Advertisements—one-off ads or multi media campaigns—are created for only one reason and one reason only: to sell. But there are two items on sale in every ad: the product or service in question and the brand itself.

Any ad that merely attempts to separate the general public from their money fails to do justice both to the brand it represents and the consumer’s intelligence. Which is why the best ads engage us on an emotional level, get us to view the brand as socially-motivated, funny, intelligent, authoritative, innovative, traditional or whatever they’re going for. The off-loading of inventory thus becomes a mere by-product of the entire process, and, of course, brand advocacy, that holy grail of all brand building exercises.

With every piece of advertising I have worked on, my mission has remained constant, to breathe a little personality in the communication. It has been said that that personality is often mine, what can I say but, quod erat demonstrandum.