A Flash ad that works well. Very well.

I just finished buying some Christmas presents from Amazon and there was one of those Flash video ads that I hate on the confirmation page.

Except that I watched this one quite intently.

It was quite disturbing - a stuffed toy monkey being bashed against the 'walls' of the ad, shaking it; then being throttled and punched repeatedly before being discarded in a heap in a corner. Even (or given the cute factor, perhaps especially) when done to a stuffed toy it made you feel bad.

Then the tagline: "And some people treat their children like this"

It was an ad for the NSPCC: the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. The NSPCC has always run great TV ads that really pack a punch (no pun intended) and now it seems they're translating the concept well to the web. I ignore online ads with ease for the most part these days but this one caught my attention immediately, doing its job perfectly.

I tried searching the NSPCC website for a link to the ad to show it here, but they only have their TV and print ads in their media section. I've just copy-and-pasted the embed code from Amazon instead, so I hope the NSPCC weren't paying per impression (not that this blog will cause many hehe).

If you'd like to donate to the NSPCC, head to their donation form (don't forget Gift Aid!).