All the evil marketers hacking into your brain have done is get you to buy the thing you were going to buy now and from us rather than later and from someone else
The "2 other people bought this!!! Buy now before you miss out and destroy your chance of happiness!!@" needs to die though tbf. I want to buy the (not branantia, I can't afford that flex) bin, but that pop-up keeps getting in my way and eventually I am forced, FORCED I tell you, to simply throw the computer out the window and burn all future rubbish in the sink. When will the Marketeer Mafia come and scrub the scorch marks from my kitchen walls, that's what I want to know?!!!
"But we also know that your mum or BFF, the woman from Which? or Martin Lewis on the telly, even Steve down the pub are more trusted than the advertiser."
You can see this effect with movies, and particularly since the rise of social media. Marketing in various forms (brands, chat shows, ads, actors) can bring an audience for the first weekend, but after that, it's almost entirely about word of mouth. A lot of films are collapsing by as much as 70% in a week. And there's various films that are terrific where the effect is far lower. Like Everything Everywhere All At Once was going to be for the arthouse circuit, but people loved it so much, it went onto wide theatrical release, and even then, it was only falling by 10-20% per week. And those collapses are cumulative, remember. The 4th week of release is 30%^3. Which is a lot less than 80%^3.
I'm as much of a cynic about the expansion of public health as anyone, and in general I think that targeted advertising- showing you things that are more likely to be relevant and useful to to you- is a good thing rather than an insidious intrusion.
Nonetheless, is there no value to the ideas that whilst advertising (specifically, online marketing) might not have any special or unusual sway over your behaviour, the impersonal nature of online tools might mean that they are much more aggressive and determined to enforce a certain behaviour than the "lovely shop assistant" might be? It seems unlikely that a human behind the desk at a bookies would continue to suggest to a gambling addict that they part with more of their money, purely out of some basic human empathy- even more unlikely if they had an existing relationship outside of the commercial one, like living in the same small town.
I'm not sure if this is a difference of degree or kind but it seems to push back against your idea that online marketing is just one more input to your ultimate decision, with no greater influence than your mate Steve- the difference is that your mate Steve might suffer some kind of consequences, even only a vague sense of guilt, if he suggests that you spend all of your money on another drink.
I also think that a lot of people's problem with online marketing is not the output but the input; it seems like large amounts of intellectual work by highly capable people is dedicated solely to optimising online platforms for views, clicks, and sales conversions, rather than doing something more obviously productive. Even if there is a benefit in allowing people to buy what they wanted at a convenient and reliable location, it's not clear that the societal benefit is worth the effort required to buy it once opportunity cost is factored in.
I appreciate much advertising is just about stealing market share without affecting overall demand, the classic example being Pepsi vs Coca-Cola. And in a wider sense I can accept that it doesn't change aggregate demand for the economy as a whole.
But isn't the point that marketing might steer us towards more impulsive choices that long term we don't like? To take vapes, a teenager who is unaware of them or sees them as drab and uncool might go spend her money on a frappe instead, or even a recreational drug. So advertising can draw you to categories of products you otherwise wouldn't engage with.
As a scientist my delving into marketing ideas some 15 years ago always makes me see how different communication styles can influence outcomes. But as you say in the end someone has to choose to spend their time digesting the marketing.
Some years ago my wife had to design a mockup ad for an NHS service that was for enteral feeding. This is where you feed yourself through a tube in your navel using a special nutrient paste. Not very sexy but important to those how may end up needing it due to gastro surgeries.
I had Oglivy On Advertising. We decided to use the VW Lemon format with a big photo of a guy who promotes life with a tube. “Rick’s Having Lunch” with a photo of Rick standing in Yosemite. We even used the same text font and paragraph layout. When they tested it in the department so many people came up and had a look. Of course they didn’t use it in the end but a year later the final design by an outside firm was eerily similar.
All it did though was pique interest. It wasn’t mind control although it is a very pleasing format that just “works”.
Fascinating stuff. Of course people who believe that advertising ‘hacks the brain’ (your silly brain, not my clever brain obviously) often have quite a low opinion of their fellow human beings. Thats why the little people need ‘protecting’, by them of course, from making ‘bad choices’. Great article.
