Blog #8 Creative methods in today's advertisements

The average American is exposed to around three hundred advertisements every day.  Half of the time we do not even realize we are seeing these ads.  Advertisers have become desperate and are placing advertisements everywhere that they can from the backs of cereal boxes, before YouTube movies, and even on HD computers at the checkouts in stores.  If advertisers want to keep the consumer intrigued and interested in their products they need to be constantly innovating and making their advertisements more and more creative.  In this day in age consumers are always expecting something new and exciting, and marketers are expected to provide those ads.

            One way that advertisers are keeping up with the people today is using sex in advertisements, I feel like I have concentrated on this a lot but it’s too big to ignore.  Think about how many perfume, clothes, make-up, and even lotion advertisements don’t make you feel sexy after seeing them? Some advertisers have even gone so far to incorporate sex in an ad that has absolutely nothing to do with sex.  Dentine Ice gum company shows ads for their product and in the end many people end up kissing and falling in love, just from a simple piece of gum. It is incredibly unrealistic.  

Dentine Ice Gum Commerical  

            Another creative technique advertisers use is a constant visual symbol.  This visual symbol appears in all their ads whether is be a commercial, newspaper, or magazine advertisement.  These visual symbols often create an association for consumers to think of when they hear that company’s name.  This is a simple yet very effective technique to get consumers to remember their company and the different products that that company can offer to its consumers.  Along with creating that memory in consumer’s heads it also creates a way to generate new consumers.  Every time a person see’s an ad with this visual symbol they notice it and the more they see this symbol the more they will remember it and soon associate it with the company.  Many companies are famous for this.  Geico has the talking lizard that almost every person recognizes as the “Geico Lizard”.  Progressive Insurance has their spokes women Flo who notoriously sells people the best deal they can get when using Progressive Insurance versus another company.  The General Auto Insurance has the man “The general” dressed up as a military general who is always also saving people money on thegeneral.com.  Even clothes companies have small logos that are meant to be discreet yet everyone knows what it means.  On all Hollister clothes they have the red seagull in a viable location, Lacoste has an alligator in the same place, Abercrombie and Fitch has a moose, and Aerepostale has a butterfly. Just by simple looking at a plain white t-shirt someone is wearing, by what animal you see on his or her shirt you can tell exactly what company that shirt is from.  Many people buy plain white t-shirts, that are often more expensive, just because of the dime sized logo on the shirt.  It is a way for a consumer to show off the brand.  

Geico Commercial  

Notice the Moose Logo on this Abercrombie Shirt

 

 

Notice the Alligator logo on all these Lacoste Shirts

            One of probably the biggest creative trends today in advertisements is celebrity endorsing.  So many people in our society today are obsessed with Hollywood and all the famous people that come along with it.  Cover girl is famous for using up and coming country singer Taylor Swift to wear their make-up and say that she wears it in their telavision ads.  Weight Watchers is famous for using newly smaller Jennifer Hudson in their ads to promote weight loss.  People see how much weight she lost and they assume since she is on the Weight Watchers ad she lost all that weight with Weight Watchers and many people join in the hopes that they will look like her. The same goes for the makeup ads that have Taylor Swift, and even Queen Latifa to endorse their line for African Americans.  Advertisers will always continue to get the newest celebrities to endorse their products in the hopes that most consumers will want to use their products.   

Taylor Swift Cover Girl Commercial 

Queen Latifa Cover Girl Magazine Advertisement

 

Excellent Video showing Creative Techinques in Adversting  

 Sources:

http://www.adcracker.com/techniques/Advertising_Techniques.htm 

www.google.com/images

www.youtube.com

http://justcreativedesign.com/2008/07/30/192-of-the-best-smart-clever-creative-advertisements/ 

http://buzzmarketing.com/2010/11/26/advertising-techniques/  

Blog #7 Legalities in Pharmaceutical Advertising

According to the movie "Big Bucks, Big Pharma." experts are saying that pharmaceutical companies are “Marketing disease and pushing prescription drugs”.  This statement becomes very true if you take the time to sit down and watch television for about twenty minutes. You will see countless commercials for prescriptions that you have often never heard of, drugs that are guaranteed to fix a disease that you have never heard of. In today's day in age consumers are exposed to anywhere from three to four-hundred ad’s a day and around half of those are for medications and medical institutions, and they are often portraying the image that everyone has a problem and they are all easily cured with a simple pill.  The Pharmaceutical companies are marketing things that can often help people immensely, but also harm them just as bad. 

