As for this week’s topic we looked at the impact that advertising has had on our lives and how it has gone on to become a necessity for companies to use as a kind of sales pitch of sorts to remind people that this product is out there and available to buy.
Over the years the use of advertising has been a
difficult to define. While some may argue that advertising is a good investment
due to its impact on the economy, while others think it is a bad one due to its
oversaturation in the media today with the use of billboards, television and
the internet.
While I do believe that it could be argued that the
market is becoming more saturated, I do however believe that the use of
advertising has become an important staple in the media today as people can
nowadays get a better idea of what is actually available out there and giving
customers the option on which product you place the most trust in due to it’s
what could be possibly seen as a quite manipulative way of gaining your
money.
Even today advertising as a whole has adapted in a
way in order to make sure wherever you go some kind of sales pitch will be put
in front of you, the primary source being Smartphone’s, “Our phones become a
portable place to consume content and record data, devices to make payments,
store mobile coupons, keep tickets on. They become our most portable interface
with the world”. With most things being digital nowadays it’s easy for
companies to take full advantage of consumers as everything on your Smartphone
from in game adds to social networking websites such as ‘Facebook’.
One of the more controversial aspects
of advertising for some is the way that companies can sometimes demean their
customers through the use of advertising. Take many of the perfume adverts that
we see today that feature actress’s such as ‘Miss Dior’ which features
Hollywood actress Natalie Portman. The overall vibe of the advert is trying to
convey a sense of beauty and basically telling consumers that if they were to
buy this product they will also have the sophistication that Ms Portman has
throughout the ad, while also claiming that currently, without the product they
will never reach the same level of beauty, “This imaginary world is supposed to
be what makes the operation successful”. (Long and Wall, 2012, pp 173) The same could also be said for other
products. Take cleaning utensils for example, ‘Cillit Bang’ has a very special
way of gathering your attention, by being more forward (and to some annoying) about
its products claiming to be “revolutionary” very aggressively while also giving examples by
showing how quickly it can remove stains compared to other stain removers that
are on the market, quickly showing consumers which product is the best one to
buy gaining the customers trust straight away.
While advertising could be seen
as annoying to some I do believe that they do have a lasting impact on people,
giving them more options on what is actually available out there.
Bibliography:
InsaneNutter. (2007). Cillit Bang Advert 1. [Online Video]. 17 April. Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lrMD_z_FnNk. [Accessed: 09 May 2015].
Bibliography:
Tom Goodwin. (2014). Welcome
to the future of advertising, where the word digital is redundant.
Available:
http://www.theguardian.com/media-network/media-network-blog/2014/dec/18/future-advertising-digital-media-technology.
Last accessed 8th May 2015.
“
Consumer Society and Advertising,” in Long, P.; Wall, T; Bakir, V. &
McStay, A. Media Studies: Texts, Production and Context. London: Pearson
Education. P.173
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