….The Power of Audio.

By: Rick Stanton, Creative Director / President, Stanton & Everybody Advertising + Design

It’s been pretty difficult to avoid Travelers Insurance “Watering Hole” commercial. And it’s been even more difficult to forget it. The scene is a busy watering hole where all types of animals, normally food sources for one another, are romping around with no fears or worries. The bill for the post effects it took to show a chimp floating on the back of an alligator or a Meer Kat high diving off the top of a giraffe’s head probably has something to do with rate increases at Travelers. But as much fun as the visuals are, the thing that makes this ad really sticky is the music. A simple music bed with a hook or some other type of pneumonic used consistently in broadcast is as important as a logo in making brands memorable. For TV, audio is more important than the visuals. Coke called it the “Flush Theory.” You can probably figure out why. Doing a little self-promotion, a very effective example of this lives on our website in our radio portfolio; the Washington Fryer Commission’s Chicken Tango. I knew it had done its job when I heard a woman humming it in line at the grocery store. And now Travelers has me doing the same thing thanks to a song from an indie band called Aberfeldy, titled “Summer’s Gone”.

Look, listen and try and get this out of your head for the rest of the day.