Less smiles and more twisted. What really makes for a great Christmas ad

What makes a good Christmas ad? All smiles and tasty turkey or more twists, turns, and tinsel stuck in a cat’s bum? Top creatives weigh in on the dos and don'ts around this vital brand moment.

Australia Post’s Spread the Merry campaign via The Monkeys, part of Accenture Song.

The pressure for brands and their ad agencies to serve up the ultimate tickbox Christmas ad has intensified year after year.

With UK retailer John Lewis historically setting the bar for delivering emotive festive-filled ads that are revered globally, creative competition, as well as fears around under or overcooked Christmas ads, are all too real.

With more consumers also actively seeking out Christmas advertisements online from their favourite brands, we asked Australia’s top creatives to weigh in on why this time of year is so vital for brands and what exactly makes a good Christmas ad.

Contrary to the good times, glee and food-filled frolics associated with Christmas, TBWA\Melbourne group creative director Matt Stoddard said people want to be captivated by a story that takes them on a journey and makes them feel something - and this doesn’t always have to be so merry.

One of Mr Stoddard’s favourite Christmas ads in recent times is Ikea’s ‘Silence the Critics’, mostly because it wasn’t overly Christmassy.

“Audiences don’t need to be showered in tinsel to be entertained,” Mr Stoddard said.

“Hence why a lot of them are kicking back and watching the movie ‘Die Hard’ on Christmas Eve, rather than Home Alone.”

Mr Stoddard said with people not typically seeking out TV ads on YouTube for light entertainment like they do with Christmas ads, this does up the ante.

“There is a little more fear when trying to create a good Christmas ad because you have to imagine you’re following on from a John Lewis one. You also want to be one of the ads that everyone loves and comes back to every year,” Mr Stoddard said.

In contrast, M&C Saatchi Group chief creative office Cam Blackley argues that while some Christmas ads tend to dwell in the season’s struggles, highlighting pain points and exhaustion can actually be the last thing consumers want to be reminded of.

“There’s a real opportunity to park the cynicism and bring some escapism, lean into joy, sentimentality, even silliness and play to the mood - it’s why people watch Love Actually or Home Alone every single year,” he said.

“These fundamentals have never changed. What does change is the context; this year we all have the ‘cost of living’ crisis to contend with. Context is always your ‘north star’ for tone.”

With the typical pressures around trying to nail an ad with both scale and visibility, Sydney-based Mr Blackley said with Christmas ad briefs there’s often more stakeholders to contend with, more subjectivity around the season to navigate and more pressure to be original at a time when probably every seasonal insight has been well trodden.

Innocean CEO Jasmin Bedir

This point is echoed by Innocean CEO Jasmin Bedir, who said a good Christmas is all about the insight, arguing every great Christmas ad always has an insight that’s so relatable to make the audience instantly hooked.

While there’s no failsafe recipe for a good Christmas ad, BMF creative director David Fraser said a brand with a strong and consistent tone of voice, compelling truth to create tension or humour and of course the craft to make it feel special, can be a winning combo.

“It’s harder to stand out from the glut of festive frolics. And so many ideas feel familiar,” Mr Fraser said.

“Campaigns need to be pushed that bit further every year to stay fresh, surprising, and distinctive,” said Mr Fraser.

While Mr Blackley argued more smiles make the best Christmas ad, Mr Fraser welcomes the challenge of taking a risk with something more twisted and more truthful.

“Brands fear taking a risk. They avoid uncomfortable truths and steer clear of genuine tension or humour,” Mr Fraser said.

“Everybody’s always smiling. And everything’s always OK. Christmas is a time to be populist and pull-on heartstrings, but when all the edges get sanded down the viewer has nothing to grip on to and the brand falls into the sea of sameness.”

An important takeaway from Ogilvy Network ANZ chief strategy officer Toby Harrison, is for brands to remember that a good Christmas ad isn’t just for Christmas, given it has the potential to change how people feel about your brand for the next year too.

“Previously, brands looked to Christmas campaigns to drive sales for this period in isolation,” he explained.

“However, it’s clear that more and more businesses are looking to Christmas as an opportunity to build their brands for the long-term…and they are doing it well.”

Clemenger BBDO chief creative officer Jim Curtis

There are plenty of challenges when it comes to creating knockout Christmas ads, with the common consensus among Australia’s top creatives being too many brand ads look and feel the same, with brands fearful of taking any risk.

While it’s a common notion that creative work from brands isn’t brave enough or doesn't push enough boundaries, it’s equally as common to hear that a great agency can only be as great as the client allows them to be.

