The Labour and Conservative Parties are failing to have the impact they attained in the run-up to the 1997 general election, according to research from the outdoor specialist company Concord.
The recent poster campaigns for both parties have had a much lower recall, scoring an average 41 points out of a possible 100, compared with the 1997 average of 71 points.
Concord has measured the impact score according to the branding, colour/contrast, imagery, clarity of message, involvement and overall impact of each poster execution.
Labour's current campaign, created by TBWA/London, is a very simple poster image using a pair of scissors to replace the 'y' in its tagline: 'Tory Cuts.' At the end of last year the party also ran a series of poster executions thanking voters for their support in 1997. These campaigns combined scored an average impact of 44 points.
The Conservatives' ads by Yellow M, which include the campaign 'You paid the taxes' as well as 'Pen pushers', scored just 38 points.
Comparing the impact of these ad campaigns with the infamous 'demon eyes' ads by M&C Saatchi, Concord found a noticeable shortfall in their impact.
The 1997 poster campaign by the Conservatives averaged 80 points in terms of their impact, while Labour's 1997 ads 'Britain deserves better' and 'Same old Tories, same old lies' by BMP DDB chalked up 61 points.
Nigel Mansell, the managing director of Concord, said: 'The political ads this year just don't have the fizz of previous election years. It's not rocket science. Simple, clear, heavily branded posters that involve an audience will always fare well.'
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