Talk:Advertising/Archive 2

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Jamieasson.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 13:28, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

Kinseitan
Can someone please translate the Kinseitan ad? 117.216.27.245 (talk) 06:20, 3 August 2018 (UTC)Soucy

Pioneers of Advertising
I think more could be said of the role advertising gurus played in defining what advertising is. More could be written of the role Ogilvy played on research and the impact the Saatchi brothers and Sorrel have had in defining the big group and holding companies, and how the big four groups impact global advertising. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jmas8516 (talk • contribs) 06:28, 11 April 2014 (UTC)


 * I couldn't agree more. David Ogilvy and Rosser Reeves - in terms of advertising executions, and other luminaries such as Arthur Nielsen, J. Walter Thompson, Daniel Starch and George Gallup for their pioneering work in advertising research. BronHiggs (talk) 11:29, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

How many jobs?
b Do you think it would be good to mention how many jobs advertising creates, worldwide? Stars4change (talk) 19:30, 6 January 2010 (UTC)


 * uuuu 2A00:23C7:8106:2D01:D46:79F5:66B7:8463 (talk) 18:07, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

In Germany (population: 80m) 350 000 people work in advertisement; Christian Felber, Neue Werte für die Wirtschaft (Vienna 2008) —Preceding unsigned comment added by StefSchweinschwaller (talk • contribs) 16:22, 22 February 2010 (UTC) Not without sources it wouldn't. If you can find some then go ahead, I guess, although I'm not personally sure how relevant that is. 193.82.153.194 (talk) 10:43, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

Yes it woiluld be better so the world too Vduglas (talk) 02:54, 10 May 2017 (UTC)

The article on advertising is already an uncomfortable mix of the history of advertising, advertising strategy/ practice and social issues in advertising, with a few other sidelines along the way. Anyone who wanted to discuss the number of people who work in advertising might consider starting a new article on the "Advertising Industry" rather than try to add more and more sections to what is already a very long article that lacks any real central focus or theme. My own view is that advertising is such a large topic, it needs to be split up into more logical themes. The lengthy section on the history of advertising duplicates content and ideas canvassed in a different wikipedia article History of advertising; the material on advertising strategy and practice duplicates content covered in Advertising management and the material on media duplicates content covered in Advertising media selection. It is time to encourage some rationalisation of the many articles on different aspects of advertising and come up with a few logical themes. BronHiggs (talk) 05:36, 10 May 2017 (UTC)

Campaign Ads and Political Advertising
Seems to me that Campaign Ads and Political Advertising could use its own section. The January 21, 2010 Supreme Court campaign finance ruling is one example, but there are many. Although campaign advertising is explored elsewhere in Wikipedia and in this "Advertising" article, to omit it from this advertising page seems undesirable, —Preceding unsigned comment added by Richbrobee (talk • contribs) 14:35, 22 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia already has an article about campaign advertising. Maybe this article should include a short summary of this topic. Jarble (talk) 00:08, 5 January 2019 (UTC)

Edit request from 119.153.64.32, 6 April 2010
== Evolution of advertisement == In the early period,advertisement was no important and used on small scale.Due to Industrial revolution,when goods were produced at large scale in big factories then use of advertisement increased.The producers took help from different means of advertisements to bring the product in the notice of general public.In present era besides business organisations, the govt. and welfare organisations are also using advertising media to convey their message to the community.

119.153.64.32 (talk) 17:49, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Not done: Please provide a reliable source for this. Also, please indicate where in the article this should be added. Thanks, Celestra (talk) 17:58, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Will Rogers
The 1930s performer Will Rogers famously referred to it as "the art of convincing people to spend money they don't have for something they don't need." I don't know if it's worth adding this. Stars4change (talk) 05:07, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Edit request from Wikiwoman823, 15 April 2010
These changes are for the "Children and Adolescents as Targets" section of the article. After the first sentence of the section, this paragraph should be inserted to provide more background information on how advertising's relationship with children began:

Most advertisements used to be targeted towards families, however, in 1955, this changed. The changes came along with the emergence of the Mickey Mouse Club, a variety show that showcases children with talent. In 1955, this show demonstrated the potential of children’s advertisements. Then between the 1960’s and 70’s, children were heavily targeted by advertisers. This lead to the toy-based television programs that became popular in the 1980’s (Transformers, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, etc.). With these shows, it seemed that the children could never escape the advertisements. The toys were advertising the shows, and the shows were advertising the toys. They worked together to generate as much desire for the product as possible. Later, in the 1990’s the children’s television programming market became segmented with the different children’s networks (Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network, Disney). This evolution of children’s advertising brought us to the children’s advertisements we have today.

