Ad campaign with the balls to get men talking

23 February 2016 - 08:24 By Gabi Mbele

Finally - a campaign that has the balls to get men talking about their testicles.New online adverts featuring two hairy testicles being interviewed - with voices by comedians Siv Ngesi and Louw Venter - aim to highlight testicular cancer.The internet commercials, called Testi-monials, were made by ad agency FCB Cape Town for the Cancer Association of SA.Cansa spokesman Lisa Balona said the adverts were a "genius idea" by the agency, which did the two commercials free of charge.They feature realistic-looking testicles - which in some cases sit on a couch - talking about their experiences. Ngesi and Venter's mouths have been superimposed on the testes."We didn't want to put them on television because we didn't want to offend families with children, but felt online it could reach the right market if distributed to the right websites such as Men's Health magazine," Balona said.The two talking testicles belong to Jabu and Darrell, each of whom has only one testicle."I didn't always used to hang out on my own. My whole life, lefty was with me," says Darrell's ball.Jabu's says: "Since the day I was born, we were two, side by side, me on the left and him on the right. The real deal Joe, double trouble, up to no good, having fun."Then one day I saw there was something wrong with my brother, I tried to tell him but he wouldn't listen, he's a stubborn one."According to Cansa, testicular cancer is common in young men aged between 15 and 39 and affects males of all races.But, if monitored properly, the average survival rate after five years is around 95% - stage one cancer cases have essentially a 100% survival rate.Collaborating with Hellocomputer ad agency, a question and answer page was created for men to ask testicle-related questions and get answers.FCB Cape Town creative director Mike Barnwell said the aim was to "find a way to remove the awkwardness around the topic and get the conversation started"."The entire process took around eight months. That's a lot of time to create realistic looking, talking testes. But well worth the effort."And men are talking on social media. Sam Naik described it on Twitter as "the campaign that has the balls to get men talking"...

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