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6 Concepts in Advertising to Propel Your Business
Updated December 9, 2025
Advertising is key to growing your business. Follow these seven advertising concepts to create a memorable campaign that appeals to your target audience.
Whether you realize it or not, advertisements surround you almost constantly. Walking to work, you may see an ad at a bus stop.
Online, you may see an ad on your favorite social media platform.
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You probably see them on TV and in magazines, but also hear them on the radio or a streaming service.
Needless to say, they’re unavoidable. However, to be effective, companies must develop creative concepts that stand out.
Creative concepts are the big ideas that capture an audience’s attention and persuade them to take action.
By producing engaging ads, companies can build connections with their target audience, introduce new products, and increase brand awareness, ultimately aiming to grow revenue.
Here are six creative concepts that are commonly used in advertising. By incorporating these seven advertising concepts into your campaign, you can appeal to potential buyers and build brand awareness.
Looking to create your own advertising campaign? Connect with a leading ad agency on Clutch.
1. Use Repetition in Your Ad Campaigns
Have you ever noticed that you see the same television ad nearly every commercial break?
Repetition is key in advertising because it keeps a brand’s name or product at the front of a potential customer’s mind.
This is because repetition helps people form long-term memories. When people repeatedly hear about a brand or product, they are more likely to remember the name and buy the product in the future.
Companies can employ repetition by advertising on multiple platforms or repeating the same ad multiple times.
For example, the athletic brand Lululemon advertises on TV, social media, and on other digital platforms such as BuzzFeed.
They use cookies or tags to track users across their devices and build profiles based on their habits or interests. In doing so, they’re able to get their brand name in front of potential buyers more frequently.
This conversion-based funnel tactic is known as retargeting, and it's why if you visit a brand’s website, you are more likely to see an ad for their products or services on Facebook or Instagram.
While some people worry about how cookies impact their privacy, many companies can use them responsibly to help customers find what they’re interested in and serve ads across multiple platforms.
As a result of their repetition, they leave a lasting impression that helps potential customers remember their brand and product offerings.
Additional reading, ‘4 Social Media Retargeting Tactics for More Conversions.’
2. Utilize Different Advertising Mediums
To repeatedly get their brand name in front of customers, many advertisers utilize multiple types of advertising. Consider which combination is the most effective in reaching your target audience.
- Magazine Ads
- Newspaper Ads
Broadcast Advertising
Digital Advertising
- Paid Search Advertising
- Social Media Advertising
- Influencer Advertising
- Display Advertising
- Billboards
- Public Transit
- Conferences
- Pop-Up Shops
- Networking Events
3. Appeal to Emotions
While other persuasive strategies use reason and rationality to sway customers, an emotional appeal is when a brand stimulates their audience’s emotions, whether it's with concern, excitement, happiness, sadness, or any other emotion.
Other ad concepts may use reason by focusing on features or benefits that a product or service provides. At the same time, an emotional appeal seeks to tell a story or create engaging content that resonates with customers.
Appealing to an audience’s emotions is particularly beneficial because it has been proven to increase online engagement and brand loyalty.
For example, consider Toyota’s 2021 Super Bowl ad featuring Paralympic swimmer and 13x gold medalist, Jessica Long.
The ad shows Long swimming past multiple big events in her life.
At the same time, viewers can hear her parents talking to the adoption agency about Long, her background, and her disability. In the end, her mother says, “[Her life] won’t be easy, but it will be extraordinary,” as Long smiles.
The ad played on a surprising emotion for a car company — inspiration. While the ad didn’t even feature a Toyota, it built the brand by focusing on their values.
Rather than wanting customers to buy a Toyota because they have nice trucks, they appealed to customers because of their brand values. As partners of the US Paralympic team, they wanted customers to know that Toyota values hope and strength.
Other companies can create their own emotional ads by:
- Using visuals
- Selecting the proper audio track
- Developing a story
- Use colors that reflect the emotion you want to portray
In doing so, they can portray emotions effectively and leave a lasting impression.
4. Establish a Bandwagon Effect
Have you ever had FOMO — the fear of missing out? A bandwagon effect plays on the desire people have to be a part of a group. By showing that “everybody” has something or wants something, brands can appeal to customers trying to fit in.
They want to jump on board the bandwagon.
