Creative Advertising in the USA: History, Features and the Newest Trends

Creativity is an ability to produce new and original ideas and things. 'To create' according to the Oxford dictionary means "Bring into existence, give rise to; originate. The word “creation” means all created things products of human intelligence, especially of imaginative thought;" 'creative' means: "Creating; able to create; inventive; imaginative; showing imagination as well as routine skill" Of course, even the dictionary definition refers to an actor creating a part or a product created by a designer. The essential elements of creativity are really imagination and inventiveness disciplined by routine skills. The creative side of advertising is one of its most interesting aspects. The creative strategy used to communicate an advertising message is an integral part of the promotional process and is often critical to the success or failure of the campaign. The advertising industry is a mix of business and art. Advertising is similar to the art and painting. During the 1950s the prevalent strategy of American advertising was hard-sell: hit the viewer with bits of information, explain how the product was unique, repeat this issue to drive the message home. Only the time has allowed the industry to discover itself as pure creativity form. In fact, the ‘Creative Revolution’ of the Sixties represented for advertising a turn in an artistic direction. It was like an artistic movement where the artists were the advertisers, with their own style, and the manifesto of this movement was the ‘Think Small’ campaign for Volkswagen. The center of this movement was Madison Avenue in New York where all the agencies have their offices. After the Sixties, there wasn’t such a creative period for advertising. Some advertisers took the heritage of the creativity giants of the Sixties, and came out with their works from the large masses of ad men. Today, creative advertising is seen as artistic and brilliant work, and the media, from the TV to the internet, have became a kind of art galleries. Searching “Creative Advertising” on Google, the first results are websites and blogs where fans of creative advertising load pictures of creative works from any place of the world. This sites show also charts of the most creative works and people can vote and comment them and often give new ideas, humus for innovative advertising. Moreover there are contests where the most creative advertising of the world wins prestigious awards (Clio Awards, Effie Awards, International Advertising Awards). This thesis marks the history of creative advertising and identifies its features focusing on the creative approaches of the American advertising giants, that has been, and still is, the school for the international advertisers. The purpose is to analyze creative advertising from its birth, follow its evolution, up to the current years, expressing how and why it has changed over time, sometimes radically and in a revolutionary way, how it is re-born again from its cinders, rethinking itself in a new style, new slogans and new forms. The thesis, moreover, through the study of new trends, aims to understand what is the future of creative advertising. This study identifies the guidelines that are uniqueness, mainly of image, originality both seen the basis for an emotional approach, or a real sensorial experience. Advertising creativity aims to involve consumers completely, so it will be a picture, a sound, a taste, or a touch experience to hit the potential client.