Don’t Tell Me What To Do !Penny McKinlay

4 Tools for Creating Effective, Positive Messages

You can change people’s attitudes, but the tired old approaches, such as fear, aren’t very effective

Which approach do you find more effective?A scary ad …

… or a positive one?

Four tools for creating effective, positive messages:

Humour

CultureRewards

Surprise

Humour – funny, memorable

http://sheltongrp.com/creative/wasting-water-is-weird/

Denver Water Authorityhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/28/denver-waters-use-only-wh_n_886323.html#s300714

Words by Tracy Cox, Pinterest

Surprise – unexpected, eye-catching

http://bethgalton.com/

. . . UNLESS YOU NEED IT.

– Patagonia

A billboard in Lima, Peru, generates water from humidity

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sustainable-business/water-from-air-collaboration-engineers-marketeers

Ad for a Japanese funeral companyhttp://www.thisiscolossal.com/2013/05/a-japanese-ad-agency-reinvents-advertising-for-funeral-services/

http://greenworldads.blogspot.ca/2008/04/green-advertising-may-not-always-be.html

Rewards – participatory, competitive

Projects earn points to satisfy green building requirements:• Sustainable sites credits• Water efficiency credits• Energy & atmosphere credits• Materials & resources credits• Indoor environmental credits

http://www.cagbc.org/AM/Template.cfm?Section=LEED

Culture – employing art, music, literature, dance

Romuald Hazoumè, Ear Splitting, 1999, Mendel Art Gallery exhibit, Beneath a Petroliferous Moon

Brian Jungen, Mendel Art Gallery exhibit, Beneath a Petroliferous Moon

Buckminster Fuller said, “If the design is not beautiful, I know it is wrong.”

“When you compare the bus and the car as experience, there is a clear winner and loser….

“My bus is a design failure. It’s a stick painted green, and out of desperation or inspiration, I’m supposed to want the experience.” (Glimmer, Warren Berger)

Recycling bins in Baja California

Coastal First Nations use Paul Simon’s Sounds of Silence as the soundtrack for a television ad

Our hero, a NASA engineer, struggles to resolve an energy crisis

It may require some thought, but there is a better way to change people’s attitudes and behaviour.

You won’t be tilting at windmills if you apply:

• Humour

• Surprise

• Rewards

• Culture

mckinlaypenny@gmail.compennymckinlaycommunication.ca

@PennyMcKinlay

Penny McKinlayCommunications Consultant