Poll: Ads - do they affect you?

[Lizardon]

Looking at my recent purchases, I don't think any of them were due to advertising. I find most ads really boring so I tune out. I actually can't even remember an ad I've seen recently off the top of my head. I haven't had a television set up for nearly two months now so that might be why.

The only ads I pay any sort of attention to are movie trailers/ads. Although I've only gone and seen two film this year (Avengers and Dark Knight Rises) both of which I was planning on seeing well before any trailers were out.

 

[Heronblade]

Why yes, yes they do.

There are several dozen products I will never touch, for myself or as a gift, because of the related advertisements. Granted, a few of them I wouldn't have touched anyways, but that's beside the point.

 

[klown]

I don't generally watch a lot of ads anymore as I DVR pretty much everything I watch on TV because of my schedule at work. On my computer, I run adblock, but I tend to white list a lot of the websites I go to a lot, but will block out any AD with sound.

So of the very few I do see, I don't really ever see anything that has anything I want to buy. Though I do watch ads on the food network sometimes, because I buy a lot of cooking things, and like to see who has made a new kitchenset.

 

[Dags90]

You do realize that advertising spans several fields all them requiring a college graduate level of studying to understand properly right?

Spoiler: The guy who came up with this ad was obviously not woman's study major.

I know they're all not that terrible, but seriously. How did no one stand up and say "Maybe not such a great idea" to that ad?

I'm guessing advertising people don't all look like Jon Hamm, either.

 

[Rednog]

Since the whole digital thing is more and more prevalent in my life, I think I've gotten less tolerant of ads. I've honestly gotten to the point where if I hear too much of an ad it begins to piss me off and I go out of my way to not buy it.

 

[aba1]

You do realize that advertising spans several fields all them requiring a college graduate level of studying to understand properly right?

Spoiler: The guy who came up with this ad was obviously not woman's study major.

I know they're all not that terrible, but seriously. How did no one stand up and say "Maybe not such a great idea" to that ad?

I'm guessing advertising people don't all look like Jon Hamm, either.

There are lots of reasons why stuff like that could happen. It was in bad taste but most people won't put together the dots in the same way you do either. I mean nothing is wrong with it inherently only the implications people take out of it which is completely subjective.

But a lot of times things like that happen because the person paying for the commercial (the client) insists on things being his or her way despite not having the expertise and the advertising studio advising against it. You would be amazed at the client horror stories... hell there is entire books and websites based around it. Here is one I go to for a laugh myself. http://clientsfromhell.net/

 

[Berithil]

Normally, I don't really mind commercials on television. At best, they're hilarious. At worst, they're annoying.

Unless of course it's Gak commercials -_-

But, no. Ads usually don't affect whether I purchase a product or not. More often than not, I usually just tune them out, or mute.

And then we have internet ads...

Those tend to annoy me to no end. I must admit, that's one of my favorite perks of being a PubClub member (yay!)

 

[Murais]

The answer to everyone here is "yes."

If advertising didn't work, companies wouldn't spend billions on it annually, nor would it be the main source of revenue for most forms of media. It's incredibly pervasive, even if you don't always perceive it as such.

I've spent most of my college life studying precisely that impact.

 

[soren7550]

Most of the time I try my best to ignore ads. I'm almost never inclined to buy what they're advertising because 1) I don't care for their product 2) I have no money to spend on their product anyway.

Hell, most ads infuriate me because they often come off as if the people they're trying to sell their product to are very simple minded. Such as this gem:

In case you are deaf or don't want to see one of these stupid ads again, I'll sum it up here: they're trying to pander to women because
A) it's pink
B) it gives money to breast cancer research, so it are must be relevant to the vagina people!
and let's not forget, it says almost the exact same thing, pretty much word for word, THREE TIMES IN A ROW.

"OMG, it's pink lemonade, gives me energy, AND gives a very small portion of the proceeds of this ass drink to breast cancer research? I ARE WOMAN, THIS ARE RELEVANT, AND I MUST CONSUME!"

