Blog post 6: Research into existing TV commercials (other genres)

To get a broader idea of general advert conventions we looked into other genres of commercial. We also got more ideas for an engaging advert idea as we had a wider range of ads to study. This also allowed us to get conventions of other ad genres meaning we knew how to add genre hybridity to our ads if we wanted to. I did this research generally through YouTube and collated it into my already existing YouTube playlist in order to be able to go through all of them in one place. The TV was also another source for a wider range of adverts.

The bizarre 2013 Oreo Superbowl TV commercial 

There were clear differences within the various ad genres with general food adverts making sure to zoom in on the food and make it look really nice whereas technology ads were more likely to have minimalist shots of the product and shots of people using it. Despite this looked at conventions across all ad types which included catchy slogans as well as use of intertitles or end titles. One ad in particular caught my attention being the Oreo super bowl advert which had very clear instant placement of its product as soon as the ad opens as well as a use of over dramatic fast paced action throughout. This combined with use of special effects made the advert especially eye-catching. This was combined with the humorous concept of the ad (a lot of people causing mass chaos whilst staying quiet as it's set in a library) to overall make it stick in our minds.






This was very much useful to my final advert as it only confirmed what we previously thought the conventions of TV ads were by watching a wider range of adverts. This also meant I was able to look at a larger variety of ideas to incorporate into my own advert and I used many of these  typical ad conventions; ie title cards and voice over in my own advert as seen in these other adverts.

Blog post 5: Research into existing TV commercials for take-aways food delivery services

We researched existing TV commercials which also advertised food delivery apps in order to find conventions of both adverts as a whole as well as the specifics of food delivery adverts in order to find what to add to our own ads to make them seem realistic. We did this by going on YouTube and looking for food delivery adverts which stood out to us, we then created our own playlist containing these adverts. We looked at each others playlists for ideas as well in order to get a wide range of ads. This was coupled with watching TV and looking out for food delivery adverts.

I looked at a variety of conventions seen in food delivery ads as a whole. I found that it was common practice to include a shot of the app being used in the advert if the company had one. The use of logos was also common with them being seen on vehicles clothes and food boxes throughout the ads. Catchy slogans were seen across almost every company such as "tap the app and get that mini fist pump feeling" from some of the Just Eat ads. The brand values of speedy service and high quality food are seen in most ads, with either fast paced adverts or use of slow zoomed in shots of the nice food delivered. These are all things shown to be common to almost every food delivery advertisement.

Just Eat tend to make their adverts humorous in order to have then stick in the viewers head through their constant use of intertextuality and give a generally amusing tone to their ads. They also make sure to effectively use catchy music as well as their memorable "mini fist pump feeling" slogan to show the positive mood of their adverts. The idea of intertextuality is strong with Just Eat adverts, with their whole song parody campaign being driven directly off this idea; using content the audience already know to easily evoke an instant connection with the advert.

My YouTube playlist of food delivery adverts

From what I saw I realized how important conventions of these adverts would be crucial to making my adverts seem believable. I made sure to include as many of these conventions as possible, with the lighter theming of the Just Eat adverts being something which stuck with me and carried on to my final ad, as well as making sure to spend enough time making a decent slogan

Blog post 4: The target audience (males and females aged 16-25)

I did this research in order to see who to market my adverts to. This was in part influenced by the brief we looked at which told us to market to males and females aged 16-25 but I also looked into the target audience of Channel 4 in order to see generally who would be watching the channel and when. I looked at the Channel 4 website, we did a survey to see what they found important in a food delivery service and I also looked at an Ofcom report on TV watchers.

The typical Channel 4 audience

From the Ofcom research, I have learned that the core audience of channel 4 is from around 16-34 year olds. They are generally seen to do this through more experimental shows which would appeal to a more diverse, accepting youth audience through shows such as “The Bisexual” or “Skins”. This as well as its constantly changing branding in order to be more modern is what makes it a real young persons tv channel. It does however know it’s audience and knows where everybody is watching: online. Netflix having a 76% favorability rating among young people, the highest of any television channel or on demand service available; compared to channel 4’s 42%. Our audience crosses over nicely, as our whole audience (16-25 year old males and females) fits within the channel 4 audience . Channel 4 also reaches a slightly older demographic (up to 34 year olds) and so we had to also take this into account, making sure we didn't try to appeal to the whole of channel 4's audience and staying true to the brief.

