The Morality of Advertising

[davideduardo]

From the "Religion and Ethics" section on Australia's ABC website... and interesting article with the title "Is Advertising Morally Justifiable? The Importance of Protecting Our Attention"

http://www.abc.net.au/religion/articles/2015/07/14/4273200.htm

I find interesting the way that the author expresses the function of advertising and, thus, of advertising media such as radio: The advertising industry consists of the buying and selling of your attention between third parties without your consent.

We are used to hearing terms like "impressions" and "ears" but "the buying and selling of your attention" makes it seem both more personal and, at the same time, more intrusive. It's a bit of a dense read, but it's a good brain exercise.

 

[landtuna]

Of course advertising is "morally justifiable" but there is more to it than that. The advertising must be complete and truthful. No omissions and no deception or unverifiable facts. That is the goal but very, VERY few ads make that high bar. Today's ads consist of flashy half truths (ex: a car for sale at an unbelievable low price in big print but with half a page of very small print explaining it isn't the actual vehicle being advertised) or there are so many ads that they get lost in the static. Fortunately, with technology, I don't have to view or listen to ads the majority of the time. I can ignore billboards, hit the pre-set on the radio when an ad comes on (or listen to the program of my choice on my personal audio device), download my TV shows without commercials, instruct my web browser to ignore online ads and otherwise ignore virtually all ads. I quit my newspaper subscription decades ago because I was tired of the tiny stories buried amongst the plethora of ads. Direct mail goes from my mailbox right into the trash bin.

The advertising industry has brought this on themselves. By inundating me with BS of all types they have made me immune to commercials to the point that it is virtually impossible for me to recall a specific ad or the subject of an ad once viewed. Even the cream of the crop commercials ballyhooed during the Stupid Bowl have reached new lows. It is very rare that an ad catches my eye enough to remain for future consideration. The vast majority are dismissed out of hand and those are only the ones that I cannot yet avoid. And if they think they can burrow into my subconsciousness by repeating the same commercials dozens of times (I'm thinking of you NASCAR) that doesn't work either. I simply bypass the live presentation and download a commercial-less version a day or so later.

Someone is surely going to mention my age and say "of course, look at the demo, advertisers don't care about you any longer". The problem for them is....I have been this way since my 20's. I simply got sick and tired of all the BS and shut it off. I suspect I am far from alone.

 

[hm insulators]

Same with me, landtuna!

 

[landtuna]

Now that I have had time to cool off from my rant of several weeks ago I should add the following:

There are some ads that are very entertaining and/or very clever. One of the current State Farm commercials ("At Last" with the voice of Etta James) makes me stop and listen every time I hear it BUT State Farm is not on my list of companies I will buy insurance from given past experience. Another is the VW commercial with the three old ladies ogling the young man's butt. I laugh every time I see it BUT I will never buy a VW because IMHO they aren't reliable enough or worth the money. So from a seller point of view their advertising money is wasted on me. Nor would I ever buy a product of significant cost based solely upon their commercial content.

It can go the other way too. I detest Hyundai car commercials. They are loud and offensive and don't give you any information other than a phony sales price. But I bought a Hyundai Genesis 3 years ago based upon reviews from previous buyers and several articles in respected auto mags (and past experience with the brand). Advertising had no impact upon my decision to buy that particular car or brand.

It ain't like the old days where shills provided most of the information on products. It is possible to obtain information today about virtually every type of product and compare cost before doing the perp walk to the store. And yes, I know there are professional "reviewers" and planted articles but they are usually pretty easy to spot and most cannot outnumber the real product reviews.

As long as commercials are incomplete, outright false or have qualifying language in big, unreadable paragraphs I will continue ignoring them in total. And as much as I love the Clydesdales, Bud is panther piss. Sorry Bud. Love your commercials. Hate your beer.

 

[b-turner]

Advertising has evolved so much in the past few decades. The art of 'spinning' the advertised product is quite the craft and I'd rather not be a part of selling something that doesn't fit the intended need. I notice many advertised products reflect only certain information. I'm not saying you dwell on the good and bad but at least make what you are advertising really be just that. I am talking about the bait being, for example, the stripped down vehicle marketed $X with a photo of the car and caption saying the photo is of the upgraded model. Usually the dealer has only one of the advertised cars on the lot and it's likely sold by the time you get there so you can be persuaded to buy a more expensive vehicle. I'm not just talking car dealers.

Another thing I notice is what I call window dressing of commercials. We have developed an attitude in radio and maybe TV that a spot must be a certain length. Indeed, formats dictate this, but I have found that frequently the message is only a few seconds and the remainder of the spot is to create a clever way to get the message across a few times in the 60 second spot. Too frequently the window dressing obscures the message itself.

Here's a TV spot I love: scene: man in passenger seat of pick up truck saying 'You're not listening to me now". Camera pans to show a dog driving the truck. Suddenly a duck crosses the road and the pick up is airborne and about to land in a pond as the passenger says "Mother of Pearl, Noooo!" What is the advertised product? Any guesses?

 

[davideduardo]

Too frequently the window dressing obscures the message itself.

Somewhere in the 70's when I visited Benton & Bowles' local office in San Juan I saw a framed motto that said, "It's not creative unless it sells". I inquired, and my good friend who was the Media Director said that everyone in the agency had received one with a message to the effect that winning peer awards was not the object of an ad agency... moving product was.

He went to another office and got me a copy of the card. I had it in my office for years, and it was a frequent reminder when I was writing promos and liners and contest copy that I had to engage, sell and ask for the order. If I could be cute, fun, exciting at the same time that was great... but the primary objective was to ask listeners to use my station more.

http://www.otismaxwell.com/blog/my-david-ogilvy-tribute-page/

Benton & Bowles may be best noted for having created the genre of the "Soap Opera" for their client, Proctor & Gamble.

 

[JeffM]

Wish I could remember the book, but I remember years ago reading that "a program is not 'brought to you by' a sponsor; YOU are 'brought to' the sponsor by the program." This was back in the "sponsor era" of TV, but I believe it still holds true.

It's been argued back and forth endlessly (and always will be) whether advertising has morals or ethics. I'd like to believe it does, though everyone I know in the ad biz locally has worked on projects they knew were bogus, from promoting a rundown amusement park to a seedy politician. So much of radio advertising now sounds like the back of a "men's sweat" pulp magazine used to look.

By the way, wasn't it Frank Hummert of Blackett, Sample & Hummert who created the soap opera? (For certain, he and his wife Anne made a cottage industry out of them through their Air Features production company.)

 

[anotherguyTN]

There is a lot of questionable junk that is advertised in the field of infomercials and as seen on TV garbage that I have to question the morals of the people making and selling this junk and also the stations that carry their ads. And I hate to say it but even some Christian stations who should have higher morals and would never carry ads for alcohol or gambling or sexually oriented items are just as guilty of carrying their ads.