Natalia reads "This I Know" by Terry O'Reilly

<p>When you create a message with emotional content, it attracts people. Leadership consultant Edwin H. Friedman puts an even finer point on it, saying, “People can only hear you when they are moving toward you, and they are not likely to when your words are pursuing them.” Emotion pulls, it doesn’t chase.</p><p>I’ve always been a fan of humour in advertising, and most of the ten-thousand-plus commercials I’ve directed over the last twenty-five years were humorous. All marketing is an intrusion. It piggybacks on the real reason people have focused their attention—watching television, listening to radio, perusing a newspaper or surfing online. They are there for the content, not the advertising (though the Super Bowl may be the one exception to this rule). So if advertising is an interloper, how do you make that interruption the most polite or, at minimum, the least intrusive message possible? Even more, how do you give something back in return for the loud knocking? Humour is one answer.</p><p>It’s important to understand the difference between humour and comedy. Humour is giving, it’s generous. Comedy subtracts and is usually sarcastic or biting. That’s why humour is better suited to marketing. To make someone smile, or laugh, forges an emotional connection. Humour gathers people. Think about people you know. The ones who make you smile are the ones you most want to be around. Humour doesn’t pursue, it pulls.</p><p>Not long ago, I attended a talk given by filmmaker Richard Curtis at the Cannes advertising festival. Curtis is a very successful screenwriter and director whose credits include Mr. Bean, Blackadder, Four Weddings and a Funeral, Love Actually, Bridget Jones’s Diary, and Notting Hill, to name but a few. Not a bad resumé. He was in Cannes to unveil a new marketing campaign he was spearheading to tackle extreme poverty and climate change. The campaign was going to begin with a cinema ad that would be shown on the same day in every movie theatre in North America and Europe. It would be the first global