Have I Got a Deal for You!
In the middle of an interminable marketing meeting the other day, I actually started thinking about the process of marketing. Everyone seems to accept the concept of “today’s sophisticated consumers”, but it’s patent nonsense. Consumers know almost nothing about the TVs, cars, computers or even food they buy. We are not sophisticated. We are resistant.
Fundamentally, marketing is a process of subtle manipulation. It works by preying on the mental shortcuts we all rely on to form opinions. Things like authority, consensus, popularity, urgency, and familiarity. Of course, as advertisers use these techniques in greater frequency and strength, we become desensitized to it. Therefore, marketers must come up with ever more crass ways to manipulate us. We are a lot like roaches becoming resistant to new pesticides.
The problem, however, is that to a large degree, society itself is based on these decision making shortcuts. I can’t help but think that by developing the mental habit of ignoring the false opinions we see every day in advertising we also train ourselves to ignore the very real opinions of other members of society.
Numerous studies have shown that people (not children, people) are influenced more by the social interaction they see on TV than they are by the social interaction that occurs in real life — although perhaps that’s just because we witness so much more interaction on television than we actually engage in — so it is not surprising that learning that everyone is trying to take advantage of you and manipulate you would have a negative impact on the way you view the rest of the world.
No solutionis today. Just ideas