Number 36 of 52 Lifelong Communication Lessons: Visual Messaging
September 08, 2015 |
| Sitting with one million dollar bills, 1985. |
The year was 1985.
Live Aid raises over $50 million for famine relief in Ethiopia. The Color Purple (film) is released and grosses over $142 million worldwide. Michael Jackson purchases ATV Music and every Beatles song for $42 million. Locally, Bryan Adams becomes the first British Columbian to sell one million albums within Canada.
I was working at an ad agency with a financial institution as a client. We were doing some innovative communications to get attention for the innovative style of the CEO. One of the team came up with the idea to do a photo shoot with a million dollars cash. It made strategic sense as the organization was announcing a million dollar return to its members.
It may sound easy to get a million dollars in a bank but not so. There were more than a few hurdles including insuring the greenbacks for the day.
Everyone wanted to be in on this photo opportunity. How often do you get to be in a room with a million dollars? We all got a bit giddy, even the client.
The cost of doing the visual paid off with a lot of media coverage and the main message got through in a creative way.
Over the years, we did many photo ops with great results. Sometimes just the visual with a headline was all that was needed. Today, it is even more important to capture an audience with something visual to satisfy our short attention spans. Social media venues such as Instagram, Pinterest and Snapchat have brought photography to new heights... and sometimes new lows. Whatever the medium, we have been drawn to visual eye candy since our caveman beginnings.
Communication Lessons:
- Sometimes it takes money to create the right visual but the payoff can be huge.
- If you are using a visual to tell the story, it should be able to stand on its own with a short descriptor.
- We communicate well with visuals if they are on message, not just a pretty picture.
Fast Forward to 2015:
The highly disturbing photograph of Alan Kurdi, the Syrian child, moved people more deeply than reading or hearing about an entire country of people in peril. The old adage "a picture is worth a thousand words" rings true more than ever in this case. #heartbreaking
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