Marketers in this field use branding to catch the consumers attention to their products.  Branding can be defined as an emotional relationship between consumers and the product.  These marketers are purposely making consumers feel “attached” to these drugs, like they will not live a normal and healthy life without them.  Along with branding marketers also use something called a “me-too drug”.  Me-too drugs are drugs that are marketed to a large group of people on a global scale.  A perfect example of a me-too drug is Lipitor.  Lipitor is a drug made for lowering cholesterol.  Many senior citizens watch their cholesterol intake to avoid having heart problems are they age.  The Lipitor commercials often show an older aged man or women who is living a life where they do not look happy or content with their health, and as soon as they start taking Lipitor they immediately are outside smiling, in love, and finding new hobbies. This is a very untrue depiction of what a drug can really do to help someone’s health.  By changing what “high cholesterol means, you increase the profit from cholesterol lowering drugs.  When marketers make people look like their lives have immensely changed just from this medication more and more people will begin to think they need cholesterol-lowering drugs so they too can have an improved life. Notice in the link below of a Lipitor ad.  This man is now able to ride bikes by beautiful rivers with his family, his wife touches him and appears to love him more, and he appears to be having more fun in life just because of taking Lipitor.  

 Lipitor Commerical

            The Federal Drug Administration (FDA) is responsible for approving all drugs before they hit the market, including stating all the warnings that each drug has.  According to the FDA they have no control what so ever over what is being advertised in the prescription drug world.  They also do not have to approve any ads with prescription drugs in them including the drug ads that have serious risks, including heart attack and strokes.  The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is in charge of all drug advertisements, to me this is obscene.  The FDA should be the ones in charge of drug ads, after all they are the ones who approve all drugs and know the risks the comes along with each drug.

            In  1985 the FDA attempted to get involved with the drug advertisements by presenting a ruling stating that all ads must state all the risks that go along with taking these medications. These warnings were often several pages long, which is too long to state in a commercial.  In 2002, after much delegation, the Secretary of Health and Human Services approved this ruling.  The ruling was edited however, stating that they did not have to state all the warnings but just the ones that seemed most important.  Marketers took this clearly with a grain of salt.  All drug commercials that air today all have warnings attached at the end and often said so fast that no one with normal hearing could ever understand.  The safety of prescription drugs is almost always misrepresented.  They usually state all the side effects and risks at the very end of the ad, when people tend to tune out of the advertisement that they were watching.  Birth control advertisements are notorious for doing this because taking birth control comes with many risks that consumers often do not know because they are not often properly informed because of how fast the warnings are stated.  

YAZ birth control commercial

            In magazine advertisements the risks and side effects are often printed at the very bottom of the page in extremely small type that you almost need a magnifying glass to read.  People often try to pose cases against the pharmaceutical companies saying they were never told the drug they were taking would have this effect on them, they often can not create a case because they are stated, just not in an easy way to hear.  

Notice how hard the warnings are to read!

             Although these companies often misrepresent the risks, side effects, drug outcomes, and lifestyles people are still buying more and more prescription drugs. The United States spent $234.1 billion on prescription drugs was $234.1 in 2008, which was nearly 6 times of the $40.3 billion the United States spent in 1990.  So the big question is why fight this industry when we are making $235 billion dollars in just one year? This industry makes a lot of money for our country and many other countries around the world.  This will continue to be a controversial industry for many more years, but as long as our country is making money, chances are not many changes will be made.  

