In celebration of Pride Month

As some of you may or may not know, this month is pride month and, while I was too busy moving and painting my new office to go out and enjoy the festivities last Sunday at NYC pride, I've decided to celebrate pride by featuring the latest ad by SAGE




















This is really a god awful ad. God awful.

Firstly the art direction is terrible. I don't know where to look or what to look at. Are there three vertical stories or am I supposed to read it like a cartoon strip? Also why are those people in those retarded positions? Who stands like that? Furthermore, for the images at the bottom, why are the faces so close? It looks like that first bald guy is going to try to eat that other guys brains or like that lady in the last frame is pondering that old guys nose hairs. It's just terrible. Even if you can move past the terrible art, the copy is horrendous. It's like they're trying to trick me into reading a tiny confusing book. I can't tell where to start or where to end. The call to action is crazy small (yeah, it's there all the way at the end) and then you have those two huge logo's taking up 20% of the image. Once again I'm confused. I can't tell if this is a Sage ad or a SageCap ad, or even how they interplay.

This is what the ad needs to do 1) Pick one of those six images and stick with it, before and after only works with weight loss ads - and they especially don't work when the 'before' picture is the same as the 'after' picture 2) Cut down the copy - nonprofits are always trying to do a million things at once, just do one thing really well 3) Come up with some kind of a headline (duh) 4) stop making the logo's compete - pick one 5) bump up the call to action and 6) cut down on the copy - I'm not here to read your brochure, even if you disguise it as an ad (I know I said that earlier but it should be repeated).

This is a classic example of one ad trying to do too much and ending up failing miserably. As always K.I.S.S. - Keep It Simple Stupid.