to cast their vote for them. The nominees should stand out for once, as an exclusive group of those who know their business best. That's the idea behind our annual award for the most creative head in the Swiss advertising industry.
Today we're crowning Dennis Lück - not because of the cute unicorn on Facebook, but for his performance in the past advertising year. The "Advertiser of the Year" award is only given to those whose excellent work and personal appearance are one hundred percent convincing over the long term.
So, Dennis, Livio and David, you could have saved yourselves the trouble. However, it was very entertaining to see what you do when all of a sudden the focus is on yourselves and not "just" what you do. So I can only appeal to all future nominees and their fans: Show what you've got when it comes to self-promotion. It's insanely entertaining and gives our sometimes dogged business a wonderful and pleasant lightness for a few days. That's how advertising should always be.
Anne-Friederike Heinrich, Editor in Chief
