Have you been hit lately?

‘Have you been hit lately?’ is the headline for the advertisement for launching a new website or refreshing an old one.

Websites are all about hits after all.

Now, there is a part of me that thinks that a headline like this is sending the wrong message. Yes, it is clever. Yes, it relates directly to the product we are trying to sell BUT can it be taken the wrong way?

When the LOSER campaign came out, did anyone take offense to this? I suppose some may have.

A long time ago, when I was young and trying to be really creative, I came up with a concept “we’re not a fat company” eluding to the fact that in the technology boom days, agencies had large overheads and therefore had to charge their clients more – yet as a boutique agency, we had little overheads and kept our prices low.

An image I had in mind was an obese, nude lady, with layers of fat and our logo at the bottom of the page.

My creative department was scared! They were worried that everyone would take offense to an ad like this. I found it to be creative, yet others found that it would offend people and so in the end, we didn’t do it. The risk was too high.

I still like the creative and personally, wouldn’t care whether someone is fat or thin… as long as they are happy and healthy – who cares. Right?

Given the context, ‘have you been hit lately’ relates well to the topic at hand and certainly would make someone look twice.

It will be interesting to see what happens from here. Will our phones be ringing hot with sales or will someone take offense?

Let’s wait and see.