I was in a meeting this week where the hot topic was ‘how to be memorable’. It's a great question to ask in the context of advertising, where I spend large chunks of my life, and though I didn't mention it in the meeting, I have an answer about the functions of memorability.
I was once lucky enough to spend time with David Bernstein, legendary ad man, author of Creative Advertising and trustee of the History of Advertising Trust. He had many wise things to share, but the one that stayed with me, amusingly enough, was about the nature of memorability.
He put it this way. Memorability is about the three ‘C's:
- Frequency — how many times you experience something
- Recency — how recently you experienced something
- Relevancy — how relevant the experience was to you personally
In our age of neuroscience and advertising pseudo-science, it is really good to have a simple, human perspective on what makes successful advertising.
David, we salute you and the history of great British copywriting.