Sources:

www.kff.org/rxdrugs/upload/3057-08.pdf

http://www.pharmaphorum.com/2010/09/17/a-history-of-the-pharmaceutical-industry/  

http://prescriptiondrugs.procon.org/ 

www.fda.gov 

www.youtube.com 

www.google.com/images 

  

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/01/080103161527.htm

http://www.naturalhealthstrategies.com/big-bucks-big-pharma.html 

Blog #6 Ethics in Advertising

Ethics in advertising can be described as that fine line between wrong and right. Many advertisers today straddle that line, and risk what is “acceptable”.  One of the biggest unwritten rules in advertising is, never intend to directly deceive.  To me this is surprising because almost every ad has some sort of deceiving concept to them. As an example, I bought Crest Vivid White toothpaste because it said you were guaranteed visibly whiter teeth in just one week. Who doesn’t want white teeth in a week just from reasonably priced toothpaste? I used the toothpaste and after a week I did not notice a difference, so I waited two weeks and still no difference. I eventually used to whole tube of toothpaste and my teeth were not any visibly whiter.  I soon realized that my teeth were probably not getting whiter because I drink a large amount of dark coffee everyday, which yellows my teeth.  I was upset because this toothpaste guaranteed I would have whiter teeth and I did not, I would have known this if the toothpaste said that It would vary from one person to another depending on their eating, grooming, and smoking habits. Untimely the marketers assumed that as consumers we would already know this, but the truth is if our teeth are yellow we are using this toothpaste to get them whiter, and it doesn’t work unless you stop your bad habits that yellow your teeth.

Another unwritten rule in the ethics of advertising is to not use lust, greed, or anything else that does not respect each and every human being. I laughed when I read this because I think almost every beauty product geared towards both men and women contain lust.  In a commercial for Brittney Spears new perfume there is a small scene of her in bed with a man and it looks intense, you hardly see the mans face but you see hers.  This is a perfect example of lust, you won’t buy this perfume because you are honestly in “love” with Brittney spears but you rather lust, or want, what the ad represents which is sex and happiness.  In another commercial made by Axe for men shower products a man washes in the Axe body wash and when he walks outside millions of girls in bikinis come running to him because of the Axe he used. These girls are in tiny string bikinis with model-like bodies that do not depict the average women.  Men do not want this because they are in “love” with these women but because they lust for them, they want the feeling that flawless women in string bikinis will come running to them if they use this product.  This is a perfect example of how unrealistic advertisers are getting, and along with being extremely unrealistic they are becoming so desperate to sell their products that they do not care how they depict women and men in their ads. 

 Brittney Spears Curious Commerical 

Axe Commercial  

Throughout history there have been many accounts of companies falsely advertising their products. In 1921 Listerine advertised that it was a cure for bad breath, dandruff, coughs, sore throats, a cut protectant and an after shave gel.  They were slapped with many lawsuits and fines against them and were forced to spend ten million dollars in re-advertising their product.  In 1996 Amoco released an as saying that because their gasoline was clear in color that it had superior performance and was environmentally friendly.  They were also slapped with fines and forced to re-advertise.   

 

 

Although there is an unwritten code of rules in advertising that will never stop the advertisers from falsely portraying people, giving people the wrong ideas, and simple claiming things that their products do not do.  In my opinion there needs to be laws set in stone against ad's like these because they are unrealistic and degrading, and it will only get worse.  

Sources:

http://www.carroll.edu/msmillie/busethics/ethadvertising.htm 

http://www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/17036 

www.youtube.com 

Blog #5 Advertising and women

I’ve always had the opinion that advertisements towards women have been degrading.  When the typical girl flips through a magazine she will se countless make-up ads that show flawless faces’ that are incredibly unrealistic.  As she turns the page she will see a swimsuit ad that has a women who appears to be seven feet tall, weigh barely on-hundred pounds, with flawless skin, and hair that every girl dreams of having.  The marketers of these advertisements have only one thing in mind; to sell products, they don’t even consider what these pictures are doing to the young, and normal girls’ minds as they flip through their “Seventeen” magazine. 

This was an ad in "Seventeen Magizine" in the may/april issue last year.

            An extremely good example of a commercial that is incredibly unrealistic towards what perfume should be about. The commercial is Beyonce’s commercial for “Heat Perfume”.  In this commercial she walks out in a racy red dress that shows cleavage and barely covers her hips. In the commercial she sings a love song and walks around in her small dress. At the very end she says, “Feel the heat”, and that’s it. Then a small image of a perfume bottle appears in the screen and a sexy male voice repeats what she says, and it’s over.  They barely even show the perfume! So to a thirteen year old girl who sees this on T.V. she now thinks that if she wears the perfume she will look and feel like that, because she feels like she can trust Beyonce, because many girls look up to her successful career and good reputation. 

