The 50 Most Creative Ads

Here are the 30 most creative classic ads I've collected:

1. Vaseline

Principle: Iconic Layering

Use something iconic to stand your product on top of.

2. Range Rover

Principle: Create An Exclusive Club

Show them everybody else — and how you differ from them.

The more expensive your product is, the more you have to do this.

3. Band Sports

Principle: The Subtle Joke

People love British humor because of how subtle it is.

This is gold.

4. Keloptic

Principle: POV hacking

Everyone has had the experience of putting on glasses and seeing differently.

Notice how this ad was done with the viewer in mind. Genius.

5. Surreal

Principle: The Third Door

If you can’t afford celebrity endorsements, think outside the box.

6. Plum Guide

Principle: Sell the YOLO

Everyone is procrastinating on their next holiday.

If you remind them how scarce life is, you create activation energy.

7. Hublot

Principle: Turning Sh*t into Sugar

Bernie Eccleston (billionaire) was attacked in London for his Hublot

He told Hublot to use his battered face as an ad campaign:

"See what people will do for a Hublot"

8. Porsche

Principle: The Inner Child

Appeal to their inner childhood dream state.

9. Loctite

Principle: Conversation Hacking

If nobody is talking about your product, find what people are talking about -- and insert your product into the conversation.

10. KFC

Principle: Call out the elephant in the room

If you can't sue them, use them as marketing material.

11. Gameboy

Principle: Your Product > Survival

Position yourself at the bottom of Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Gameboy is more important than sleep, food, and shelter.

12. New Balance

Principle: Create humor by connecting two unique audiences.

13. Wilson's

Principle: The Disclaimer

Use the headline to create extreme emotion.

Use the disclaimer to turn it into a smile.

14. Luxor

Principle: Advertising is Alchemy

If someone can create a great ad for highlighters, what's your excuse?

15. Spotify

Principle: The Left Turn

Take them down one road... and then take a sudden left turn.

16. The Economist

Principle: Call Out Your Anti-Customer

Rather than tell them about the wonderful people that use your product -- show them the people who criticize your product.

You can create an aspirational brand by showing them the anti-customer who dislikes your brand.

17. Porsche

Principle: Funny Humble Brag

If you're going to humble brag about your product - make it funny.

18. Staedtler

Principle: The 2nd Read

This ad is like a Christopher Nolan movie.

The multiple layers make you want to read it again and again.

19. Coca-Cola Light

Principle: The 10x Rule

10x the benefit you are trying to advertise to make the point.

20. Toyota

Principle: The Extreme Stat

90% of statistics are made up. The more specific the number and the funnier the claim - the better.

21. Alka Seltzer

Principle: Show Them The Pain

Remind them what happens if they don’t use your product.

Accessing those painful memories will create enough emotional energy for them to take action.

22. Timex

Principle: Create an Enemy

Turn your competition into the enemy by pointing out their weaknesses.

Position your product as the savior from the enemy.

23. Nescafe

Principle: Stand On The Shoulders of Giants

Take something iconic your audience recognizes — and then layer your product on top with a relevant twist.

24. Omega

Principle: Anchoring

A $235 watch is framed as more valuable because it's worn by an Astronaut in a $27,000 suit.

25. Rolls Royce

Principle: The Weakness Reframe

If you can't offer a feature, find a way of reframing this to focus on your strength.

Ogilvy called this "the best headline I ever wrote" -- and it has the same principle as this Porsche ad.

True story - When the Chief Engineer read the advert he said:

"It is time we did something about that damned clock"

26. BIC

Principle: 1+1=11

BIC sells razors and pens.

They took out ads next to one another for both products.

If you think outside the box, 1+1 can equal 11.

27. Nicototinell

Principle: Vanity > Health

If you want people to stop a negative action, appeal to their narcissism.

28. Nike

Principle: 4 Words

"If I had more time, I would have written a shorter letter" - Cicero

29. British Airways

Principle: A picture paints a 1,000 words

"The world's fastest airline"

London > Singapore in a blink of an eye.

30. Bose - Noise Cancelling Headphones

Principle: Contrast your selling point with the most extreme setting

It’s impossible to view this ad without a change in your heartbeat

Bonus: Rolls-Rocye

Rolls-Royce stopped exhibiting at car shows.

Instead, they started exhibiting at private jet shows.

"If you've been looking at jets all afternoon, a £300K car is an impulse buy. It's like putting the sweets next to the counter." - Rory Sutherland

The 20 Most Creative Social Media Ads

1. Fiverr

Principle: The Handbrake Turn

2. Sunnei

Principle: Multi Tab

Use Multiple iPhone Safari tabs to showcase your product.

Genius.

3. Liquid Death

Principle: Weakness Reframe

Use your negative reviews and comments and turn them into hilarious ads.

4. WWF

Principle: Ride The Wave

When everyone is talking about one thing -- insert yourself into the conversation.

5. CRAFTD

Principle: Meme Announcement > Boring Sale Announcement

The more relatable the meme, the more share opportunity it has.

Think "Would I share this with my contacts?"

6. Therabody

Principle: The Group Chat

If you want to put your marketing on steroids, reverse engineer it from the group chat message you want people to send.

7. AG1

Principle: Classical conditioning

Your brain sees this screen and wants to take action.

8. The City of LA

Principle: Meta Marketing

Sometimes being out of ideas can be the idea.

9. Apple

Principle: Minimalism.

Bonus: Notice the sexy locked Apple in the top left corner too.

10. Papier

Principle: CMO = Chief Meme Officer

11. AG1

Principle: Ride The Wave

AG1 taking advantage of the Chat-GPT wave by running AI conversations as ads.

12. IKEA

Principle: Punch Upwards

If you're a commodity product, don't be afraid of punching up at luxury goods.

13. Liquid Death

Principle: The Outrageous SMS

People hate ads that look like ads.

Make it something they want to forward to friends.

14. Hims

Principle: Emojis Speak a 1,000 Words

If Hims was to describe what they mean, this advert would get banned.

But if they use emojis, it's allowed AND it makes the customer laugh.

15. Wonderskin

Principle: The Worst Case Scenario

Take them to the worst-case scenario -- and show how reliable your product is.

16. Ridge Wallet

Principle: The Pink Elephant

Show them the boring grey competition -- and then present yourself as a pink elephant.

17. Converse

Principle: Copy & Paste

People don't think from first principles - they think in analogies.

To give an elevator pitch for your product, use an analogy from another industry.

"The leather jacket of sneakers"

18. Huel

Principle: Camouflage

They've run a customer's tweet and meme as the ad.

It camouflages it as social content on the newsfeed.

19. Morning Brew

Principle: Show Them The Future

Compare your innovation to the legacy competition

20. Calm

Principle: The Absurd Scroll Stopper

This is one of my favorite social media ads I've seen in a long time.

Bonus: Norwich City - World Mental Health Day