Advertising Technique: Elicit Empathy

Source: Design Taxi

"The distress we see someone experiencing — the compassion we feel for them — isn’t determined by the objective facts on the ground; it’s determined by who’s looking. … It’s not the severity or the objective facts of a disaster that motivate us to feel compassion and to help — it’s whether or not we see ourselves in the victims." - David DeSteno

If facts alone were convincing, the world would look very different.

We'd take global warming seriously.
Hunger would be a thing of the past.
And, cigarettes would not be on the shelf.

Instead, we need stories to be convinced.  We need to feel a connection.

That's why I really like this Equal Pay campaign by Publicis & the International Women's Media Foundation.  

"According to statistics, women’s earnings in the US “were 77% of men’s in 2011”, while in Switzerland, women earned “roughly 20% less than equally skilled men in comparable positions”. 

If this fact really resonated with us, we'd be a lot more vocal.  In reality, progress has stalled.

To bring the stat to life, they launched an "Equal Pay Day" where men received 20% less money when they took out money from an ATM.  They got to actually walk in someone else's shoes for the day. 

See the video below.