MGibson, I think the point some of us are trying to make might go like this:
Same backpacking trip …
Guy 1: “I need a new pair of boots these are falling apart.”
Guy 2: “Well I like these boots. They’re comfortable, durable, and water proof. And besides, if you buy this brand of boots supermodels will want to boink you on an hourly basis.”
Guy 1: “Shucks, really? I gots to get me a pair o’ them.”
Guy 2 isn’t being very forthright, is he?
to MGibson:
It would be a bit messy to quote all your stuff, so let me just reply free-form.
What’s the big deal about co-opting music? I suppose it’s a matter of preference. Not only does it often pervert the message of the music (for example, “Lust for life” is not about banks (or whatever it is in that ads)), but it also causes associations to form that I’d rather not be there. If you’re cool with that, then fine. I’m not.
Also, you claim that as a child, and now, ads never made you do something that you wouldn’t want to do anyway. I doubt this is completely true. The purpose of advertisement is to affect your behavior, including making your buy things you ordinarily wouldn’t. Obviously there’s a limit to its powers - if you are 25 years old you aren’t going to buy adult diapers no matter how many ads you see. But if you have a certain chance of buying something, even a tiny chance, ads can raise that chance a fair bit. This is why ads exist. Are you claiming
that it doesn’t work, or that you in particular or somehow immune to it’s effects?
Next, you misunderstand my point about the cost of advertising figuring into the product price. I’m saying if there was no advertising, prices would be lower. Simple enough.
About the SUV’s. I’m not too familiar with truck or SUV commercials that show people using them to do work. Unless their work involves driving over streams a lot. And yes, the companies know and will tell you that if you don’t know what you are doing, duplicating the off-road feats found in commercials is very dangerous and could definitely damage your car.
About the Wendy’s commercial - you may be right, she may be complaining about formed meat - not about dark meat. It wasn’t clear in the commercial, though.
Also, your last post is attacking a straw man. I’m not against people influencing other people. That’s a part of life. I’m saying that advertisement, which is companies paying money to influence people, is wrong. If I tell you something is good, it’s because I think it’s good. There’s an element of truth in there. If the TV tells me something is good, it’s because someone paid money to tell me that. There is no element of truth there anymore.
MG: Again, as a child an ad never made me want something I wasn’t inclined to want in the first place. I never wanted a Barbie but damn those GI Joe’s kicked ass!!
Oh, Marc, Marc, Marc, Marc. Ya fell right into the trap! 
A big part of the reason you weren’t “inclined to want” a Barbie is that they weren’t marketing Barbie to you. I largely agree with you that commercial product advertising is something that we’re for the most part stuck with, but I can’t agree that it’s as neutral and passive a process as you think it is. Believing that your consumer desires ultimately spontaneously originate with you is just what they want you to think! 
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<looks up at ceiling> Khaaaaaaaaaaaaan!! Khaaaaaaaaan!! Ok, I’m all better now.
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I never said they have no affect. I maintain that the did and they continue to affect me. What I’m saying is that they never made me want to buy something I wasn’t inclined to buy in the first place. I’ve seen commercials and thought to myself “Hmmm, I think I’ll give that a try.” So I fully recognize that they influence me. However I really really loved those Budweiser commercials but I never bought Budweiser. Why? Because I don’t care for it.
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I’m claiming that it doesn’t make me do anything. I’m not a mindless zombie who stares at the boob tube and says “Yes, Master” after every ad.
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Perhaps. I am unsure how negligable the price increase due to advertisment is for various products. But I’ll go back to my point that companies might not stay afloat or do as well without advertising. Coca-Cola is a prime example.
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In Texas and Arkansas there are plenty of pickup truck commercials from Ford and Chevy that show them being used for work. That doesn’t include stuff like SUVs though.
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I thought it was plenty clear. But if you didn’t I guess the advertisers didn’t do their job. On the other hand you seem to be a person who is hostile to most forms of advertisments.
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Well, I think you’re wrong. I find nothing wrong with a company trying to influence you to buy from them instead of someone else.
I’m sure the companies who sell their products or service actually believe they’re pretty good.
Marc
I have two primary concerns with advertising.
The first is that is promotes stereotypes and frequently encourges poor self images, particularly in women. This is presently being discussed in the thread Some Women’s Low Self-Image and the Media.
The second is that it marginalizes people who are not in marketable target groups.