The only times I've liked an as is if it's funny and/or cute, or is this:

 

[Trippy Turtle]

Good ads do. If I find the ad annoying I go out of my way to avoid getting it, unless it is undeniably better.

 

[Joccaren]

Adds in no way influence my willingness to buy something. Well, in a positive light anyway. If an add keeps popping up in my way on either TV, the internet, or in the middle of an interesting part of a magazine, I am motivated to go out of my way not to buy it because it pissed me off some time.
Unless the add is telling me "Go to x to download your free game", and said free game is actually interesting, and x is a legitimate channel, then no, I will not buy your product. I have no interest in your product. If I need/want something, I know what I need/want and will buy that, not what your add says is awesome. I do my research before buying most things, so adds have 0 effect on me.

 

[Canadamus Prime]

No, I actively try and avoid advertising as much as I possibly can.

 

[Dags90]

There are lots of reasons why stuff like that could happen. It was in bad taste but most people won't put together the dots in the same way you do either. I mean nothing is wrong with it inherently only the implications people take out of it which is completely subjective.

But a lot of times things like that happen because the person paying for the commercial (the client) insists on things being his or her way despite not having the expertise and the advertising studio advising against it. You would be amazed at the client horror stories... hell there is entire books and websites based around it. Here is one I go to for a laugh myself. http://clientsfromhell.net/

I'd say "hair was the reason she was unmarried" is pretty explicit in saying that looks = women's only bartering tool for marriage. Seriously, she's a princess. She's set to inherit huge tracks of land, but no one can deal with some hair snakes meant to represent bad hair.

Some of it is definitely the customers. The American dairy industry targets women to a crazy degree. My aunt works in pharmaceutical advertising, and she's dealt with customers who know zero about biology.

Spoiler: The lab technician in the commercial needs to go. Seriously, she uses a micropipette without a tip, and then uses another pipette without any suction. Also, her distillation apparatus doesn't have any fucking water going through it.

 

[wottabout]

There are some products, such as Five Hour Energy, that I refuse to associate with because of their annoying ads. (I probably wouldn't drink Five Hour Energy anyway, but now I'm not drinking it WITH A PASSION.) On the other hand, I really like the Toyota ads on Hulu. I'm not planning on buying a Toyota, but I certainly think better of the company than I would otherwise. (The ads are these trivia quizzes, but it doesn't matter which answers you click, so it's just clickclickclickclickclick and then the rest of the video is commercial free! Thanks, Toyota!)

Also, I will look into movies and games and shows that have good ads.

 

[RandV80]

Everyone thinks they are immune but as someone who designs them I will just say that nobody truly is.

Exactly. It's a massive industry for a reason, no matter how any individual is going to claim it doesn't affect them.

Eh...

The Korean F2P market is massive, but most of them have no idea what they are doing.

I imagine the same is true for marketing.

You do realize that advertising spans several fields all them requiring a college graduate level of studying to understand properly right?

That doesn't really mean much in itself... in my tech college the marketing program was known as the easy classes for dumb blondes. The program was easy enough that they had to set the passing grade bar at 70%. Really though my bad impression from it came from one of my dorm roommates who was a total drunk redneck and the complete antithesis to myself.

Anyways, for this argument you really have to clearly define where the goalposts are and how you're keeping score. At it's most basic level the purpose of marketing is to create awareness of a product. So for example, personally I have a sweet tooth and a love for variety. I very rarely go to Dairy Queen but if a commercial gets flashed in front of me with an enticing new blizzard flavour and/or a good promotional deal then it's like going to be a successful advert. But, if it's a company I lost faith in like say Subway then it doesn't matter what kind of new sub or deal they flash at me I'm sticking with my Vietnamese sub places. Also, where Dairy Queen may have spent millions of dollars on that commercial, Starbucks can accomplish the same thing by sticking a sign in the window. New flavour this summer is a cookie crumble mocha frappuccino? Sold!