From the survey we did I found out that when it comes to food delivery, most people saying that both food quality and good food hygiene are the most important to people. We also found that on the whole people didn't really want anything specific changed about the current model except maybe an overall cheaper service.

Survey results on how important each aspect is (1: least important to 5: most important)

This overall taught me that I should make sure my advert has a diverse range of races and genders in order to appeal to the more diverse youth audience. As well as making sure I kept my branding modern and fairly minimalist to appeal to my audience. My focus on quality food in my advert was also influenced by the survey we did as that was clearly a priority for most people.

Blog post 3: The ASA BCAP code

We researched this in order to help us see what we could and could not include in our own adverts. We did this mainly by going on the official ASA website and looking for what are things which our adverts would be likely to include that we wouldn't be able to do.

The main section of the BCAP Code I focused on

“Advertisements must avoid anything likely to condone or encourage poor nutritional habits or an unhealthy lifestyle, especially in children.” This clearly showed us that we should stay away from using young children in our advertisements (those below the age of 16) if we plan on advertising unhealthy foods to be delivered. “ Advertisements must not disparage good dietary practice” and so we should stay away from discrediting other healthier options to make one's own advert look better. This follows a general trend that any practices promoting a less healthy lifestyle explicitly, are very much prohibited.

This helped me choose my actors in my advert and made sure I only used people my age or older. I also was very wary of having no discouraging of healthy food in my adverts. One of my adverts was going to have the character eat a YourFood burger instead of a "boring" salad however this may have been against the ASA BCAP guidlines and so I opted to use a less healthy boring food, a cheese sandwich.

Blog post 2: Channel 4

We researched Channel 4 in order to get a clearer idea of what kind of things its viewers expect. Whether it was more mainstream and similar to channels such as BBC 1 or more alternative. We went about this by going on the Channel 4 website, looking on the Wikipedia page, going on YouTube and watching the channel itself.

The channel 4 Wikipedia page

I learned it was a channel that started in 1982 as a public service broadcaster for alternative media. Owned by Channel Four Television Corporation, a corporation for the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport.

From my own prior knowledge along side research I did of the Channel's scheduling i was able to see the ways in which Channel 4 worked alongside gratification theory.

I could instantly see the importance of people identifying with the channel through the variety of characters and shows on the channel, such as the show Gogglebox which has a range of real life people of all races and genders who almost mirror the viewer themselves as they watch popular TV shows much like the audience does. Almost every show on the channel entertains the audience, especially fictional shows such as Friday Night Dinner or Humans. Despite this Channel 4 shows itself to be a channel largely focused on reality TV and these shows such as The Circle, The Great British Bake Off and originally Big Brother, develop a huge amount of social interaction both on and offline. These shows are also in some ways aspiration, with cooking shows such as The Great British Bake Off or Jamie and Jimmy's Friday Night Feast appealing to peoples desire to be able to cook or even eat the food prepared on these shows. Despite this these shows and others on the channel are good at informing and educating viewers on these topics.

The popular social media page of The Circle for Channel 4

From this research into the channel it helped me decide when exactly I would schedule my advert within the Monday-Friday 7-9pm window.

I would schedule my adverts on Monday and Tuesday at 7:30 on E4 as there aren't many very popular shows on Channel 4 itself on these days but on E4 this is between 2 shows which are popular with their youth audience, Hollyoaks and Young Sheldon. On Wednesday and Thursday I will put my advert on at 9pm on Channel 4 as this is when The Undateables and Hunted are on, two very popular shows on the channel; this is prime time on the channel when most of the biggest shows are on. On Friday however I will put my advert on at 8pm; this is earlier meaning people may still be wanting dinner and would be more inclined to order it in on Friday, a very common day for ordering in food. This would also put my ad just before Jamie and Jimmy's Friday Night Feast, a food program which may make people want to order in even more.

This was overall very helpful and this helped me realize that the channel has a clear focus on entertainment with it being present in almost every show as a number 1 focus which therefore lead my own project to more so focus on this aspect as well.