Consider, for example, the difference between publicly funded and commercial broadcasting. With commercial broadcasting, the audience is being sold to the advertisers. If your target group collectively has significant disposable income, odds are that you are marketable, and therefore shows will be created for you to watch along with the advertising directed toward you.
If, however, your target group does not have significant disposable income, then you are out of luck in hoping for programming to be geared toward you, for you are not marketable to the advertisers.
Now look at publicly funded broadcasting. No or little advertising means that a wider variety of programming can be offered, for it is not necessary to program for only a limited number of primary target groups.
What does one get from commercial broadcasting? Sitcoms, action dramas, soaps, and shock schlock. What does one get from public broadcasting? “The History of Canada,” “The Story of English,” “Ideas,” “Saturday Night at the Movies,” “The BBC World Service.”
Thanks, but no thanks to commercial broadcasting.
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One of the rarest 12" GI Joe figures is a female nurse from the 60’s or early 70’s. Hasbro tried to sell this product to boys. Boys didn’t want a female nurse to go along with their macho GI Joe with life like hair, beard, and kung-fu grip. In fact from when I was a kid most of the boys didn’t buy Lady J or Scarlett either. I doubt Hasbro could have convinced boys in the 50’s or 60’s to play with Barbie.
Wow, it’s a vast conspiracy and I’m just a poor fool who is at the mercy of the evil capitalist advertisers. That’s it dammit, I’m going Commie. Somebody hand me my hammer and sickle and let’s strike a blow for the people! Remember, better Red then Dead!! Ok, that’s out of my system. We’ll call that a mild psychotic episode and forget all about it.
My consumer desires do originate with me based on what I’m interested in. The things I’m interested in have more to do with my peers and how I was raised then anything I’ve seen on television. Uh, except for Babylon 5 of course, I did see that on TV first. I’ll stick with the hiking boots for now. If you don’t hike then you’ll never be interseted in hiking boots. No amount of advertising is going to get you to spend 200 dollars on a pair of boots if you don’t want the boots.
Marc
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People actually watch/listen to commecial broadcasting. That was the difference, right?
I can’t say I really understand your point. Most people don’t want to watch the History of Canada or the Story of the English. I might enjoy those programs but it doesn’t appear that most Americans do. And since commercial broadcasters are in the business of making money they’re going to do that the best way they can. And while public broadcasting has some decent shows they’re not all good. Some of them are boring.
Marc
Aside from the sheer pervasiveness of advertising and the manufacturing of previously unrealized “needs”, advertising also promotes a very shallow viewpoint of potentially serious issues. As an example, I’ve heard or seen over the last year or so, many ads in which Philip Morris touts the money and effort they put forth for charities. It’s great that they do give so readily to charity, but the cynic in me tends to see it as nothing more than an exercise in manipulation, as it comes from the same people who sit in various courtrooms insisting that any evidence that smoking is seriously detrimental to one’s physical health is purely coincidental. Helping charity can be a great thing, but it doesn’t erase the less savory actions of the charitable, although Philip Morris would certainly like consumers to see it as such. The world of advertising is one in which the rhetoric is an inch deep and endlessly wide.
So much effort is spent in advertising selling not a product, but a supposed better life. McDonalds doesn’t love to see me smile, they love to see me buy Big Macs, but their commercials will insist that when I need the warmth of wholesome food and community, McDonalds is where I’ll find it.
And don’t even get me started on that car commercial that was on a year or so ago which ended with the singsong taunt of “I’m better than you are”. What does that have to do with selling a car? That’s not information to use in order to make an informed purchase, but rather a blatant ploy pandering to my insecurities.
Some books on advertising which I’ve found to be interesting: “Coercion: Why We Listen to What They Say” by Douglass Rushkoff, and “The Sponsored Life” by Leslie Savan.
While not condoning fraud, I find it interesting that so many people seem to have issues with the fact that corporations and marketing gurus work hard to present their products in the best possible light. We all do it in our personal lives, why should we be surprised or disappointed when someone else does it? I doubt that any of us have ever shown up to an interview for a job (one which we wanted to get, at least) bleary-eyed, unshaven and smelling slightly musty from that four day bender we finished the night before. Just so, the company or marketer isn’t exactly going to set the world on fire with a commercial for a car that says “Well,we’re not as good as Mercedes Benz/Cadillac/Audi/Toyota/whatever, but since you can’t afford them, might as well buy ours.”
Hey, maybe it would work, in a cynical and satirical attempt to capitalize on the anti-marketing sentiment, but even the people who admire honesty above all else are going to think twice before making that purchase.
