Tuesday, June 01, 2010

'There's nothing like Australia' tourism advertisement

There's nothing like Tourism Australia either, for getting their ads wrong.

They've done it again with their latest international commercial, which is supposed to convince people to visit Oz.

They've got it badly wrong. Yet again.

In fact the last time they got it right was way back in the Crocodile Dundee era with Paul Hogan's 'Shrimp on the barbie' ad.

This latest one, from their ad agency DDB Sydney, has just been revealed and it's a shocker.

The visuals are good for an international audience but the soundtrack is as bad as it could be.

Banal. Hackneyed. Horribly dated. Embarrasing.

They need to change it. Immediately. Before it's released.

10 comments:

Susan said...

Oh dear! Maybe they want to put people off!

Rory said...

Well I hope that's nothing like Australia.

Neil Roberts said...

Hmmm.. well maybe without the soundtrack it would be ok!

Kathryn said...

Cringeworthy. I'm embarrassed. Why can't we just have those beautiful pictures with a tasteful soundtrack. That makes us all look like a pack of tone deaf bogans. Let the images speak for themselves. What's wrong with these people. First the awful girl with the foul mouth and now this! The prospect of coming here and being sung at is unlikely to appeal to anybody!

Anonymous said...

It's cute (in the eyes of a foreigner). Beats Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan...

JiE said...

I ain't Australian, and I loved it... Was I the only one seeing the humor in this?

Basically a parody of all other tourism commercials. If this would have had the standard "nice" soundtrack, nothing would differentiate this from the others as seen on BBC/CNN (India, Malaysia, Croatia, Turkey).

As good and Monthy Pythonesque as "Every sperm is sacred" if you ask me...

Seabee said...

JiE, it's getting exposure around the world, could well go viral...but it was unintentional.

Quotes from the people responsible:

"The use of the song represents a back to basics approach by using music to ensure that consumers remember the advertising long after they have seen it."

“It was important to us that this campaign was simple, universally appealing and one that would strike a chord with international visitors by using insights from the Australian people."

They "...chose to write a song for the ad because of the universal appeal music has with people...through research we realised it was also important to capture the welcoming nature and warmth of the Australian people."


Parody and humour didn't come into the thinking, they were serious.

Susan said...

OK if you look at it as Monty Pythonesque then its a stroke of genius - shame it wasn't intentional!!

Dave said...

As Australians I thought we had progressed past this type of advertising years ago - obviously not!!

JiE said...

Well, even though I found it funny, it is always a bit scary when it is unintentional... in this case especially if you're an Aussie.