Blog post 1: Existing take away food delivery services/industry

We researched this in order to get an idea of USPs and conventions of the modern online food delivery industry. We did so by and looking in various places such as Youtube, Wikipedia, watching the ads themselves on TV or even using the apps or websites of these various companies

This was a video I found from YouTube which really helped in my research of the industry. It showed me a plethora of different delivery services as well as telling me what makes each one different thereby giving me plenty of ideas for food delivery USPs. The video also shows the variety of categories on which people judge food delivery services, from speed to quality to cost of delivery. This helped me decide what features I may want to advertise in my adverts. I also did other research on the food delivery industry itself as I learned how the industry generated £9.7 billion in 2017 in the UK as well as 41 thousand jobs. I also learned the importance of collaboration between brands as Uber Eats was able to acquire Mcdonalds delivery under its name. Both Uber Eats, Deliveroo and Just Eat were able to provide delivery for places which don't have it such as KFC or Mcdonalds, however the Uber Eats did get some negative press with how little money the jobs makes for those who are delivering it.

The Just Eat Website

I also specifically looked at the Just Eat website for a clearer picture on what these companies were branded like as well as what was their main priorities.

Something that stood out to me from this website was the addition of the advertisement for the app at the bottom of the page. As the page only contains a few features: a field to enter your address, recommendations (which only appear once you have already used the website once), a page footer and this advert. This page is very bare bones yet they clearly felt it was important enough to include the app advert; showing how important the mobile app is to the company. This is reflected also in the advert. The importance of speed can also be seen in the ad copy, the use of language such as “even faster” and “speedy” included in the few words there are, show that the speed of delivery is a very critical feature in the food delivery. As well as the importance of taste, with “flavour” also featuring in the tagline.

Uber eats app page

Overall it meant I showed my audience the good things about my service IE speed, quality of food; whilst also helping me design a food delivery company based on the companies I already know. I really liked the unique USP of Uber Eats, delivering food which isn't typically delivered to peoples homes as well (ie McDonalds). I was also a fan of their generally minimalist colour scheme used in their branding and decided to try and adopt that simple approach into my own branding.

Compare and contrast of Big Issue cover

The poster on the left is a real big issue poster featuring musician Will.i.am. In this advert, layout is used interestingly with the the focal image of Will in the middle and a variety of quotes around it. The other stories are in a small font at the bottom of the poster. This makes the focal image clear on an initial glance with the variety of interesting quotes around it used to get readers to read on. The coverline is also placed directly in the middle at the bottom of the page; the reader's eye going directly from the focal image to the coverline and then elsewhere. In this way the cover allows the reader to see exactly what's most to least important. In my poster I have also made sure the focal image is large and clear, however I have put it in the bottom right corner of the page to give it a more relaxed less in your face feel. The use of this placement has meant that I also placed the logo and tagline in top left to contrast. This was to make sure everything had its own place as well as to effectively fill up the page. The main coverline is written through the focal image, the text seemingly going below the arm of the main actor, creating a unique design as well as making it clear that they are the focus of the cover. The official cover uses a font  which coincides with the mosaic look of Will himself, it's a font which has a futuristic feel to it whilst staying relatively sleek and high quality. The coverline of "My Voice Will.I.Am" has the Will.I.Am as the largest font on the whole page making it especially clear both what the reader should look at first as well as showing who the person on the cover is. My cover uses font sizing in the same way however uses a different font for the main coverline than for the smaller one this is just as another way to clearly show what the order of importance of the coverlines. The font used on the pricing and selling line are the same as is used in the official covers, with the use of  bold, simple black or white writing. The focal images for both covers are similar, with a shot of an artist with the background keyed out, these images are the largest part of the cover in both. There are clear differences however, though they both stylise the photo, the official cover shows the face to be made up of a variety of different colored polygons which help with the futuristic, professional look they're going for. My cover uses a simple stroke around the focal image, with the arm also edited to go over the text, this is a lot more subtle and just helps with the more cartoony light hearted feel of the cover. The official cover only uses 4 main colours a red-orange gradient, white and black. The gradient creates a colourful background for the white/black text to stand out boldly on, whilst also catching the eyes of people who just catch a glimpse of the cover due to the stark colours used. The red/orange also give the cover a clear character; ideas of action and power are connoted through only the use of 2 colours.  My cover instead uses a more toned down blue gradient for the background as well as white and black text. The text being black and white again helping make it readable on top of the background whilst not distracting too heavily from the other elements of the page. The blue background also helps give it a more mellow, calm feel as is the general theme throughout the cover. The official cover lacks original writing, with most of it being presumably quotes from Will.I.Am himself, with the only original language being the main coverline as well.