From: Arlo J. Bensinger (ajb102@psu.edu)
Date: Thu Oct 27 2005 - 02:05:13 BST
[Platt]
Advertising informs the consumer of what's available. If you don't
advertise how does the consumer know your product can add value to her
life?
[Arlo]
If this is all there was to it, a simply picture and the words "this is our
product" would be as effective as Jared or the Energizer Bunny. Do you think
this is so?
At any rate, Wikipedia disagrees with your non-influential diagnosis.
"In general, advertising is used to convey availability of a "product" (which
can be a physical product, a service, or an idea) and to provide information
regarding the product. This can stimulate demand for the product, one of the
main objectives of advertising. More specifically, there are three generic
objectives of advertisements : communicate information about a particular
product, service, or brand (including announcing the existence of the product,
where to purchase it, and how to use it), persuade people to buy the product,
and keep the organization in the public eye (called institutional advertising).
Most advertising blends elements of all three objectives. Typically new
products are supported with informative and persuasive ads, while mature
products use institutional and persuasive ads (sometimes called reminder ads).
Advertising frequently uses persuasive appeals, both logical and emotional
(that is, it is a form of propaganda), sometimes even to the exclusion of any
product information. More specific objectives include increases in short or
long term sales, market share, awareness, product trial, mind share, brand name
recall, product use information, positioning or repositioning, and
organizational image improvement."
The propaganda-similar techniques are futher elaborated in the Wikipedia
article, and include such things as pressure, appeals to emotion, bandwagoning,
and association (including branding) described as "Advertisers often attempt to
associate their product with desirable imagery to make it seem equally
desirable. The use of attractive models, a practice known as sex in
advertising, picturesque landscapes and other alluring images is common. Also
used are "buzzwords" with desired associations. On a large scale, this is
called branding."
Hardly simply "getting the message out", advertising works because of its
manipulative effects. People "value" something greater than they would without
influence because of (false) associations of the product with sex (for
example), pressure techniques or any other technique Wikipedia elaborates.
Advertising is, by definition, manipulating what people "value". How a MOQer can
not only say that is "okay", but "Good!" is beyond my comprehension.
Arlo
PS: Thanks again for the "Arlo wants to eliminate free markets" plug. Although
I'm distressed you forgot to remind people that I want to take away all their
freedoms and send them all off to gulags. Don't forget that next time, eh?
MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
Mail Archives:
Aug '98 - Oct '02 - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
Nov '02 Onward - http://www.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/summary.html
MD Queries -
To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Thu Oct 27 2005 - 02:18:14 BST