One of my favorite TV shows is the Gruen Transfer, a show deconstructing advertising. Don’t laugh, it’s the ABC’s #1 TV show.
A few weeks back, one of the panelists revealed that there are two fundamental ways to sell things – fear, as in:
and hope, as in:
The panellist’s comments are revealing – fear sells well for a short while and then stops working. This is true of the AIDS campaign. The campaign reduced HIV / AIDS infection rates to a low that hasn’t been repeated anywhere else on the planet since that time. Then the ad stopped, and there’s been no replacement campaign for nigh on 25 years. You can guess that the HIV / AIDS infection rates are back up.
We need to change the security industry from selling fear to selling (and delivering) hope. The results will last longer, and have better long term outcomes.