            

Beyonce's "Heat" commercial 

Chanel perfume ad in cosmopolitan magizine

            

            One company that almost every person has heard of, Playboy, has become a national phenomenon.  They not only have a mansion to live in but, a magazine, a website, reality TV shows, movies, restaurants, hotels, and their one line of clothing.  It’s sad to me that a business that is represents naked pictures of women, porn, and an old man with three girlfriends can be this successful.  The popular television show “The girls next door” has attracted over millions of viewers, in different parts of the world.  This show was about life at the playboy mansion making it look fun to be in a bikini, pose naked, and always be with men look like the cultural norm.  A current article in Cosmopolitan magazine told us some shocking things that we would never have seen on the popular television series.  An ex-playboy bunny spoke to interviewers at Cosmopolitan and told them about life in the mansion, she mentions that they could be kicked out at anytime, were spied on, have a 9pm curfew, and could not gain more then a pound.  They were also highly recommended to be on birth control.  This television shows none of this, and makes many young girls want to be a playboy bunny.  

Hugh Herfner, the founder of Playboy, with his four girlfriends.

            Although brands like playboy are exploiting women, it would be mean to say that all women’s companies are like this. There is one company that is constantly on television and in magazines showing their “Campaign for real beauty”.  Dove, the company known for selling decently priced beauty products has made it their mission for the last two years now to raise women’s self-esteem as stated on their website:   

               “The Dove^® brand is rooted in listening to women. Based on the findings of a major global study, The Real Truth About Beauty: A Global Report, Dove^® launched the Campaign for Real Beauty in 2004. The campaign started a global conversation about the need for a wider definition of beauty after the study proved the hypothesis that the definition of beauty had become limiting and unattainable. Among the study’s findings was the statistic that only 2% of women around the world would describe themselves as beautiful. Since 2004, Dove^® has employed various communications vehicles to challenge beauty stereotypes and invite women to join a discussion about beauty.  In 2010, Dove^® evolved the campaign and launched an unprecedented effort to make beauty a source of confidence, not anxiety, with the Dove^® Movement for Self-Esteem.” 

In their advertisements they have pictures of women who are the average looking women in all colors and sizes.  These women look happy to be who they are and that they do not have to use the expensive products to be happy with who they are.  

A Dove magizine ad

Sources: 

advertising and exploiting of women 

Dove Capmaign for Real Beauty 

commercial-youtube.com

Images  

Blog #4 Advertising research methods

When it comes to advertising research the methods are endless. There are so many ways that marketers can research advertising from simply observing consumers to lengthy tests.  Researching advertising is the main way that advertisements have evolved. Pre-testing which can also be known as copy testing, is a form of research that predicts the performance of an advertisement and its success in the real world before it airs to the public. Pre-testing analyzes attention, brand loyalty motivation, communication between consumers and weather it is entertaining or informational. This for of research also breaks down the ads flow of attention and emotions the consumers will feel when seeing the ad.  Measuring the attention level is extremely important when it comes to pre-testing. This data collected tells us what parts of the ad consumers look it and which parts of the ad they ignore. Pre-testing can be extremely helpful for ads that are still rough drafts. It can tell us what else we need to put in the ad and what aspects of the ad need to be removed. 

            Another form of marketing research is called post-testing.  Post-testing provide either intervals or continuous research in the market.  They monitor a brand’s performance, including brand awareness, brand preference, product usage and attitudes consumers have towards the products and services. Some post-testing approaches track changes over time. It’s an easy way to tell the popularity of a product over a certain period of time.   Another method is a campaign, which is much larger and hands-on with the consumers. Mainly advertisers use post-testing to plan future advertising campaigns, so the approaches that provide the most detailed information on the accomplishments of the campaign are the ones that are typically used the most.  There are two main typed of post-testing campaigns.   The first is continuous tracking.  In continuous tracking is when the changes in advertising spending and compared to changes in brand awareness. Usually with these studies they will use the same group of people over a long period of time to track the changes.