There’s no question that the majority of advertising out there sucks rocks. They have to play to the lowest common demoninator to appeal to (hopefully) the broadest possible segment of the market. I don’t feel that commercial advertising has gotten worse as time goes by. I actually think that the quality has gotten much better over the admittedly few commercials I can remember from the Seventies and Eighties. (Anyone remember the Maxwell House coffee ad from the early Sixties that ended with a close up of a homemaker and the voice over of “… a good Maxwell House-wife,”?) There are a lot of commercials out there that simply drive me right up the wall, but that makes me dislike the individual commercials, not “marketing”. Obviously, they work for someone, and that’s the job of marketing. Like Purd Werfect I abhorred that car commercial that taunted “I’m better than you are.” But that caused em to be annoyed with that individual commercial (and perhaps the idiots who initially came up with the idea), not the idea of marketing. It’s nice when the commercial is socially responsible, artistic and intellectually stimulating as well, but it doesn’t mean it’s invalid if it’s not.
Getting upset at ad agency people for pandering to the lowest common denominator is like getting mad at the Pop for being dogmatic. It’s their job.
As far as the corporate sponsorship of sports stadiums and the like, I think the key here is the idea of the Golden Rule. “He who has the gold makes the rules.” As mentioned delphica, it would be wonderful if the corporate sponsors would decide to keep the traditional name for the sports venue. I too would be much more inclined to purchased their product if I knew thay had done such a thing. However, the corporate sponsors have laid down a significant chunk of change in most of these cases and it’s difficult to envision them exchanging the sure thing of having their corporate name mentioned each time the scores are announced on Sports Center for a rather hit or miss hope that their prospective customers would caught the initial press release. Additionally, I’m all in favor of corporate sponsorship, at least for new stadiums and venues. Each dollar they contribute is one dollar less that will be raised by public money. Although, even that has its limits for me. This weekend I saw the “Weetabix Womens’ British Open” and that, to my reverent hacker/duffer/golfer soul, is just wrong.
Actually, I find TLC and the History Channel better options for educational programming. And Bravo, AMC, and TCM better for critically acclaimed movies. And CNN and MSNBC better for news.
In any event, more people want to watch commercial broadcasting. Or are you advocating that perhaps we should just tell everyone what they ought to watch?
I think I see the problem here, you object to advertisers “making” you buy products you don’t need through advertising, and would prefer the government to make all the decisions for us. That way, we can be free!
So, rather than allow people to decide for themselves if Philip Morris’s charitable actions make them a better company to purchase cigarettes from, you’d just declare your judgement on the matter supreme? Perhaps for me, their charitable action makes me more willing to give them money to support my (hypothetical) addiction instead of Brown & Williamson. Perhaps that market pressure will drive R.J. Reynolds to seek the socially concious dollar as well.
How many people go to McDonald’s solely because they honestly believe that the corporate executives actually want to see them smile? Several of you people seem to think that other people can’t distinguish between an advertisement and a solemn promise. Never yourselves, just other people who don’t know better.
Let’s look at the benefits of advertisements. Take Volvo, for example. For many years, they were widely regarded as uncommonly safe cars. This undoubtedly made their cars more expensive. Why did they spend the money? Because they could use the high safety ratings of their cars to advertise and appeal to those who wanted to spend the extra money on safety.
If they were unable to advertise this fact, it would not have been worth the extra money to appeal to those few people who read consumer journals.
Hell, even in cigarette advertising this principle applied. Years ago, the tobacco companies could advertise their products as being less unhealthy than others, leading to honest attempts to make healthier cigarettes. Then the government prohibited them from making such claims, and the tobacco companies had no incentive to do anything to make cigarettes healthier.
If companies cannot extol the virtues of their products, why would they bother improving their products? A free market depends on a vast interchange of information, much of which is done through prices, but a decent amount is also done through advertising.
waterj2, you’re saying that the only reason for a company to make good products is so that they can say on a commercial that they have good products? Huh? Wouldn’t it simply be cheaper to say in your commercials that your mediocre product is excellent? (Hey, wait a minute…)
In fact, some companies actually make quality products and word of mouth is more than sufficient to keep them going. Other companies (e.g. Nike) rely on advertising to compensate for their shoddy products. As you said, people don’t just blindly believe what the commercials say.
OK, I need to elaborate on my last sentence. I edited that paragraph before I posted, and now it makes no sense.
