Food Porn & Marketing

What Financial Marketers Can Learn From Food Porn

What are you trying to sell?

Perhaps it’s a hot new trendy product…

Cooler than an ice bar in Reykjavik.

More stylish than Kate Moss on a catwalk.

But if you're like most financial services, the product or service may feel more mundane – and hard to get anyone excited about.

But imagine you’re selling cabbage.

Difficult to make that appealing, right?

Well not if you ask Marks and Spencer.

I bet you remember those legendary “food porn” ads…

…with the sultry voiceover, the alluring images and the classic tagline – “this is not just food; this is M&S food”.

Sure, some of the products were instantly appealing in their own right: most of us would enjoy tucking into a chocolate pudding.

But what about parsnips or cabbage – pretty run-of-the-mill, basic vegetables, right?

Well, both of these featured in the famous ads.

Except of course, they weren’t just vegetables.

They were “Lincolnshire red cabbage with apple and cranberries, slow braised in red wine and tawny port sauce”…

…and “golden roast parsnips coated with wildflower honey and wholegrain mustard dressing”.

With the words lingered over by a mysterious female voice.

These ads work because they play on the emotions and involve all your senses.

Sure, this is easier to do in a high budget TV ad…

….with fancy camerawork, melodic background music and a sultry narrator.

But the best copywriters – just like great authors – can unveil stunning scenes in your mind’s eye…

…and make you actually FEEL specific emotions just through their words.

Employing similes, metaphors, rhythm and rhyme, they can make a few lines of text descriptive, persuasive and enjoyable.

And most importantly – drive sales.

Even for ‘uninspiring’ financial services products.

But what if you’re more of a dyslexic than a Dickens?

The team here have been doing this for donkey's years...

...writing literally thousands of marketing messages that led directly to sales.

And we've spent much of that time within highly regulated financial firms - so we know how to keep on the right side of Compliance.

If you’d like us to come up with some new copy for you – or improve on what you’ve got – just get in touch Book a quick chat with me here.

I can’t promise you “food porn”...

...but I expect you'll be salivating when you see the amount of new leads you're generating.