If you search in Google for “comedy definition”, the first two that come up are; 1) “a movie, play, or broadcast program intended to make an audience laugh.” 2) “professional entertainment consisting of jokes and satirical sketches, intended to make an audience laugh.” I saw a single similarity between these two definitions of comedy, the last part; “intended to make an audience laugh.” Comedy isn’t for oneself, comedy is for others. People don’t try to be funny to amuse themselves, they try to be funny to amuse others. Because of this, companies such as John West use comedy to attract attention and hook the audience to watch their advertisement. However, comedy as a marketing strategy can sometimes come together with politics.
An example of this is an independent candidate in the United States elections under the name of ‘Deez Nuts’. This candidate was inscribed as a prank by teenager Brady Olsen. However, before this was revealed, nobody had ever heard of him, they only related the name ‘Deez Nuts’ to a video published in the humour website “The Best Vines”, and because the video was funny and they were amused by the name, in the August poll in North Carolina, ‘Deez Nuts’ was third with 9% of the votes. I am sure that comedy and humour played a big part here, and I am sure that nobody would have voted for him had Brady Olsen signed up a candidate under the name James Smith.
Comedy changes emotions and opinions, and it has the power to alter people’s first impressions on either other people such as ‘Deez Nuts’ or products such as John West Salmon. When I saw this commercial I was actually tempted to buy this salmon, just like many people were tempted to vote for ‘Deez Nuts’ in the U.S. elections. Funny people are fun to be around to, as they are always lightening up the mood, hence gaining others’ attention. It attracts people and it seems to be a marketing strategy that just can’t go wrong.
Link to the commercial: http://goo.gl/5gOlZW