Silliness that works

Time and again Public Service Advertisements (PSA) has raised the bars of creativity in the advertising industry. But what explored a new horizon of silliness and fetched great feedback was a safety PSA campaign for a local metro train company.

Pegging on black humour ‘Dumb Ways to Die’ stands a testimony to one of the most effective, dumb and the best advertising campaign ever.

One would be amazed how a few cute potato-like characters and catchy music went trending not only Melbourne but across the globe. Breaking conventional thinking, this PSA was totally opposite to the traditional gloomy and frightening ads.

Instead, this cult classic had catchy music synced with hysterically funny lyrics that narrate dumb ways to die. Throughout the ads, the cute characters depict dumb ways to die, like nudging a bear, selling both your kidneys on some e-commerce platform, petting a rattlesnake, playing with a bee hive, et al.

The ads communicated the key message of being safe around trains, as dying by being hit by one would add to ‘dumb ways to die’.

The hilarious jingle was initially launched in the latter half of 2012, through radio, YouTube, iTunes and other digital and electronic platforms.

Although the jingle started ranking on the top 10 chart of iTunes, the campaign only became viral through YouTube. This was because of the shareability of content on the platform, and of course because of the little-animated characters meeting their fate in dumb ways.

Charming people into paying attention as if they were at the most popular cinemas is a tough one to achieve by any advertiser.

As simple and as silly as the campaign sounds, trust us, it is the most difficult thing to attract the ‘cult’ through a simple campaign.

McCann not only proved their witty brains with this one but also took back dozens of awards and millions of people who find themselves humming the jingle “Dumb ways to die, so many dumb ways to die”.

Adapting the campaign and retaining its tempo, the agency introduced posters, stuff toys, educational book, and most importantly a mobile app. The result? A 21 per cent decrease in deaths caused due to metro trains in the region.

Design a campaign, feed it, nurture it and the result is an outstanding classic that people will keep humming even two years post-launch. If you can lure people into your ad then you have done it right.

There’s one thing about all the target groups of advertising, they can’t ignore charm; they may love it or hate it but can’t ignore it. And advertising is all about creating the charisma they cannot ignore.

And for those of you who haven’t watch the video or heard the jingle yet, go and have a look. We assure you won’t stop humming the lyrics, just like we can’t right now.

By:Tushar Kalawatia

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