            All of these methods I have talked about are known as field methods. The other form of research methods is the desk method. The desk method involves documents from past studies and books written by experts on the matter.  When engaging in the desk method you take many different test results on a similar brand or product and compare them. The results from twenty years ago to date can be extremely helpful. This data can tell you how consumers needs and wants have changed.  As technology and the way we live changed so do our wants and needs.  As we find out what consumers needs and wants are now we can more heavily advertise towards those needs and wants. Many popular documents that researches use are government documents such has census reports, bulletins on labor and commerce and governments income reports.  All of these can tell use how things over time have changed.  The census reports alone can tell us so many things. In a census we can learn all age groups living in an area, nationalities, and income of all the people in one town. Once we learn that we can then know if we need to advertise towards children or the elderly, African American or Mexican, and wealthy and poor.  Those are just to name a few.  If the census report has a high amount of children then for example, we can more heavily advertise products geared towards children on the local stations and in newspapers and magazines.  Not only can we advertise to children themselves, but we then know weather to advertise children’s products towards the parents for products that children are not as interested in directly, like children’s vitamins. 

            Advertising would not be what it is today without the research that has gone into it. You can say that advertising is one of the most innovative and ever changing businesses in our world today, next to technology. Advertising relates directly to the needs and wants of the consumers, and by studying the consumers over time we can tell how we need to approach our ads, and how we want to speak to the consumers. 

Sources:

http://www.smetoolkit.org/smetoolkit/en/content/en/196/Market-Research-Techniques

http://www.jstor.org/pss/1015078

Blog #3 Research methods in advertising

When it comes to advertising research the methods are endless. There are so many ways that marketers can research advertising from simply observing consumers to lengthy tests.  Researching advertising is the main way that advertisements have evolved. Pre-testing which can also be known as copy testing, is a form of research that predicts the performance of an advertisement and its success in the real world before it airs to the public. Pre-testing analyzes attention, brand loyalty motivation, communication between consumers and weather it is entertaining or informational. This for of research also breaks down the ads flow of attention and emotions the consumers will feel when seeing the ad.  Measuring the attention level is extremely important when it comes to pre-testing. This data collected tells us what parts of the ad consumers look it and which parts of the ad they ignore. Pre-testing can be extremely helpful for ads that are still rough drafts. It can tell us what else we need to put in the ad and what aspects of the ad need to be removed. 

            Another form of marketing research is called post-testing.  Post-testing provide either intervals or continuous research in the market.  They monitor a brand’s performance, including brand awareness, brand preference, product usage and attitudes consumers have towards the products and services. Some post-testing approaches track changes over time. It’s an easy way to tell the popularity of a product over a certain period of time.   Another method is a campaign, which is much larger and hands-on with the consumers. Mainly advertisers use post-testing to plan future advertising campaigns, so the approaches that provide the most detailed information on the accomplishments of the campaign are the ones that are typically used the most.  There are two main typed of post-testing campaigns.   The first is continuous tracking.  In continuous tracking is when the changes in advertising spending and compared to changes in brand awareness. Usually with these studies they will use the same group of people over a long period of time to track the changes.

This shows some of the information on poverty we can obtain from a census report

            All of these methods I have talked about are known as field methods. The other form of research methods is the desk method. The desk method involves documents from past studies and books written by experts on the matter.  When engaging in the desk method you take many different test results on a similar brand or product and compare them. The results from twenty years ago to date can be extremely helpful. This data can tell you how consumers needs and wants have changed.  As technology and the way we live changed so do our wants and needs.  As we find out what consumers needs and wants are now we can more heavily advertise towards those needs and wants. Many popular documents that researches use are government documents such has census reports, bulletins on labor and commerce and governments income reports.  All of these can tell use how things over time have changed.   

The census reports alone can tell us so many things. In a census we can learn all age groups living in an area, nationalities, and income of all the people in one town. Once we learn that we can then know if we need to advertise towards children or the elderly, African American or Mexican, and wealthy and poor.  Those are just to name a few.  If the census report has a high amount of children then for example, we can more heavily advertise products geared towards children on the local stations and in newspapers and magazines.  Not only can we advertise to children themselves, but we then know weather to advertise children’s products towards the parents for products that children are not as interested in directly, like children’s vitamins. 

