The Art of Low-Brow Advertising

The average commercial runs for roughly 30 seconds. That's not much time to grab the viewer and never let them go. Advertisers typically rely on a small set of sure-fire archetypes to win the audience over. Many of these, but not all, are comic in nature. This is especially true for high-stakes advertising like the Super Bowl where a single 30 second commercial can run the advertiser upwards of $4 million

At Top Marketing Schools we decided to take a look at the most overused and exploited comic archetypes in the marketing industry. And here are the top 10 that we were able to come up with:

Top 10 Archetypes in Low-Brow Advertising

1. Babies
Nothing moves a human audience like a cute baby. Or a baby doing things baby don't really do. Like trading stock.

2. Gratuitous Physical Humor
The awkward touch or the funny punch.

3. Animals
Whether it's cute animals or animals outsmarting humans or somehow associating beer with horses... animals FTW!

4. Sexual Innuendo
Orgasmic shampoo and well endowed sandwiches... you get the point.

5. Fear
Perhaps the most powerful human emotion... the fear of what could happen, and WILL happen if you don't buy this awesome product.

6. Battle of the Sexes
Men and women will never understand each other. So why not laugh about it?

7. Patriotism
Yep, patriotism can be funny when it's misplaced. You know... like when you buy the right car.

8. Raw Hunger
Hunger drives people. Show someone being driven by their appetite and people will relate.

9. Celebrity Cameos
Because we all want to be like Charlie Sheen and Lindsey Lohan and ... you know... Tiger Woods.

10. Banned and Shocking
No one can look away from an accident... or a scandal. So manufacture a scandal, and you've got free advertising. GoDaddy!