Rich Maddocks: Pleasing everybody is the toughest part

The Rav4 ad was banned from TV, but then reinstated.

Campaign: Toyota - RAV4
Agency: Saatchi & Saatchi
Creative Team: Toby Talbot, Andy DiLallo and Jay Benjamin
Reviewer: Rich Maddocks, Colenso BBDO creative director

We live in a world of sanitised advertising. Just about everything that reaches the consumer has been checked for anything that someone, in fact, anyone may find offensive, demeaning, irrelevant, misleading, too funny, not funny enough, confusing or irritating.

Which makes it damn hard to do anything different. AKA outstanding.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not anti research, I'm not against finding out what consumers think. Understanding the consumer is the most valuable part of the creative process.

The frustration comes, however, when the work we produce to engage these consumers, to entertain them and have a relevant conversation with them is constantly watered down - just in case someone doesn't approve.

Rav4 is a great example.

Most consumers laughed and enjoyed it. Seventeen didn't and felt compelled to write in and lodge a formal complaint. And it was temporarily taken off air.

Watching the Fair Go ad awards the other week, I also saw an ad was banned because it featured a man drinking out of a juice bottle that another man had already taken a drink from. What an outrage.

It's tough for us from a commercial point of view because we're not competing with just other advertising. We're competing with anything else that might interest our target market - television shows, the internet, or the surprising length of their toenails.

Can you imagine sitting down to watch The Sopranos and seeing a stern warning: "The following programme contains sex, violence, coarse language, nudity and a man drinking out of a bottle that someone else has been drinking from"?

It's never easy breaking through. It's never easy getting your ad watched, let alone getting it remembered. But it makes it a lot harder when we're trying to please everyone all the time as we do it.

Not everyone loves the most popular TV shows, the most popular musicians, or politicians. But the most popular ones are usually the ones doing something different, or with a point of view.

I'm delighted the Rav4 ad was allowed back on TV. Rightly, it was given a time rating so it played in programmes adults were watching. I wouldn't have thought Toyota was targeting children for pester power anyway.