This is an example of an ad for Children's vitamins geared towards parents.

            Advertising would not be what it is today without the research that has gone into it. You can say that advertising is one of the most innovative and ever changing businesses in our world today, next to technology. Advertising relates directly to the needs and wants of the consumers, and by studying the consumers over time we can tell how we need to approach our ads, and how we want to speak to the consumers.  

Sources: 

http://www.google.com/images

http://www.jstor.org/pss/1015078

Consumer Behavior 3 student edition 

Babin/Harris

Cengage.com

Blog #3 Theories in Advertising

When it comes to advertising and marketing there are many different approaches and theories on how the get the message across the table quickly and effectively.  One very known and fairly easy theory to advertising is buss marketing. Buzz marketing can be defined as an event or activity that generates attention, excitement and, information to the consumer.  It is usually something our of the ordinary that catches the consumers eye, but is not quite as crazy and out there as guerilla marketing.  A good analogy to explain buzz marketing that I found was, “Buzz marketing typically contains a shot of adrenaline with a chaser of product information”.  If buzz marketing is done effectively people will typically talk or write about it and the information can spread quickly, especially with the help of the Internet in our society.  With Buzz marketing the whole point is to catch the eye of the consumer by doing something out of the ordinary such as using crazy colors and eye catching graphics that may not have anything to do with the product. 

Another fascinating form of advertising is viral marketing.  Viral marketing can be defined as an attempt to deliver a message the spreads quickly and exponentially to consumers.  Its point is to make consumers want to tell other people about the advertisement and then it spreads by word of mouth, articles, and over the Internet. Viral marketing depends on a high pass along rate. It depends mainly on people “spreading the word”.    So then over time it starts to spread quickly from person to person, hence the name “viral marketing”.  Although viral marketing sounds easy, just make something interesting enough to talk about right? In reality, it is not that easy to make something so interesting that people want to talk about it among their families, friends, and coworkers.  So what makes viral marketing? It is made up of catchy songs, interesting punch lines, and unusual ways of passing off a message.  If have something unusual isn’t easy for the company to get across in their message another way to produce a successful viral message is relating to the consumer.  By having a realistic feel that people can relate to they will talk about it.  Something realistic can be as easy as a commercial for a cleaning product in the kitchen to clean the stove; everyone eventually has a dirt stovetop in his or her kitchen at some point.  

Click here for example of Viral Marketing 

47 Outrageous Viral Marketing examples 

Weather a company uses buzz marketing or viral marketing to get their message across they all have the same goal, to get consumers interested and talking about their product. This is called word-of-mouth.  Word-of-mouth is a result that happens when someone see’s something and then relays the message across to the people they are close to.  It is said to be “The most powerful medium on the planet”.  It’s crazy to think that something so simple as people talking can make or break the product.  One person talking badly about an advertisement to one of their friends can spread by word-of-mouth from one person to the next extremely quickly and then the advertisement then has a bad reputation.  It is the easiest way for companies to get to consumers, because it’s a persons natural way or relaying information. 

The last theory that I think worth mentioning is called the communication theory.  The theory of communication is simply sending out messages to consumers with information that is easy to read and easy to understand.  The goal of communication is to generate customer responses.  There are multiple customer responses depending on the degree of information presented.  The first customer response is creating brand awareness.  Brand awareness is making a consumer aware of a brand, their products, the benefits of the products, and what the product is used for.  When making a consumer aware of a product we must be careful in the way we present our information to them.  When presenting information in a television advertisement for example marketers must remember that not everyone is educated in the same way so they need to relay the information in an effective yet easy way.  After creating brand awareness the next response they are looking for is for the consumer to purchase the product. Once the customer purchases the product the company wants to for a long-term relationship with the consumer by providing good customer service and product quality.  

Click here for an example of Communication Marketing 

Sources:

http://www.slideshare.net/emakina/viral-marketing-theory

http://www.marketingterms.com/dictionary/viral_marketing/

http://www.slideshare.net/mcurphey/advertising-theory

http://www.ignitesocialmedia.com/social-media-examples/viral-marketing-examples/

http://www.youtube.com