This is a best practice piece on the use of humour in advertising. It explains that humour may be cognitive, affective or both.
Best Practice
Using humour in advertising
David Ogilvy
famously said that nobody buys from a clown but he clearly ignored the
patter of good streetmarket salesmen, and neglected the fact that humour does
not have to wear baggy trousers, a red nose and gigantic shoes (17).
It
is abundantly clear from any scrutiny of advertising that humour or at least
wit is a regular ingredient in ads (4), and that it is potentially at least
one key element in making an ad 'likeable'. (It is, clearly, not the only way of
achieving this, as many commentators...