How many words can you pack in an ad?

I have had a penchant for wearing a wrist watch with a stop-watch feature. This is an old habit predating the smartphone era. Why, you may ask. While working in marketing and adv­ertising, you are in the business of creating and approving televi­sion spots of a fixed length (it was a practice at least till the 2010s). And it was always a good habit to see if all that a copywri­ter has written can fit into the 30 seconds planned for the ad. One rule of thumb was to ensure that the dialogue and voice­over portion of the ad, when narrated in normal style, does not exceed half the duration of the ad. If you have pla­n­n­ed a 30-second ad, the narrat­ion should ideally not be for more than 15 or 20 seconds. Why? Well, television is a visual medium and hence a picture can tell the story of a thousand words.
 

Prof John Philip Jones, who had a stellar career in the global ad agency JWT and then a second innings in academia, said: “Effective advertising is generally more visual than verbal. The number of words in a 30-second commercial should be restricted to thirty or less. The picture should tell the story” (in the book Brands Engines for Profit). His latest book, Advertising at the Crossroads, explores this issue and many more, especially with respect to the Indian subcontinent.

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How verbose are Indian television ads? And are they getting less or more verbose? These were the two questions the acc­ount planning team at FCB Ulka attempted to answer in its res­earch a decade ago. The analysis involved taking a purposive sample of around 30 television ads from the 1980s, 1990s, 2000s and 2010s. In order to compare likes with like, ads of only packaged goods brands covering personal care, home care, foods, cosmetics etc. were dissected. The simple reason was that these ads dominated the television medium in India and archives were available for the team to dig into. The team found that Indian ads (Hindi ads) were packed with a lot more words than Prof Jones would have liked. And the word count was going up. From 41 words on an average in the 1980s to almost 53 words in 2010s. While going through this article recently I was wondering if this increase is continuing? Are we packing more and more into the 30-second ad now than in the past? Or are we moving the other way and going more international?
 

Once again my researcher and I looked at consumer packaged goods ads from popular TV channels like Star TV, Zee TV etc. A total of 30 ads were analysed. We discovered that the word count had now reached 65. The analysis also revealed that more and more ads had a lot of dialogue. On an average, dialogue content of ads was at 39 words. This was a big jump from the past. Voiceover word count had declined marginally. And jingle word count had declined substantially. In our analysis in 2010, we had total words at 53, jingle at 11, voiceover at 29 and dialogue at 12. Our re­sea­rch said that now in 2022, we have a total word count of 65, jingle at five, voiceover at 22 and dialogue at 38. Significant change indeed.

A further sub-analysis showed that ads for personal care brands packed as much as 69 words in 30 seconds; the number was significantly lower at 52 words for food brand ads.
 

What could be the reason for the increase of word count in In­dian ads? There could be many. The increase in competition across categories has pushed brand marketers to pack more and more “points of difference” in their messaging. The cost of television advertising (though in cost per thousand exposures, Indian television advertising is still a bargain) has pushed brand managers to not take any chances with the message content. The other reason could be the need to convert rural consumers to branded pro­ducts (that may also explain the need for dialogues narrated between characters). Finally, the reason could also be the pre-tes­t­ing methods being used. When applied blindly, these pre-tests tend to favour the more verbose forms of advertising (often with a celebrity thrown in).

It is said that Japanese television ads pack a lot of words, of­ten in just 15 seconds. We all know how mutual fund ads tell us: “Mutual fund investments are subject to market risks, read all scheme-related documents carefully” (14 words in 3 seconds or less). The way consumer brands are packing words into their ads, I do worry if all ads will one day be narrated the way mutual fund risks are anno­u­n­ced. Hopefully, we will not end up there. Yes, if you are planning for your next ad, remember that a picture is worth a thousand words. Pauses allow an ad to breathe. And your consumer to lean in.

(Research support received from Sreyan M Chowdhary)

Ambi Parameswaran is a best-selling author and independent brand coach. He can be reached at ambimgp@brand-building.com