Wajih Halawa wants government agencies to wise up about their ad spend.
Navigating the streets of Amman, I'm treated on a daily basis to adequate amounts of billboard baloney assaulting my eyesight. Aside from the elevated accident risk resulting from the quality of entertainment provided by these outdoor ads, I'd say that driving in Amman can be relatively fun overall.
The latest campaign by the Department of Customs (DoC) is a perfect example. It seems our friends at the DoC are taking a cue from all kinds of "snazzy" marketing campaigns, and with their PR image being perpetually washed up thanks to the ever confusing combination of customs duties and taxes consistently draining our pockets it appears to make sense that this government institution has a need to justify its existence and practices to the nation.
Sadly, though, the DoC has taken to the billboards and newspapers with a series of laughable ads aimed at the Jordanian public and carrying various "because" that aim to explain why we pay so much in customs duties, perhaps naively thinking the people are gullible enough to accept these raisons detre without question.
In the first of these ads, a pile of manufactured goods appear with the tag line: "So our products can be competitive." Yes, we make you pay 30% of the cost of a product that we can make ourselves so you can pay a similar amount for the locally made product, even if its quality is not quite up to par. To top it off, you get slapped with sales taxes that seem to be going up an upward slope, and you end up paying almost 50% of the item's price just to gain the right to possess this item within the Kingdom.
A second ad goes even further in preposterousness, with the image of a massive safe watermarked with a Jordanian flag and proclaiming: "To support the Treasury." Although I consider myself a patriot of my country, I find it a shameful waste to see my hard-earned income flowing into the coffers of bureaucratic government agencies that put them to poor use in the first place, waste my time when I try to process my paperwork, and add insult to injury by finding ever more creative ways to subject anything I try to bring into the country, no matter how mundane, to all kinds of duties, taxes, storage costs, processing fees, and a whole bevy of other payments.
Here's another botched campaign that just breaks my heart: the Ministry of Culture's laudably aggressive yet consequentially ineffective attempt at encouraging the pervasion of "culture" in our society through several television spots showcasing the importance of reading, folk music and dancing, local luminaries, and historic monuments.
Being a journalist and a fan of reading, I am wholeheartedly supportive of well-planned strategies that can measurably encourage some form of self-improvement beyond the school environment. However, I have a huge problem with this campaign as well, because it does not seem to go beyond flashy TV footage, a suitable accompanying jingle, and a colorful slogan that simply acts as proof that the ministry in question "conducted a campaign to encourage reading and culture in all fields of Jordanian society."
To simply excuse these kinds of travesties as the usual missteps of bureaucratic government agencies is sad and unacceptable. In the same way that the public have a duty to "support the treasury," there is an accompanying responsibility for the government to be a good custodian of these funds, and to spend them appropriately. It's bad enough that money is lacking for all kinds of government-related functions; there is no need to waste it on ineffective, poorly thought-out PR campaigns which simple allow someone to take credit for effort.
Besides, and in spite of all its misgivings, we do have some excellent people working in the public today though they may not be given the chance to contribute their ideas and excel. The government is spending more time and funds on training and development, and part of this should include promoting an understanding of effective marketing tools and measurement of their results. Why go to all this trouble, you may ask? Because, at the end of the day, it's worth it to go the extra mile and get things right. You might be benefiting on the other side, too.
© Jordan Business 2006
