Conventional wisdom in advertising is that it’s much easier to sell painkillers than it is to sell vitamins–i.e., it’s easier to motivate a suffering prospect with the offer of relief than it is to motivate a basically content prospect with an offer of future betterment. This is especially the case with men, who basically *never* believe anything bad will happen to them–or if they do, simply brush it of with cavalier bluster (“Why stop smoking? Sure, it shortens your life, but it only takes the worst years, amiright?”–which I’ve heard countless times, evidently from men you *haven’t* watched their spouses’ beloved grandfathers slowly suffocate in hospice, smothered by lungs gone brittle with a lifetime of Luckies.)
So, for example, insurance was a really hard product to sell in the ’30s, ’40s, and ’50s–until it dawned on folks not to focus on the prospect, but instead on his family. Tell a man about how his *family* will suffer when he’s gone, and you give him pain in the here and now that will be soothed by purchasing an insurance policy[*]–i.e., you convert vitamins into painkillers.
The genius of this ad is that shifts the vague notion of future pain caused by smoking cigarettes into an immediate discomfort and moral panic. Well played Thai Health Promotion Foundation (those with an interest in marketing–and MAD MEN fans–will note that the ad was produced by Ogilvy & Mather).
[*] I’m sure you won’t be shocked to learn that I have a wife, two young children, and so much goddamn term life insurance that my death certificate amounts to a winning Lotto ticket.