With a carefully crafted illustration, a sensitive topic can be presented creatively and with dignity.
Developing marketing materials for a sensitive subject
Want to make an impact with a super-sensitive - or deadly dull - message? Here’s how and why it pays to be quick on the draw….
When it comes to developing marketing materials for sensitive subjects such as personal hygiene, sex or potentially embarrassing health problems, it’s all too common for creatives to find themselves staring out of the window, not knowing where to focus their gaze, never mind where to start.
It’s these tricky topics, together with dull or ‘dry’ factual content, that require the most ingenuity in terms of creative input. Sadly though, there’s no marketing-with-sensitivity handbook out there explaining how we should handle potentially awkward or yawn-inducing marketing matter. There are, however, approaches we can adopt and adapt in order to maximise audience reach, without compromising a topic’s gravity, causing extreme embarrassment, or sending someone to sleep.
Illustrations for a sensitive subject - where a photo won't do!
Delivering the message with ingenuity
... and brevity.
Illustration for Sanitation Learning Hub by @sandrastaufer.
Good illustrations can persuade, inform and influence subliminally; showing rather than explaining, enhancing a marketing message by genuinely engaging audience emotions.
Delivery is everything when it comes to both super-sensitive and super-boring topics. How we say something is almost as important as what we say. And as we might not know exactly who will be looking at our content, we cannot predict the potential fallout from the narrative we deliver. We can, however, communicate our message in a way that maintains audience dignity.
And while long-form written content is certainly valuable in some areas of marketing, the antithesis is true for both highly sensitive and deadly dull topics, where brevity is always the best approach. We need to cut out any potentially patronising waffle and get straight to the point.
Content must never accuse or overwhelm, but rather show our audience what we can do to help them, by delivering facts in a comforting way. This is where well-considered and well-drawn illustrations can do the hard work, enabling us to take ownership of our message while at the same time creating immediate audience impact.
The most important thing we must do though when delivering information is to tell the truth, and this is where good illustration really comes into its own. Sensitive bespoke graphics can help organisations appear friendly and trustworthy, while at the same time communicating a marketing message in a more visceral, organic way than even the best-chosen words or photographs.
In the same way that picture books hold the attention of young children, helping them to move the narrative forward without adult assistance, good illustrations and animation can persuade, inform and influence subliminally; showing rather than explaining, enhancing a marketing message by genuinely engaging audience emotions.