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UAE ads lack originality
In a survey conducted by YouGovSiraj, a market research company working all over the Arab world and specialising in qualitative research and online polling, 55% of UAE residents said advertising in the country was not original while 71% of UAE consumers believed only a small percentage (0-29%) of advertising was relevant to them.
A number of 1066 UAE consumers responded to the online poll in August. The survey revealed, for the first time, the size of the gap between what advertisers are trying to achieve and the actual impact of advertising.
Another finding showed that advertising in the UAE is failing to build the vital bond between brand and consumer. 68% of UAE residents thought the majority of adverts do not make them feel good about the brand being advertised.
"Millions of Dirhams are being wasted on advertising that could be improved if creative concepts were tested in advance. More time needs to be spent on understanding consumers and creating bolder messages that engage and relate to them," said Nassim Ghrayeb, CEO of YouGovSiraj.
Another indication of the UAE's displeasure with advertising was the fact that 55% of people in the UAE believed advertising was not original while 55% said they did not talk to their friends about the adverts they had seen and heard. The UAE's billion dollar advertising industry is thriving but this survey revealed the extent to which adverts in the UAE were failing to meet their objectives.
"Brand stakeholders need to take bolder directions with their advertising. Generally the reason for the "safe" and "unoriginal" advertising is an unwillingness to take risks when large budgets are involved. Testing advertising concepts before they go live, at a fraction of the overall cost, takes away the guess work, prevents advertising dollars being wasted and enables bolder creativity," added Ghrayeb.
"In a world of ever shrinking functional difference between products, and in the context of the learning we have on the way the brain functions, advertising that has an emotional impact and stands out will be necessary to win the brand game in the long run," he said.
Based on this new research YouGovSiraj urged companies to spend their advertising dollars better by testing creative concepts at the start.
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Posted by Arshia, London, UK on 5 September 2007 at 15:00 UAE time
The UAE is such a tapestry of nationalities that it makes it just that much harder to deliver a 100% impact one size fits all piece of creative work. Its always the 'safe' option that survives during research as we all know. But more importantly the number of restrictions on content plays a pretty important part in creating advertising thats memorable and works.
Posted by Murtaza, Dubai on 5 September 2007 at 13:00 UAE time
The Etrade ads on the Arabian business website are an eyesore.
You get distracted while reading the articles and I actually logged off while reading as I could not take it.
It will definitely trigger migraines as it did to me.
You have an article on ads and originality but what about really annoying ads.
Posted by Behrooz Modirrousta, Dubai, United Arab Emirates on 5 September 2007 at 12:00 UAE time
As an advertising professional with more than 17 years experience (including 5 years in Dubai), I have found the conversation with our client useless when trying to convince them of the need for creative and original advertisements. Almost all of the clients have some "good samples" of some very familiar adverts (of their competitors) in their hands, and instead of asking us to beat them, they insist we copy them! The only unimportant things in the Dubai advertisement industry is creativity, originality and outstanding ideas.