If you can spare the time please watch both and then watch them for a second time.

Do you have a favourite?

Clearly they are both out to achieve exactly the same thing. They want to plant their website name in your mind so that, when that occasion arrives each year for your car insurance renewal, you will make an association between their message and the process.

It’s a challenging market to influence. Insurance is a low interest category and most people would prefer not to think about it unless they absolutely have to.

The GoCompare advert certainly gets its name across. The use of a melody means the mental imprint is much stronger. The tune will bounce around in the mind of many, imprinting itself in the process.

This is a good example of a marketing meme. A word, phrase or line that sticks in your mind and you end up repeating irrespective of whether you want to do so.

But, the ad achieves this by being irritating. The brand messenger is annoying and intrusive (certainly to British sensibilities). The joke at the end is old, mildly amusing the first time you hear it and then unbearably predictable from the moment the unattractive, overweight man pops onto the screen.

I’m sure the ad scores very well on the pointless measures usually used to measure ad performance: awareness and recall will be strong.

Personally, I won’t use GoCompare because, in a strange way, it feels as though I’m condoning this dislikeable brand personality. I know that I associate the company with the person they have portraying them in the ad.

Most of all though, the ad is telling me to do so something. That’s crass and not something I respond well to. I’d prefer to feel as if I’m making my own decision: of course, I’m being influenced, but I don’t want to feel it as a hammer blow to my brain!

Conversely the CompareTheMarket.com ad is clever. No one is telling me to buy anything. Instead, a curious and cute character is reinforcing the websites name in my mind by making me want to see him and want to repeat his Eastern European voice in my head.

And the masterstroke? His catchphrase (or rather catchword). A line that even my seven year old son repeats. “Simples!”

So the ad reinforces its message – the website address – as a meme, but this time it’s a positive one: I like having it flip around my mind.

But it doesn’t stop there.

It also ensures that the word ‘simples’ is associated with the brand too.

So my unconscious mind is being programmed to bring two price comparison websites to mind but linking a very different feeling about them: visiting CompareTheMarket.com feels like it will be about as enjoyable as insurance shopping can be, and it will be straight-forward.

On the other hand, visiting GoCompare.com will be hard work. It will go on a bit and I won’t like it.

It all goes to show that when it comes to developing advertising, it’s essential to consider the full package of associations you want to create in your customers’ minds.

Image courtesy: Giovanni Orlando