So obviously you can't outright say that advertising doesn't work, but where I draw the line here is the concept that a cunning marketer can make me choose Coke over Pepsi or to grab a Snickers bar or whatever through a slick marketing campaign. That I strongly disagree with. My taste driven curiosity has lead me away from these big name brands to favour ones like Jones Soda or Lindt Chocolate. While I'm sure marketers have plenty of graphs and charts that show their marketing has worked, by this day and age everyone knows about other successful companies that have never done any marketing. Google being the most obvious one, services like Steam or Facebook, and I don't believe I've ever seen a Starbucks commercial. A better/unique product combined with the right word of mouth can equal great success without spending billions in marketing.

That's all I really wanted to say, but here's another thing for outlier study. I'm always amazed at how nearly everybody I know can look at a vehicle and almost immediately know the year/make/model. Is this a result of the general populations interest in motor vehicles or because we're always being bombarded with commercials about them? As someone who has no real interest in them and generally good at tuning out commercials the best you'd get out of me is something like "blue truck" or "red car", I'm not even going to recognize half the logo's, and never the brand let alone the year. So do I have a +5 will save bonus to car commercials here?

 

[Yopaz]

It's rare that an ad makes me buy something at once, but they do affect me. There are lots of products out there I wouldn't know existed if I hadn't seen ads for it. My process usually follows the steps, ad - Interested/not interested - think through if I really need or afford it - research opinions - consider budget again - consider options for better prices or quality - consider how useful it is. It goes down a lot of steps, but advertisement makes me buy things occasionally and they do make me want things.

Of course I am human, I have my weak moments. I once saw an ad for Plants VS Zombies and I skipped most of my usual steps and bought it as soon as I found out the ad wasn't a joke. Then there are ads for food when I am planning dinner, those will often affect my dinner plans, but usually I'll get a cheaper brand of the product advertised...

 

[Slowbear]

When I see an add for a product I will not buy it if I have never use it before.

 

[Icehearted]

Voted the gag answer.

Ads generally mean nothing to me as I'm more of the type to spend on what I already want. hype, which is essentially what ads attempt to generate, has no affect on me at all, not even for movies. Which, now that I think about it is kinda sad.

 

[Nazulu]

No, I'm not controlled by advertisements, not buying something just because I saw it on an ad any way. I find myself avoiding them these days actually, I think they've put up the volume on the ad's on TV while the show is left normal. Bloody pricks will do any thing for attention now.

I do appreciate a really entertaining ad still, they don't come often though.

 

[aba1]

There are lots of reasons why stuff like that could happen. It was in bad taste but most people won't put together the dots in the same way you do either. I mean nothing is wrong with it inherently only the implications people take out of it which is completely subjective.

But a lot of times things like that happen because the person paying for the commercial (the client) insists on things being his or her way despite not having the expertise and the advertising studio advising against it. You would be amazed at the client horror stories... hell there is entire books and websites based around it. Here is one I go to for a laugh myself. http://clientsfromhell.net/

I'd say "hair was the reason she was unmarried" is pretty explicit in saying that looks = women's only bartering tool for marriage. Seriously, she's a princess. She's set to inherit huge tracks of land, but no one can deal with some hair snakes meant to represent bad hair.

Some of it is definitely the customers. The American dairy industry targets women to a crazy degree. My aunt works in pharmaceutical advertising, and she's dealt with customers who know zero about biology.

Spoiler: The lab technician in the commercial needs to go. Seriously, she uses a micropipette without a tip, and then uses another pipette without any suction. Also, her distillation apparatus doesn't have any fucking water going through it.

Ahh so you know what I am talking about then ^^. Though as far as the previous commercial goes I wouldn't say it is all that explicit really if you watch it from a face value perspective her hair was actually killing people straight out. You could argue it was sexist against men just as quickly as women too for example I could say for instance that the commercial says men are only interested in women with money and are greedy and that is why they still go after her despite there lives being in jeopardy. I mean you can really take what you want from a lot of things unless they are expressly said though it is all in the eye of the beholder.

My gf is a microbiologist so I hear stories about stuff like that all the time XD. The amount of times shes gone on a rant because someone used the wrong piece of equipment or something of that nature I couldn't count if I had a notepad and a pencil. Its really funny and interesting at the same time I actually learn so much just talking to her about that stuff.