That last sentence “People don’t blindly believe ads” was intended to tie into the fact that simply stating the excellence of one’s products doesn’t make a difference by itself. Instead, companies have to barrage you with that statement until it’s irrelevant how good the products actually are, because you subconsciously associate the word “shoes” with the word “Nike” and images of famous athletes. Very different from Nike simply extolling the virtues of its products. (“Sweatshop fresh!”)
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In the short term, maybe. But if you get a crummy product are you going to buy from that company again? Probably not. It is in the company’s best interest to make sure their products are worth the price. Of course who determins that? The customer of course.
I wear Nike walking shoes on a regular basis. They are reasonably priced and I can almost always find my size when I’m shopping for my size 14. They last me at least 1 year of some fairy heavy use.
Marc
If you’ve ever noticed, often commercials make specific claims about the quality of their products. If they simply lie, they can easily be prosecuted for fraud, thus you can generally believe the content of commercials to be honest when it comes to facts that could be proved.
Advertising is not the only way to inform the public of the quality of one’s product, nor is it the only reason companies innovate. However, it does disseminate information and encourage innovation.
I don’t agree with your first sentence. Commercials almost never focus on specific, provable facts about their products. Instead, commercials are aimed at creating an image which usually has little or no relevance to the reality of consuming the products advertised. Soda, cars, shoes, perfume, fast food, beer – what specific claims are they making? If we were to prove that they were a lie (e.g. I’ve never, ever met an employee at McDonald’s who was even a tenth as polite as all the employees in the commercials), do you really think they would ever be prosecuted for fraud?
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Thanks for clarifying. I don’t agree with the “encourage innovation” part, but it makes more sense than the “drives innovation” statement I thought you were making earlier.
[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by waterj2 *
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I should have been clearer in my statements, water. It’s true I’m passing judgement on Philip Morris’ advertising, but I don’t presume that my statement is the final word for anyone beside myself. If market pressure by one tobacco seller causes another to become more charitable, then that’s to the better. But I personally question the motives behind it. This same company which gives so generously also regularly lies about the effects of one of its main products. I myself do not see the good that the company does with one hand excusing the harm that they do with the other, and I feel that the main reasoning behind their charitable acts is to dissuade the public from looking to long at what they do in other instances. In my view, they act from a point of fundamental dishonesty. Does that mean I want that charity to end? Not at all. To those who receive help, the motive behind it is often irrelevant. I also don’t feel that the fault lies solely with the tobacco companies. If folks didn’t buy the products, then this discussion wouldn’t be happening.
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Here you are reading something into my statement which I did not say. It’s not my belief that the rest of the world is being fooled while I myself see clearly through the ploy. Just about everyone I’ve ever talked with about the subject of advertising takes it with a large grain of salt. But, and this is personal opinion here, I feel that even when one is consciously aware of the manipulations of advertising, the sheer volume of lifestyle messages and the seemingly endless repetition of same cause them to eventually sink into one’s subconscious and have an affect on one’s life and perception, and yes, that includes me just as much as anyone else.
I admit this subject is one which causes my knee to jerk in response, and my posts on the subject are a bit obsessive in nature,but hopefully this post explains my position better.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again Consumer or consumed your life is cheap
NP - Carcass - Keep on Rotting in the Free World
As an aside, can I just confirm that this is an urban myth. There is no company or business of that name registered in Australia. I just checked.
There was a company in Brisbane called “Closing Down Sale - Last Days Pty Ltd” for a while. Naturally they displayed their company name in large letters outside their shop.
We now have a watchdog called the ACCC that takes great delight in bodyslamming companies that try this sort of “misleading and deceptive conduct” these days.
Right, carry on…
Well this is all really good in theory, but can I just say:
McDonalds.
I dare you to say that their burgers are actually any good, or cheap. But their advertising is just so relentless that they are nonetheless successful. As a matter of my personal ethics I think fools and their money are easily parted and are not my concern. But as a matter of fact, I don’t think your reasoning is correct.
My reasoning is correct though I won’t say that it is 100% accurate. Harley Davidson motorcycles survived for years on customer loyalty even thought they made some truly crummy products. However I will state that I do like the taste of McDonald’s food and I do believe they are fairly inexpensive. For about five dollars I can quickly get a burger, fries, and a drink for lunch.
Please explain to me how I am a fool for eating under the Golden Arches. Do you find it ridiculously absurd that anyone could possible like the taste of fast food?
Marc