TV Advertisement Evaluation

Colman's Mustard

The Brief:

The brief of this assignment was to choose a Unilever product which we could re-brand to a different target audience. The product which we chose to re-brand was originally Bovril which we decided to change to Colman's Mustard. We changed our idea as Bovril was far too complicated as our general idea was comedy based which therefore took the mick out of this product, which we was not aiming to do. We ended up re-branding Colman's Mustard as it was a much more easier advert to create as the locations and resources which was needed was available to us. The current target audience to Colman's Mustard is more targeted towards the older generation as children/teenagers does not do their own shopping. We chose to re-brand this product to younger professions which was directed by shooting our advert in an office-based area. 

The Finished Product & Feedback:

We collected our feedback from the public by using Free Online Surveys and asked several questions to see what the audience thought of our advert. The average amount of people that completed our questionnaire is between 16 and 30 and much of the public are employed. We also asked the public what their income was as our aim was to re-brand this product to younger professions. The results were very mixed as a quarter of the public was not employed, but the people which are employed has an income of up to £22,000 a year. Our next question consisted of asking the public whether or not they liked our advert, and what they liked about it. The response of this question was very positive as not one response was negative feedback, much of the public enjoyed the humour which it brought and also the graphics which we used. Followed by this question we found that more of the public does not buy mustard, and that our advert did not make them want to buy mustard, which wasn't the response we wanted. The 'mustard man' also brought a significant amount of positive feedback as well as almost every individual finding the humorous side within the advert. 

From this response, we managed to make an advert which included humour and also a message that Colman's Mustard is not only for the older generation. This kind of advert would have more of an impact on this target audience as younger aged people are more likely to find the humour in this type of advert, such as the repeated dialogue of "mustard". This resulted in the concept of our advert having a very positive outcome, which therefore was appropriate and our use of content was effective towards this target audience. Although much of the response was positive, we did not manage to make the audience want to buy mustard which is the whole idea of re-branding. This suggests that we did not in fact sell the specified product according to our results, but our results were also completed by a range of different ages which may have made our results less accurate.

The technical qualities which we used within our advert consisted of using a pitch shifter on Adobe Premier Pro to change the pitch of the voices of the repeated "mustard" throughout most of the advert. We did this to create an echoed effect and to suggest other people were in the room. We also used After Effects to create the 'squeezy' effect towards the end which we achieved by using a liquify filter which we used on our still image of the Colman's Mustard. This effect allowed us to almost pinch the mustard several times while hearing "American style squeezy" at the same time by the use of a voice over. The aesthetic qualities we used were realistic costumes and locations to re-brand this product. The use of a tie and shirt on the protagonist brings a sense of authenticity which will lead the audience to believe in the advert, as well as the office-based location. To create an office-based location we used props such as laptops and mugs to again give a sense of realism. 

The effectiveness of the persuasion techniques we used was firstly to get the audiences attention. We did this by using the repeated "mustard" throughout the start of the advert. Although much of the audience may find this irritating, it will without a doubt grab the audiences attention and they will find themselves repeating and remembering "mustard" throughout their lives. The technique we used to interest the audience was by the use of a work-based location which we used to film our advert. Not only did we use an office to base our advert to re-brand this product, we also used this location so that the audience could see our advert as personal identity. Personal identity gives an audience features of their own life or character which they can relate to, which will make them more likely to watch and enjoy our advert. We also used desire as a technique to attempt to convince the audience of our new target audience (young professions) to buy this product. We did this buy featuring the male secretary in a real life situation which towards the end results in the message that Colman's Mustard is what gets men the ladies. Therefore this simple use of a medium shot could possibly convince this target audience to buy this product. Lastly, our whole aim is for the audience to take action and buy Colman's Mustard. Although through the use of a questionnaire we found that a majority of people would not buy this product, we only used a small amount of people which therefore suggests these results can not be completely reliable. The use of a follow-shot at 0:30 also presents the audience with a professional looking camera movement, which can be used as a persuasion technique. This is because an audience are typically more likely to buy a product if the method that is presenting the product looks professional. I would not say this advert looks professional, but there are definitely some professional looking shots in this advert which can impact the audience and their actions after watching the advert.

Throughout our pre-production process, our aim for this advert was to communicate that even though mustard is seen as an unappealing product and a product that is only consumed by the older generation, that it is in fact a great on the go product for a work based environment. This is the reasoning for the starring of young workers and the humour which it brought to our advert through the 'mustard man'.


Overall the pre-production process, the filming and the editing, we have presented the audience with a current and juvenile product which was our aim and purpose from the very beginning. We achieved this by using our knowledge to make our advert look as professional as possible which we did by using shot variation, from close-ups to long shots to creating a skillful looking hand-held movement. We also used the continuity system as a guide to make sure we made no crucial continuity errors. Advertising regulations are also very important while creating any sort of production. As a group we went by UK's independent regulator ASA (ASA, 2014) and did not introduce anything harmful or offensive on our advert. We also went by the UK's code of broadcast advertising called the BCAP code (The BCAP code, 2014). We complied the BCAP code with our advert as it does not condone or encourage violence, crime, disorder or anti-social behaviour which would be going against this code. Although much of the BCAP rules were applied throughout our advert, we allowed the audience to recognise the message as an advertisement considerably late into our advert. This was because our message wasn't presented straight away which may have caused the audience to become confused until towards the end. Therefore to completely apply this rule to our advert, we needed to straight away present the audience with Colman's Mustard.

Personal Reflection:

In reference to our pre-production process and the final advert, there were very few things which we chose to shoot differently compared to our original intentions and storyboards. As we changed our idea and locations several times throughout the process, this involved re-starting our storyboard. The few things which we did decide to change in the final product was the mustard man outfit. We first planned to buy a bright yellow top and trousers but we later on decided to use a yellow poncho due to being slightly unorganized after having to start filming straight after half term. We also decided to use more appropriate shots while filming than we originally planned such as filming much of the advert from the left rather than straight ahead.

Our advert for Colman's Mustard personally leaves me satisfied with the standards of quality of our final product with only having made 2 previous productions. The only thing that I would change is be more prepared and to not rush any process as while having a week to film, we managed to film our whole advert in one day. We then had to repeatedly go back and re-shoot scenes therefore we did not use our time wisely. The same apply's for the change in the product which we were re-branding as half way through the pre-production process we decided to re-brand a different Unilever product (Colman's Mustard). As a group of three, I personally think that each of our involvement presented equal efforts for each stage of this advert for example the pre-production process. In this process we each took a task to complete while leaving the storyboards for joint participation. We also each had a role for the filming process while two characters were on screen, the other would play the role of the director while the role would swap depending on who is in shot. This also apply for the editing process as each of us had a time limit to spend editing while each of us participated in the final decisions. 

References

- ASA, (2014) [online] available at: http://www.asa.org.uk/ [date accessed: 1/2/14]

- The BCAP code, (2014) [online] available at: http://www.cap.org.uk/Advertising-Codes/~/media/Files/CAP/Codes%20BCAP%20pdf/BCAP%20Code%200712.ashx [date accessed: 1/2/14]