OVER HALF OF ADS GOING OUT ARE MET WITH NEUTRALITY.

Not negativity, neutrality. Audiences feel nothing for them. Nada.

They’re kaput before they’re put in front of people, along with all that precious media budget that got them there.

THERE’S NOT A TRADE OFF BETWEEN EXCITEMENT AND EFFECTIVENESS.

Dull ads aren’t just sapped of personality and pizazz. They sap budget faster than HS2.

Not only are dull ads are ineffective, they’re costly, and they’re actively wasting your budget. You’re spending as much (if not more) to create an ad that does less for your brand.

Ads with low emotional connection need way more investment to reach the same effectiveness as those in touch with their emotions. 

You’re in the red before you even start.

BLAND COSTS BIG BUCKS.

If you do end up making something that makes doing your tax returns look inviting and you want to match the effectiveness of mega-emotionally charged campaigns, you’re in for a pretty hefty bill. 

The UK would have to hemorrhage an extra £7.94billion a year just to get dull ads performing on par with compelling ones. 

And the US would need to rummage down Trump’s sofa for a casual $109billion.

IT ONLY GETS WORSE IN B2B ADVERTISING.

Maybe unsurprisingly, the bar is even lower over in B2BLand – over half of all B2B media spend is spent on the dullest of dullest of dull work.

WHO’S DRIVING THE DULLMOBILE?

No one likes making lacklustre ads. Tedium doesn’t get any of us bouncing out of bed in the morning. But thanks to a whole list of equally tedious reasons, that tedious work just keeps getting its tedious-self made.

If the road to hell is paved with good intentions, it’s a slippery slope through box ticking via a minefield of budget lines that leads to dull marketing. Squandering investment and decimating competitive advantage along the way. 

The call is coming from inside the house.

1. ROI-D RAGE

Only have eyes for short-term results and lean more towards transactional ‘performance’ marketing?

If you have become so enchanted by its tightly defined dashboard and impressive stats that the two of you are now exclusive, you’re might have become blind to the charms of another contender for your affections – something a little more long term, a little more emotional.

ROI-D-y guy might be ringing your bell for right now, but they’ll never be able to give you everything you need in the long run.

2. THE UNIFORMINATOR 

Remember the trend for fashion brands to go from distinctive logos to samey sans snoozefests?

Prioritising simplicity and flexibility of assets across media platforms might feel like it’ll get you a pat on the back from Barbara in Finance for **EFFICIENCY**, but their samey-ness is uniformly lamey and, ultimately, budget drainy.

3. LEMMING-ING-ING-ING

Riding the coattails of trends and what’s working for others just makes a bland sheet of wallpaper everyone fades into. One big seething mass of brands rushing to the cliff edge of utter mediocrity.

Don’t lemming it. You’re better than that.

4. PROCUREMENT PURGATORY

Everyone’s under pressure these days, but no one has it worse than Mr Budget. With all eyes on him, creative time gets slashed and meh ads get made. When they don’t do well, there’s even less of Mr B to go round.

The circle of strife.

5. RISE OF THE MACHINES

If Mr Budget has commercial creativity in a spin, our pal, AI has it stuck between a rock and a rather hard place. Whilst it definitely has its place, if generative AI feels like a secret shortcut to endless content gold, remember you can roll a turd in glitter but you can’t make it sing.

Being able to make and deliver content at the speed of light doesn’t mean you should. Don’t join in on that game of lowering-the-bar-limbo, you’ll only get dirty.

IS IT EUV? 3 IS THE MAGIC NUMBER.

If you’re asking yourself, ‘am I dull’? Alas, there’s no blood test for that. 

At Lunar we rely on the triumvirate, the holy trinity, the jab-cross-hook of EUV as the checklist for everything we do. If it doesn’t score 3/3, then it’s not good eneuv. (sorry).

IS IT ENTERTAINING?

David Ogilvy once said,

‘Don’t be a bore. You cannot bore people into buying your product, you can only interest them in buying it.’ 

We say  ‘yes David and if we could add to that, let’s just all have some laughs along the way as well – serious work doesn’t have to feel so serious.

IS IT UNEXPECTED?

Predictability is comfortable. And in our world, remarkably efficient. But it is not the stuff of legend. Or how memories are made, or stored for that matter. And when the first stumbling block is just being remembered—predictable, predictably, needs to take a back seat for something more surprising.

IS IT VALUABLE?

Attention is valuable. If you want theirs, even for the second it takes to register that you might indeed get their whites whiter than other leading white whiteners, you need to give them something of equal value in return. Quid pro quo Clarice.

In short: Drab’s Out. Fab’s in. Yes, It’s Cool to Say Fab Again.