The "2 other people bought this!!! Buy now before you miss out and destroy your chance of happiness!!@" needs to die though tbf. I want to buy the (not branantia, I can't afford that flex) bin, but that pop-up keeps getting in my way and eventually I am forced, FORCED I tell you, to simply throw the computer out the window and burn all future rubbish in the sink. When will the Marketeer Mafia come and scrub the scorch marks from my kitchen walls, that's what I want to know?!!!
"But we also know that your mum or BFF, the woman from Which? or Martin Lewis on the telly, even Steve down the pub are more trusted than the advertiser."
You can see this effect with movies, and particularly since the rise of social media. Marketing in various forms (brands, chat shows, ads, actors) can bring an audience for the first weekend, but after that, it's almost entirely about word of mouth. A lot of films are collapsing by as much as 70% in a week. And there's various films that are terrific where the effect is far lower. Like Everything Everywhere All At Once was going to be for the arthouse circuit, but people loved it so much, it went onto wide theatrical release, and even then, it was only falling by 10-20% per week. And those collapses are cumulative, remember. The 4th week of release is 30%^3. Which is a lot less than 80%^3.
I'm as much of a cynic about the expansion of public health as anyone, and in general I think that targeted advertising- showing you things that are more likely to be relevant and useful to to you- is a good thing rather than an insidious intrusion.
Nonetheless, is there no value to the ideas that whilst advertising (specifically, online marketing) might not have any special or unusual sway over your behaviour, the impersonal nature of online tools might mean that they are much more aggressive and determined to enforce a certain behaviour than the "lovely shop assistant" might be? It seems unlikely that a human behind the desk at a bookies would continue to suggest to a gambling addict that they part with more of their money, purely out of some basic human empathy- even more unlikely if they had an existing relationship outside of the commercial one, like living in the same small town.
I'm not sure if this is a difference of degree or kind but it seems to push back against your idea that online marketing is just one more input to your ultimate decision, with no greater influence than your mate Steve- the difference is that your mate Steve might suffer some kind of consequences, even only a vague sense of guilt, if he suggests that you spend all of your money on another drink.
I also think that a lot of people's problem with online marketing is not the output but the input; it seems like large amounts of intellectual work by highly capable people is dedicated solely to optimising online platforms for views, clicks, and sales conversions, rather than doing something more obviously productive. Even if there is a benefit in allowing people to buy what they wanted at a convenient and reliable location, it's not clear that the societal benefit is worth the effort required to buy it once opportunity cost is factored in.
I appreciate much advertising is just about stealing market share without affecting overall demand, the classic example being Pepsi vs Coca-Cola. And in a wider sense I can accept that it doesn't change aggregate demand for the economy as a whole.
But isn't the point that marketing might steer us towards more impulsive choices that long term we don't like? To take vapes, a teenager who is unaware of them or sees them as drab and uncool might go spend her money on a frappe instead, or even a recreational drug. So advertising can draw you to categories of products you otherwise wouldn't engage with.
As a scientist my delving into marketing ideas some 15 years ago always makes me see how different communication styles can influence outcomes. But as you say in the end someone has to choose to spend their time digesting the marketing.
Some years ago my wife had to design a mockup ad for an NHS service that was for enteral feeding. This is where you feed yourself through a tube in your navel using a special nutrient paste. Not very sexy but important to those how may end up needing it due to gastro surgeries.
I had Oglivy On Advertising. We decided to use the VW Lemon format with a big photo of a guy who promotes life with a tube. “Rick’s Having Lunch” with a photo of Rick standing in Yosemite. We even used the same text font and paragraph layout. When they tested it in the department so many people came up and had a look. Of course they didn’t use it in the end but a year later the final design by an outside firm was eerily similar.
All it did though was pique interest. It wasn’t mind control although it is a very pleasing format that just “works”.
Fascinating stuff. Of course people who believe that advertising ‘hacks the brain’ (your silly brain, not my clever brain obviously) often have quite a low opinion of their fellow human beings. Thats why the little people need ‘protecting’, by them of course, from making ‘bad choices’. Great article.