“You need to cut through the sea of sameness that crashes across our screens every December,” Clemenger BBDO chief creative officer Jim Curtis tells The Growth Agenda.

“During Christmas, too many brands look the same, sound the same and are set in the same scenarios with no discernible differences.”

He added that the biggest challenge is finding the right balance between uniformity and giving consumers what they want, such as warmth, nostalgia and the recognisable rituals that make Christmas, Christmas.

While 303MullenLowe strategy director Smiljka Dimitrijevic believes that fundamentals of any good brand advert apply just the same whether it's Christmas or not, for an Aussie festive campaign, much like Mr Curtis, she argues the quirks of Australia should be included.

“A Christmas ad made for the Australian market really needs to be couched in the quirks of the Australian Christmas experience (hot weather, seafood trumping ham, Santa in boardshorts), not the ’traditional’ Christmas experience that the brands and fairytales from the Northern hemisphere talk about,” Ms Dimitrijevic said.

“Playing with those quirks and ensuring your brand isn’t lost somewhere among the emotive storytelling is key to a good Australian Christmas ad.”

303MullenLowe strategy director Smiljka Dimitrijevic

Ms Dimitrijevic said the biggest barrier to a good Christmas ad is justifying the expense, with the challenge of “how big is big enough” in terms of investment and differentiation from competitors a big fear for brands.

DDB Group Melbourne ECD Psembi Kinstan feels the Aussie market is still relatively new when it comes to creating sophisticated Christmas campaigns, and while the ambition of local brands is growing, he said Australia has a long way to go to contend with the rest of the world.

“There is the opportunity for Christmas advertising in Australia to do what it has done in the UK and become a cultural moment. That only happened in the UK because a department store most famous for selling hosiery, John Lewis, had the ambition to create that moment. We’ve yet to see that happen here,” he said.

CHEP executive creative director Amy Weston agreed, arguing every brand is fighting for cut through and not just against their own category, but every Christmas ad that’s come before.

Meanwhile, Ms Bedir said Christmas insights are drying up, with Christmas ads playing out the same old storyline year after year. She argued there is still a creative opportunity to mine for brands who put the effort in.

“We’re running out of insights and ways into Christmas briefs,” she said.

“They are literally drying up, as more and more Christmas ads are made year after year following the same old formula and played out storylines. The good news is there‘s still creative opportunity to mine for those willing to dig a little deeper.”

From big brand TV ads to challenger brands and their digital campaigns, Aussie creatives at some of the aforementioned agencies have been fortunate to work across Christmas ads in many guises, but what festive ads are still on the bucket list? It’s a mixed bag.

Mr Curtis at Clemenger BBDO said he’d love to work on a Christmas campaign for charity, while Mr Stoddard said he’d love to make a “twisted” ad for a postal service and one “that calls bullsh*t” on the fact that the postal service are the true deliverers of Christmas presents, not Santa and his elves.

“I imagine postal employees holding their composure as their children rush to the tree exclaiming how great Santa is for bringing the presents, all the while raging inside. Driving along in their vans, looking out their window at inflatable Santa decorations and lighting displays. Slowly shaking their heads. I could go on but I think you get the picture,” he said.

Aldi has typically been a strong player in the Christmas ad game, so Ms Dimitrijevic would embrace an Aldi Christmas brief with open arms.

“Aldi has a strong strategy and is not afraid to have a personality, unlike some brands which struggle to move beyond an earnest tone of voice,” Ms Dimitrijevic said.

“It’s not offensive, but it’s also not surprising, or interesting in any way. And ultimately not memorable.”

While once upon a time Mr Blackley would have loved to work on a John Lewis campaign, it seems the fanglory over such ads has waned, with the chief creative preferring to work on something more interesting across categories that don’t traditionally turn up at Christmas.

Innocean’s CEO Ms Bedir concurred, saying she would not want to work on a John Lewis ad and agreed that an untapped Australian brand that’s never linked itself to Christmas would be a good challenge.

On the flip side, Ms Weston said she enjoyed John Lewis’ 2022 Christmas take on stepping away from consumerism and using the season to give back.

CHEP executive creative director Amy Weston

“John Lewis’ has always been the unofficial leader of the Christmas ad genre but their shift this year to supporting kids in care made them more relevant than ever,” the CHEP creative director said.

For Mrs Fraser, he’d love to work on a humorous Christmas ad, pointing to the 2021 spot from UK paper towel brand Plenty which did an honest take on all the mess that comes with a big family Christmas.

“The film had loads of heart. And tinsel stuck in a cat’s bum. So, I think it’d be good fun to work on wherever they go next,” Mr Fraser said.