"I swallow" controversy

Whoever says Singaporeans are not creative, would probably have to rethink that statement.

To be able to link “I swallow” with sexual meanings, suggestions, connotations and impressions, does require some creativity.

Which I must admit, I lack of.

Zoe Tay recently sparked a controversy over the tagline “I swallow” of her new endorsement with beauty brand.

She was featured in this advertisement of an anti-aging supplement, with a tagline that reads, “My secret to beautiful skin? I swallow.”

Some people find that “I swallow” has some hidden sexual meaning and have slammed this advertisement over the internet.

I was laughing when I read the news. To put it in the colloquial Singlish term, I was thinking, “like that also can?”

I seriously do not see what the whole fuss over “I swallow” was about, and I agree with the view of the two women who are behind the tagline when they said, “Any sexual innuendo is in the mind of the reader.”

But that does not make me an ardent supporter of this ad. Quite the opposite, in fact.

I am not from the advertising industry so I shall not embarrass myself by trying to analyze the advertisement, but I shall talk about it from the point of view of a consumer.

If you have seen the ad, you would hardly have guessed that Zoe Tay is 37 years old and mother of a son. Despite age catching up, Zoe Tay looks gorgeous and appealing. From the visual attraction, the beauty brand had good judgement when it invited Zoe Tay to endorse the products.

Zoe Tay has been featured in numerous advertisements. To make one distinguishable from the other is no mean task.

This time round, they decided to work on the tagline.

As the tagline goes in a Question-&-Answer form, the advertisers could have gone ahead to put the name of the product down after “My secret to beautiful skin?” was written. But that would have been too customary. Not many people would remember after seeing it.

I feel that a good advertisement is one which makes people think and ponder for a while, but brings them back to the product at the end of it, and makes them interested in it.

Zoe Tay’s ad obviously met the first aim. Just look at how the internet forums are buzzing with all sorts of imagination over the tagline.

However, it falls far short of the second (and more important) aim.

Personally, I do not like this ad. Not because I feel that it is done in bad taste, but because I think it does not help to build the brand and the meaning behind the ad is weak. If the ad had not sparked controversy, most consumers would probably not know that this ad is for a beauty product that comes in tablet form. It is also hard to understand the ad, not because the tagline is too difficult, but because it does not really say much.

Perhaps it is because people did not catch the meaning of the ad, which explains the controversy.

Nowadays, creativity is the in thing. While advertisers are trying their very best to think out of the box and instill creativity into their ads, consumers, on the other hand, also use their creativity, in this case, to degrade a supposedly classy brand.

For a good ad, it is not enough to get people talking, it needs to propel people to make the right conversation.

I think both advertisers and consumers should take this as a lesson.

The next time, use creativity in the right places.