Selling the Spectacle
Advertising as a Show
It was in late 19th-century Paris that the colour advertising poster really took off. And for the 19th-century Parisian artist, to create an advertising poster was to put on a show.
Commercial art was a unique and creative challenge and the artist’s job was to stop the public in their tracks. Where paintings shown at a salon or an exhibition had to adhere to accepted ideas about art, the advertising poster gave the artist a new medium to express themselves. Advances in printing meant artists could draw freely on a lithographic plate and then use colour to bring emotion, atmosphere and impact to their work. So, the poster allowed the artist to speak directly to the public for the first time, to do so with the full force of their personality and to make a name for themselves while doing it.
The spiritual home of these artists was Montmartre. The cabarets, cafés and shows attracted the singers, dancers and musicians of the time, and the clubs and performers were among the first to embrace the poster to advertise their shows. Alert to the opportunity, manufacturers would, of course, quickly follow suit.
And so, in the 1880s and 1890s, the poster spilled on to the street with colour, motion and mischief. Luminous lithographs decorated the streets from Montmartre to Montparnasse: expressive, alive and of the moment. These posters were the TikTok of their day, and their artists were its influencers.
They entertained. They provoked. They put on a spectacle.
From Poster to Platform
Spectacle is needed because it creates fame. And fame drives growth.
Today, 130 years on, we find ourselves in a media landscape of fleeting glances and rapid impressions. Attention is short. Viewers scroll through vast amounts of content in seconds.
Yet, I suspect that a passer-by in Belle Époque Paris gave little more time to a Cappiello poster in the street in 1911, than we might to a TikTok swipe today.
And so, the advertising task now – just as it was then – is to be more arresting, more interesting and more entertaining than anything that surrounds you.
That means embracing art and the show.
Embracing the spectacle.
The Left Brain Drift
But in many corners of the industry, something has gone awry.
Where once advertising put on a show, it now seeks the direct sale.
In the clamour towards efficiency and short-term metrics, advertising has shrunk in form and stature from something that was once culturally admired to something that is now to be avoided. And in the pursuit of certainty, the spectacle has been reduced to a sales pitch.
This is part of what I call left-brain drift. It has been brought about in part by the ability of advertising technology to target and monitor short-term response to advertisers’ sales nudges. And so, the dominance of the direct, the literal, the mechanical – the dominance of salesmanship.
And so many advertisers today are not seeking spectacle but are instead allocating the lion’s share of their marketing budgets to modern-day classified advertising.
We’re not raising the curtain on showmanship; we’re bringing the curtain down on it.
Right Brain Restoration
In my new course (Advertising Principles Explained), I interview Dr. Iain McGilchrist. His research into attention offers a lens through which to view this creative decline – and to find our way back from it.
Showmanship advertising exists to capture the broad-beam attention of the brain’s right hemisphere. The right hemisphere, Iain explains, brings a kind of broad-beam attention to bear on the world. It is interested in the living, in social context, in novelty, it appreciates metaphor, humour and music, and is much better attuned to the expression and understanding of emotion. In our research, we’ve repeatedly shown how advertising that plays to these things achieves more: greater attention, greater emotion and greater memory. It creates fame and so inserts you into culture. It establishes immediate returns, and because it leaves such a strong impression, it also continues to work long into the future.
Salesmanship advertising – what is often described today as ‘performance’ advertising – is by contrast, a one-trick pony. Salesmanship’s role is to direct the goal-orientated attention of the left hemisphere. It nudges the interest of the already half-interested, helping to drive conversion, but it fails to do any of the other hugely important things that Showmanship achieves and that make Salesmanship work harder. A swing towards this school of advertising has resulted in a flattening of advertising, stripping it of nuance, of richness and life, but also its ability to drive profit and growth.
What Great Posters Can Teach Us
Showmanship gives you a way to grow when everyone else is stuck in a Salesmanship rut.
Looking at those early colour posters can tell us a great deal about the kind of showmanship that still works today. What danced on the walls of Paris in the late 19th Century is still what makes an impact in our time:
- People and the living form
- Expressivity and movement
- ‘Gestalt’, simplicity and beauty
- Contrast and juxtaposition
- Colour for emotion and impact
And we now know that the same kind of showmanship that worked in those early posters is also driving effectiveness today on TikTok.
System1’s research with TikTok, led by Andrew Tindall and Josh Fruttiger, reveals the ability of ‘Salesmanship’ and ‘Showmanship’ advertising on TikTok to drive different kinds of business outcome. Salesmanship drives conversion, but little else. Showmanship advertising also drives immediate sales, but it drives salience and image improvements too. It’s more memorable and longer lasting. And we see the same pattern of results in creator content too.
Art and the show open people up to possibility, they draw your audience towards you.
Both schools of advertising are important, but we mustn’t forget that showmanship is the master and salesmanship is the servant.
A New Creative Revolution
So, after 20-year dalliance with digital directness, I think it is now high-time for another creative revolution.
Yorkshire Tea, Specsavers, Aldi, Twix, Snickers and McDonald’s are all putting on a splendid show. These brands are using Showmanship advertising to get noticed, remembered, liked and bought.
McDonald’s “Raise Your Arches” campaign captures attention through character and music, and projects all-important personality. Yorkshire Tea’s “Where Everything is Done Proper” campaign has achieved standout performance on spontaneous awareness and many years of consistent market share growth.
This is what showmanship can do for you. This is what marketing can achieve. And this is what your shareholders will thank you for.
Be Part of the Next Creative Revolution
Can your team articulate the difference between Showmanship and Salesmanship? Can they describe the outcomes associated with each? Can they articulate Showmanship’s creative principles? If they can’t, how can they brief, judge or sell Showmanship into your business?
And that spells curtains for your show.
So, if you’d like to create advertising that moves, if you want to create some Showmanship of your own, then consider this your invitation.
Check out my advertising effectiveness course with Sir John Hegarty, which sets out the principles helpful for growth. The name of the course is Advertising Principles Explained. Or a.p.e., as we like to call it.
Bookings for the next cohort are open now, starting on 22nd September 2025.
You can sign up below. I hope to see you there.
#A.P.E. or Die