A Loyal Reader writes:
A rhetorical question about disclaimers:
Do advertisers really think that I — the guy who dubs their commercial messages — am NOT going to raise the volume on their disclaimers that are recorded at levels that dogs might not even hear?
Wouldn’t it be great if they would save us all the time and trouble by keeping the disclaimer at the same level as the rest of the message?
And, don’t they realize that listeners perceive everything they heard or are about to hear as a big fat lie when the disclaimer is presented that way?
And let’s not even get started on the time-compression issue…
My Response:
The rhetorical nature of your questions notwithstanding, some answers…
• No, it really doesn’t occur to the people who produce that crap that some stations will be smart enough to normalize the levels. And not all stations have Production Directors/Creative Services Directors who think to do so.
• No, they don’t realize that when you follow 45 seconds of babbling with 15 seconds of back-peddling fine print, people naturally look upon you with distrust.
• And before anyone can say it: This idiocy is not the result of onerous consumer protection laws, and the solution is not to banish all regulation of advertising. The solution is not to say stuff that requires a disclaimer.
Yep, that’s possible. Really.
Yep, even for automobile dealers and banks.
Comments on this entry are closed.
I’ve argued on occassions that if you can’t hear, understand (radio) or see (tv) the disclaimer, is it really a disclaimer at all?
“Oh, we said that, we just did it in a way that nobody could really hear it…”
I have two philosophical problems with disclaimers. One, they assume you’re lying in the body of the spot, or otherwise, why would you need them? Two, by assuming the disclaimer takes care of it, they give tacit approval to that lying. The result is bank spots with disclaimers explaining how the “free” checking only costs you 9.99 a month.
i think they can be amusing… and therapidic if you start altering the recorded speeds”
And somewhere along the way the agency producers forgot that :30’s are :30 & :60’s are :60!! What is this 58 second thing that is going to mess with my AM? Time stretch!! Boooo!!
I fully agree that writing a commercial so it doesn’t require a disclaimer is far better than having one run one scrunched up so you can barely understand it.
The great selling feature of radio is it taps into the listener’s imagination. Just when the body of the commercial starts to ‘connect’ with the mind of the listener, most of the trust is discarded when you’re hit over the head with the ‘disclaimer’ at the end. What a waste!
Think of the last prescription medicine ad you’ve witnessed on television. The disclaimer is easily understood listing side effects so devastating that you wonder why they were advertising the product in the first place.
Do Billboards have disclaimers that I can read ?Nuf said
You know what? Radio disclaimers SUCK big time. I cannot stand them. It is grotesque to have to listen to that babble. That is NOT what I want to hear when listening to the radio. It has gotten so bad that EVERY time a commercial break comes on, the volume goes to MUTE. So, how effective are the commercials? Not very. Everyone I talk to hates this crap.
Suggestion: How about this: “See website for details” nice and crisp, no problem.
In South Africa we have a situation that every casino commercial must include the “XYZ is a licenced casino, gambling only for over 18s” and there must be a mention of a national toll-free helpline.
Similarly, our banking ads must include “XYZ is a licensed financial institution”.
I don’t see this as a disclaimer, rather an announcement of sorts, but one that doesn’t lend itself to sparkling creativity.
It’s just got to be there, so you slap it on the end, time-compress and run it thru a low-band filter, so it sounds like the ‘small print’ that it is.
Am I still screwing up?
Send word.
Dave
This comment may be late in coming, but my biggest pet peeve goes to commercials (& the broadcasters that allow the practice) that put the disclaimer at the beginning of the spot letting the listener think that the disclaimer was attached to the last spot in the set.