Defending jingles

August 11, 2009

Jingles are primitive. Jingles should be reserved for local companies on AM radio. Jingles show a disregard for the listener’s intelligence. Jingles are hacky and stupid.

Jingles get a bad rap, especially by some enlightened advertising experts.

But you know what? They work. They work really well.

Sometimes, too well.

Take my daughter, Sierra. Though we try to keep it at a minimum, she sometimes breaks through our barriers and steals a few minutes of television. Which means she sometimes takes in the fruits of my industry’s labors: television advertising.

So it shouldn’t have been a surprise when, upon spotting a yogurt cup, she began singing.

“ACTIVIA!!!!”

My wife and I looked at each other. Did she… Was that… Wait, here it comes again…

“ACTIVIA!!!!”

Though the pronunciation needs work, the pitch was perfect. It was the Activia jingle. And we couldn’t have been more surprised if she’d buzzed her hair and begun acting like Jamie Lee Curtis.

Admittedly, I was kind of proud.

For me, these jingles aren’t cheap or grating – they’re part of my nostalgia. To this day, I can’t see the name “Mennen” without humming the three-note tag jingle. I still have the Carnival Cruise “If You Could See Me Now” jingle running through my head from time to time.

You have the same memories, I guarantee. Maybe not the same songs, but most certainly something similar – something that keeps that brand’s name alive in your mind long after you’ve turned off the television. It could be something ancient - the short burst of a jingle that signed off old Diet Coke spots - or something more recent.

So before you go slagging on the artistic merits of jingles and their place in popular customer, think of it from an advertising standpoint.

They work. And they can be a lot of fun, too.

(As long as we ignore Subway’s entire history of jingles. Those have all been preeeetttyyy awful.)

By Corey

Filed Under Advertising, Marketing, The Process

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