“The
Happiest Place on Earth.” “There’s no Substitute.” “I’m Loving It.” Ordinary
sentences, however behind these ordinary phrases billion dollar corporations have
taken ownership of these slogans. They have spent a great amount of time and
money to come up with a sentence, which they think would entice consumers the
best in order to choose their product over the abundance of alternatives, if
you can afford it that is.
Every year
hundred thousands of dollars are spent on advertising and publicity budgets in
order to create a world where the consumer is the protagonist and as the hero
of this world you really cannot live without their product or brand. In order
to make a profit, one needs to be prepared to invest. In this case the investment
is the numerous research in human behavior, human expenditures and how to link these
two together. Roderick White, writer of many advertising books points out that
an American Advertising agency adheres to the following rules:
Rule 1:
There are no rules
Rule 2:
There may be exceptions to rule 1
But also,
there are 5 general rules:
1. Every ad
should embody a clear, straightforward proposition
2. Say what you
want to say in as few words as possible
3. There is no
place for humor in advertising
4. Give the
consumer credit for some intelligence
5. Be original[1]
Rule 4
clearly points out their perception of the average consumer they wish to target.
In addition David Ogilvy once wrote: “Products, like people, have personalities
which can make or break them in the market place.”[2]
With this in mind companies assign emotional appeal to their products or brand
creating the ultimate emotional selling proposition[3].
They offer their aid in order to ensure that the perception of others on your
role in society is flawless. The perception of reality is easily distorted; the
basic fears, insecurities and inabilities are easily identified which the
companies will gladly take advantage of as their products will complete you and
make you superior to anybody else.
Why should
we pay attention to the ugly truth anyway? If you can choose to look at your
handsome IPhone 5 retina screen or the fact that the phone you are looking at
in question was actually built by teenagers who earn, about 70 cents an hour,
while you paid, let’s say $700-$800 for it. The only party who celebrates this
difference is a small percentage of the world who is cashing in their money
either way.
The surge of
information available these days makes it hard to actually find what you are
looking for. Distraction is all around. Whether by brands and products claiming
that you need them, not to mention the discounts that brings you a step closer
to them, or channels that provide you with information or entertainment, also
called infotainment. One click and you are further removed from your
destination.
While you
had a route planned you actually end up taking side roads, (a cute dress),
alleyways (information on the Boston bombing and becoming an investigative
reporter crosses your mind), high ways, (Washington re-opens peace talks
between Israel and Palestine and you actually think you have the solution), and
even go cross continent (all inclusive holidays to Thailand, you are on the
verge of booking a ticket). It does make your journey more exciting, however
you never seem to reach your destination - and you never made it to Thailand
either. In a matter of minutes a wave of information has been presented to you,
all the while you try to figure out how to avoid paying shipping costs for that
cute dress, you have forgotten what you were looking for in the first place.
The supply
of information on the internet is endless, in fact every two days the amount of
information posted on the internet equals all the information that has ever
been gathered from the start of civilization until 2003. This equals to 5 Exabytes[4].
The below graph indicates how much an Exabyte actually is.
Prefixes
for multiples of
bits (b) or bytes (B) |
|
Figure 1.[5]
In this
sense the Internet is the number one source to gather information. It has
turned people into information junkies. Information junkies like to collect as
much information is possible, whether the information is relevant is not
important. They like to share what they know. Some would consider knowledge is
power. A fierce competition of cerebral data harboring seems to be at hand. They
perpetually munch on data and regurgitate the information while being completely
indifferent of the situation they are in.
In essence
the amount of information you can store in your brain could enhance your role
within society adding to all the new products you have just purchased and
brands you associate yourself with, well equipped to play any role society
deems you worthy to portray. A first impression can have you classified in four
categories,
- without
even having said one word - the clothes you are wearing, the color of your
skin, your hairstyle and the expression on your face. Finally the words that
come out of your mouth can either confirm the classification or inconveniently
confuse the categorization process, also knows as cognitive dissonance.
Whether you
are perfectly fine living in your own warped reality or you are being violently
pulled from your dormant state the reality is that you believe what you want to
believe.
By Julie Ng
[1] Roderick White: Advertising – what it is and how to do
it. McGraw Hill, Maidenhead 1980.
[2] David Ogilvy: Ogilvy on Advertising. Pan Books, London
1983.
[3] Philip Kotler: Marketing Management. Prentice Hall.
[4]
http://techcrunch.com/2010/08/04/schmidt-data/
[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byte
© [Freethinkersclub] [2013]
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No part of this website or any of its contents may be reproduced, copied, modified or adapted, without the prior written consent of the author and blog, unless otherwise indicated for stand-alone materials.
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No part of this website or any of its contents may be reproduced, copied, modified or adapted, without the prior written consent of the author and blog, unless otherwise indicated for stand-alone materials.
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