Selling the possible, not the practical

Anyone with a pulse has seen them: The ads that always close with "Ask your doctor about INSERT DRUG NAME HERE."

Ever since direct-to-consumer advertising became kosher, our television screens have become a hypochondriac's dream. From the popular maladies to the ones you didn't know you had (like toenail fungus) there's a cure for nearly everything, and the ball is in our court to badger our physician to prescribe these wonder drugs.

The networks adore these ads because they can easily sell time that matches the demographic of the intended target. Don't believe it? Watch traditional network news and see how the drugs being peddled fit almost exclusively with an older demographic.

Physicians and the medical community, on the other hand, abhor the trend. The result of this loosening of the rules is a steady stream of patients asking about drugs that offer no benefit for anything that ails them.

For marketing communications professionals - no matter what the field - these ads are an electronic textbook in selling the possible, not the practical.

Consider the formula: The medical condition takes a backseat in the message to people engaging in energetic activities more associated with a vacation than with everyday life. The message seems to be that if you take this drug, you will be able to, for example, scuba dive, ride bicycles through the woods, and snuggle with your love on the beach. Life won't just be back to normal once you're appropriately medicated - it'll be so much better.

The fact of the matter is, of course, that the value in most of these medications is that they make it easier for us to do what we do every day. The reason they don't show us a typical everyday, of course, is head-slappingly obvious: Would anyone line up for a drug that showed its users cleaning the family bathroom, cooking dinner, or pushing a lawnmower?

While most marketing communications budgets don't have room to promote their products or services in exotic foreign locales, we can still learn something from those who follow this course. Specifically:

• Sell the possible. No matter what you're selling, your chances of success are hinged on your ability to paint the best possible picture of life after your target audience buys your product, your service, or your idea. This isn't carte blanche to stretch the truth; just a reminder to keep your messages focused on, if you will, a "realistic nirvana."

• Don't try to succeed on "science." A good client once said, "But our process IS better...just look at the science." Trouble was, his target audience based their decision on emotion. Know what? Chances are good that your customers do, too. Don't avoid critical facts; just make certain they help the message, rather than overwhelming your target audience.

• Find your space, and stick with it. That famous little blue pill for men with, er, problems, and its successors are a great case study on this point. That pill started with science - giving men courage to visit their doctors. Competitors then appeared, and focused their messages on the, well, benefits. Now the market leader is trying to occupy that space with its "We are the Champions" and "devil" campaigns. In doing so, their messages have them drifting back to a pack that's getting crowded.
  

The message? People buy hopes, dreams, excitement, opportunity, innovation, you name it. But they rarely buy "stuff." Do your best to accentuate the former.