The use of negative emotions in advertising

Chuck Young

Chuck Young, founder and CEO of Ameritest, uses Millward Brown pre-test measures and his own company's Flow of Emotion® to demonstrate that negative emotion, properly executed in advertisements, can be a powerful driver of commercial performance.

The use of negative emotions in advertising

Chuck Young

Many advertisers are wary of creating ads that evoke negative emotions in consumers, for fear of creating negative associations with their brand. This is not surprising, since the mental processes involved in transferring emotions generated by advertising to the emotional equity of a brand are not understood: playing with the dark force can be risky.

I remember one of the first copy tests we conducted for IBM. Ogilvy had created 'Blue Letterbox' TV executions; however, this one had an unusual twist. The commercial had a dark storyline about hackers breaking into...

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