For example, people are more likely to buy the last book on the shelf because it appears to be the most popular, and they’re likely to adopt certain fashion trends if they see celebrities wearing them.
Advertisers can utilize the bandwagon effect by:
- Using scarcity tactics to appear desirable
- Starting hashtag campaigns to be more noticeable on social media
- Building credibility for their brand by investing in public relations
- Hiring a celebrity to promote the product or appear in ad campaigns.
As a result, potential customers will be more likely to notice new trends and buy the product or service.
5. Focus on Benefits
Many companies mistakenly focus on features of their products or what’s included in their service when advertising. While this is great information, it isn’t very persuasive. For an ad to be effective, advertisers must explain why they should want to buy it.
For example, consider Expedia’s 2022 Super Bowl ad with Ewan McGregor.
The ad doesn’t touch on how Expedia allows users to search for hotels, flights, rental cars, and excursions all on one site. The ad doesn’t mention that they scan the internet for cheaper prices or that users can save money by booking through their site.
No. Instead, the ad focuses on the primary benefit that Expedia provides — the ability to travel.
They do this by showing McGregor walking by the sets of other Superbowl ads, asking the audience if they are more likely to regret not buying more stuff or not seeing more places.
6. Tell Stories in Your Ads
Stories are a compelling advertising concept because they resonate with a wide range of people. By including stories in advertisements, companies can effectively deliver their message, portray their brand image and values, and build relationships with their customers.
Additionally, stories are easy to remember and can evoke emotions that can persuade potential customers to make a purchase.
To effectively incorporate storytelling in advertisements, companies need to develop a narrative that communicates their message.
While it’s easier to develop a storyline in TV advertisements, other types of ads, such as print ads, make it more difficult to tell an entire story. In just one image and a few short words, advertisers must craft a narrative that people can immediately understand.
Here, the hand sanitizer company, Dettol, was able to illustrate the number of germs that could be sitting on one person’s hand by using all the things the person touched to create a hand.
Source: Bhatnaturally
The design helped develop a story about a kid who touches everything. To eliminate the germs that could be sitting on their hand, they need an effective sanitizer.
7. Be Honest
Honesty and authenticity are probably the most important concepts in advertising, especially as Generation Z comes of age.
By being truthful, companies ensure that they deliver exactly what their customers are looking for — a key concept for building brand trust and customer loyalty.
A great creative ad may be interesting and even sway some customers to make a purchase, but if it’s not based in fact, companies are sure to experience a decrease in credibility. As a result, they’ll see few repeat buyers and experience a significant drop in sales over time.
Even worse than that, they might be sued for false advertising, a type of fraud.
To keep ads honest, companies need to avoid exaggerating the benefits of their products or services and avoid minimizing any downfalls.
For example, an apartment building may want to advertise that it offers the best prices in the city or the most spacious, but it may not be accurate. Instead, they should advertise the cost per square foot and say it’s a great deal.
This helps portray the same message without stretching the truth.
Final Thoughts: Develop Engaging Ads with Creative Advertising Concepts
Nearly every business needs to advertise to attract new customers and grow. However, to be effective, they need to create ads that are interesting, engaging, and persuasive, to encourage their customers to take action.
By using repetition to engrain their brand in customers’ minds and using persuasive strategies such as the bandwagon effect and emotionally appealing, they are more likely to see an impact from their advertising efforts.
These creative concepts are used by advertising agencies globally to appeal to their clients’ customers, increase brand awareness, and grow sales.
Looking to create your own advertising campaign? Connect with a leading ad agency on Clutch.
Frequently Asked Questions
Factual ads highlight a product or the business by focusing on what the product does or how the business operates. For example, companies may discuss awards they’ve won or services they provide in an ad.
In contrast, conceptual ads focus on the benefits associated with the product or service. Often, they rely on an emotional appeal to grab the audience’s attention. By making them smile, laugh, or think more critically about how the product could help them, they are more memorable.
Additional Reading
Hannah Hicklen is a content marketing manager who focuses on creating newsworthy content around tech services, such as software and web development, AI, and cybersecurity. With a background in SEO and editorial content, she now specializes in creating multi-channel marketing strategies that drive engagement, build brand authority, and generate high-quality leads. Hannah leverages data-driven insights and industry trends to craft compelling narratives that resonate with technical and non-technical audiences alike.
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