Hello everyone! I had an interesting experience the other day, and I wanted to share it with all of you:
I was babysitting for a mother who had to leave for work early last Saturday morning. When I arrived at 7:00 AM, the children had just woken up and wanted breakfast. I was willing to make anything (being the excellent chef that I am, I can whip up cereal, bagels, oatmeal, or eggs) but the youngest child, Paige, refused to eat anything. She was wailing that she was hungry, but she didn’t want to eat what we had in the house! I was forced to become creative. (As they say, necessity is the mother of invention.) I told her I would make “Cowgirl Sticks.” (Strange name I know, but she has an obsession with horses. I hoped the name would catch her attention.) What are Cowgirl Sticks, you ask? Why, nothing more than toast with butter and jam simply cut into three pieces, but she LOVED them. She ate six cowgirl sticks.
My point is that we can use different names for the same thing to create the desired affect. I could have told Paige I was giving her toast, but she wouldn’t have eaten it. I cut the bread differently and call the pieces “Cowgirl Sticks” and suddenly she wouldn’t stop eating.
Now, after having watched the “Merchants of Cool” video in class, we realize what power marketers have over us. Just like I influenced Paige to eat the toast, marketers are also able to influence what we do, what we say, and what we buy because they recognize the power of words. Companies like McDonald’s want to sell their product, so rather than advertise their latest creation containing 810 calories and 55 grams of fat as “The Artery Clogger” they instead they call it “Big Xtra.” These are both different names for the same thing, but one makes the sandwich sound a lot more appealing. If I’m really hungry, I want to eat the "Big Xtra" because it sounds like it will satisfy my hunger. In reality, the only thing this sandwich could satisfy is my upchuck reflex.
I’m curious to know what everyone else thinks about the video. I remember we discussed it in class, but only a few people shared their thoughts. So what do you all think – do we buy the brand and label, or do we concern ourselves more with the quality of the product?
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4 comments:
Oops! Sorry - forgot to mention the above post is by Ashley Hopper.
this is Cristy.
Ash, I think the "cowgirl sticks" gave it away.jk. But really, I wanted to add how I felt about the movie. I came home today and while watching some tv I analyzed every commercial and saw that a lot, more than most, are targeted at teens specifically. Best Buy shows videogames, Wendy's has a funny man in a red wig running around (which appeals to teens more than adults even though I'm not quite sure why)or McDonalds with the toys and the characters. One very interesting commercial is the anti-drug commercial which exposes the marketing of cigarette companies towards kids. Although marketing to underage kids was made illegal for cigarette companies they supposedly came out with a commercial featuring a big purple fluffy animal/creature with big yellow polka dots on it. The anti-drug infomercial guy dresses up in the costume as the friendly looking purple giant and walks around a city. Adults are embarassed by him and ignore him, refusing to take his flyers. However, at a playground the man is swarmed by children. These commercials always impact me and make me think. They show how the cigarette companies targeted children who could not legally purchase their product for about another 10 years!!! Another commercial publicized how a cigarrette company donated something like $30,000 to a charity and then spent almost a million dollars to publicize the charitable act. These commercials and the movie emphasize how on tv nothing is ever how it seems. Words are "abused" or "used creatively" to form the thoughts and opinions of their audience. The logo of a company is very important. I prefer the word google to yahoo and that was my main reason for using that search engine a couple of years ago. Marketing is one of the most prevalent ways language impacts our life and culture and it is everywhere. And like in the example of "A-town and B-ville" the connotations a message carries are just as important or more than the definition.
I recently saw a commercial some fast-food chain that dealt with this issue. It had 2 women sitting at some sort of board meeting and someone asked what they wanted for lunch. One responded with something like, "The Trans Fat Burger" (OK so I don't exactly remember what she said...) and the other asked for the same. The point, of course, was to parody typical fast-food as fatty, greasy, and unhealthy in order to suggest that their food was better for you. But it just goes to show that "name-changes" work in both ways and that we must be cognizant of the shrewd techniques of these advertisers.
In fact, the same goes for many other goods. If you take a stroll down any aisle in almost any store, you will soon be bombarded by the "neon-lights" of the plentiful brands. "NEW," "Better tasting," and "26% more than the leading competitor," all beckon to us to buy their products. One specific example is the anomaly of store-brand medicine. If you take a look at Advil or Motrin, you'll quickly learn that the active ingredient is ibuprofen- so these pills effectively do the same thing. But if you look at the store-brand counterparts (which are often packaged by the same corporations), the price is much lower but the ingredients are EXACTLY THE SAME. The only difference is the bright packaging. I think that this really testifies to the effectiveness of modern advertisers to sell their products.
Hey it's Erin. I was originally going to say that advertising doesn't affect me; I'll shop in what stores I want to shop and only buy the clothes I like but that changed. When Ian brought up the Advil example I was like, wow, that's me. I wouldn't buy anything other than Advil. Or yahoo something instead of google it. One thing that marketing does is put your trust in a product and that's why I use Advil and google. Ah! Advertising strikes again!
Did any of you ever see the commercial for Lean Cuisine Paninis (I think it's Lean Cuisine, but usually I remember the commercial and not the product)? It's these people who are on diets talking about what they're eating and it makes that panini (spelling?) sound so good! Another commercial that's stuck on my mind is the most annoying ever! Head On! They just repeat, "head on; apply directing to the forehead" over and over as this lady rubs something that looks like a glue stick across her head. But the commercial worked; I'll NEVER forget that one.
(by the way Ashley, I loved your story - babysitting smarts there)
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