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Advertising executives discuss use of Belarusian language

Belarus’ top advertising executives held a discussion in Minsk on Monday to discuss the use of the Belarusian language, BelaPAN reports.

The discussion took place as part of a festival of Belarusian-language advertising that began on May 13 running through until the beginning of July. Belarusian national revival activists had organized the festival called “Adnak!” within the framework of their “Let’s be Belarusians!” campaign.

Aleh Stashewski, CEO of Adventa Initiative Media, said that no profound research had been carried out to assess how the use of different languages could increase the efficiency of advertising.

Nadzeya Zelyankova, development director at Red Graphic, said that clients believe that the Russian language will make their products more recognizable, as a majority of people in Belarus speak Russian.

Customers’ stereotypes are behind the scarce use of the Belarusian language in advertising, said Yan Karpaw, CEO of the Yanka di Ullka advertising firm. “We may talk about the efficiency and effectiveness of Belarusian-language advertising as long as we wish, but we don’t have any facts or documents proving them,” he said. “Advertising firms just can’t be bothered to make their clients to change their mind.”

Alena Makowskaya, a coordinator of “Let’s be Belarusians!” campaign, said that a recent poll suggests that 70 percent of all Belarusians would like commercials to be in the Belarusian language. But it appears that Belarusian advertising agencies are too conservative, choosing to stick to stereotypes instead of advancing the progress and meeting the public’s needs,” she said.

Alyaksandr Vasilevich, CEO of Publicis Hepta, expressed confidence that the Belarusian language could make an advertising campaign more efficient and even add the product a touch of exclusiveness. “Sometimes, the language can boost a brand image when it represents some elite circle,” Mr. Vasilevich said. “If we embark on this path, we will succeed.”