The general public can be a highly malleable lot. So when it comes to smoking, anti smoking advertisements have to be clever, clever enough to make you stop and think. While the die hard smokers may not be swayed the first few times after seeing anti-smoking ads, eventually some of the anti-smoking advertisements start to sink in. After all, smokers know that they are doing something that will eventually kill them. It just takes some gentle, consistent prodding from anti smoking ads to get them to really assess their life and try to make a change.

Anti smoking advertising is a big market. Many different health organizations like the American Cancer Society, the American Heart Association and more use anti smoking advertisements to drive the point home that smoking can cause all sorts of health issues. And while smokers are the intended audience, these organizations create some pretty amazing anti smoking ads that grab the attention of children and non-smokers alike. This is actually a great thing because these effective anti-smoking ads are capturing those kids’ attentions before they fall prey to the draw of cigarettes.

So these anti smoking advertisements are essentially killing two birds with one stone. One such anti smoking ad uses a caricature of the famous Joe Camel. A few years back, kids thought Joe Camel was cool and smoking among teenagers grew. However, the anti-smoking ad posters that came out after that were pretty effective too. These posters depicted Joe Camel in chemotherapy. Now that painted a pretty unglamorous picture, doesn’t it?

There are some anti-smoking ads that are ineffective too. The ones that sound preachy and judgmental are definitely out. Then there are the anti smoking advertisements aimed at parents which urge them to talk with their kids about the dangers of smoking. When kids saw these anti-smoking advertising spots, they were more likely than not to try smoking. The reason is that kids think parents are overprotective fuddy-duddies trying to ruin their fun. Therefore, these kids would smoke cigarettes in spite of the anti smoking advertisements as well as their parents. Kids are impressionable but they balk at being preached at or told what to do. That is why anti smoking advertisements have to be visual and subtle to get past those youth defenses. In addition, to reach the adults, they have to be attention getting and repetitive. Plus, it doesn’t hurt to throw in some anti smoking statistics in the ads either. There is nothing like presenting concrete numbers about smoking to capture the attention.