Source: Strasburger, V. C., Wilson, B. J., & Jordan, A. (2008). Advertising. In Children, Adolescents, and the Media (pp. 43-98). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

The next change that I think should be made is in regards to why children are good targets for advertisers. This information should be inserted after the first quote(cited with endnote 73): Children are prime targets for advertisers because they pay much more attention to ads than adults. Every year, children ages 2-7 see about 13,904 television ads, children ages 8-12 see about 30,155 television ads, and children 13-17 see 28,655 television ads. That turns out to be 106 hours of ads (for ages 2-7), 230 hours of ads (for ages 8-12), and 217 hours of ads (for ages 13-17). This is a lot of exposure to advertisements, which could create a problem in a child’s development. Children have specific developmental responses to advertising. For example, children do not distinguish between the ads and the program content, they do recognize the bias associated with advertising, they (especially children under 8) do not understand that advertisements are meant to be persuasive messages, not information ads, and lastly, children also do not understand disclaimers present in all ads. Basically, they lack a general understanding of commercial media which makes it hard to properly interpret the messages in the advertisements.

Sources:
 * Strasburger, V. C., Wilson, B. J., & Jordan, A. (2008). Advertising.
 * In Children, Adolescents, and the Media (pp. 43-98). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
 * A Kaiser Family Foundation Report. (2007). Food for thought: television food advertising to children in the United States. Retrieved April 12, 2010 from http://www.kff.org/entmedia/7618.cfm

The next addition that I think should be made will add detail to the point that there is a correaltion between TV exposure and childhood obesity. My additions will serve to add more evidence to support this point. These additions should be inserted after the second quote in the second paragraph (cited with endnote 76):

Television advertising has been linked to childhood obesity. Studies have shown that television exposure is correlated with points that would lead to unhealthy food choices. Children’s television viewing is connected to children trying to influence their parents in their purchases, especially when it comes to food. It is also associated with eating more snack, or junk food, and eating less fruits and veggies. Television exposure has also been said to create misconceptions about what is “healthy”, and “unhealthy”. All of these things could easily contribute to the epidemic of childhood obesity. Statistics also support these correlations. The amount of food advertising that children see is incredible. From ages 2-7, children see 12 food ads a day (4,400 ads a year), ages 8-12 see 21 food ads a day (7,600 ads a year), and ages 13-17 see 17 food ads a day (6,000 ads a year). During children’s programming, 50% of all ad time is about food.

Sources:
 * Strasburger, V. C., Wilson, B. J., & Jordan, A. (2008). Advertising.
 * In Children, Adolescents, and the Media (pp. 43-98). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
 * A Kaiser Family Foundation Report. (2007). Food for thought: television food advertising to children in the United States. Retrieved April 12, 2010 from http://www.kff.org/entmedia/7618.cfm

Wikiwoman823 (talk) 06:25, 15 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Comment I reformated this request, removing commented lines with spaces -  Chzz  ►  12:47, 15 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please be more specific about what needs to be changed. To be precise, some of the figures and such that you are quoting could be considered "likely to be challenged"; so it's important that your sources apply to specific sentences or even phrases, per WP:CITE. Please read section 4.2 of that page, then reformat your request using tags, so that the citations will appear in-line.  It's taken so long to get to this request because none of the editors who have reviewed it have had the time to put in the effort to convert your references to in-line citations.  Your edit request is much more likely to be completed if the citations are already done. Thanks! --Darkwind (talk) 07:02, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Mass amount of people?
Look at it! The expression "a mass amount of people" is terrible English, and not indeed English, because "mass" is not a pronoun, that is a word which qualifies the noun it is attached. Used once, I can assume the expression is accidental, but it is there twice, early in the page! The word "large" would be suitable, if "a large number of people" is what is meant - it is better English - but maybe the definition can be refined to "the highest possible proportion of the number of people who are potential users of the product" or whatever expression is intended. This section looks like it was written by an 11-year-old. Incidentally I forgive society for mis-using the word "mass" which means in its original scientific sense, a "quantity of matter" (measurable in pounds or grams), since the expression "mass advertising" has been taken into current usage; but please, not the horrible extension to "mass people". P0mbal (talk) 22:45, 6 June 2010 (UTC)


 * While you are right that a mass amount of people is not good english, pronouns are not qualifiers. Pronouns are words such as I, me, you, etc.  What you are thinking of are adjectives, words which qualify and describe nouns.  Yes, mass is not an adjective, and should not have been used as such.  However, usage like mass advertising is correct, where mass is being used as a noun adjunct.  By the way, the original meaning of mass was a lump or a collection; the scientific definition came second and was formed by analogy from the original meaning.  Still, mass people is not correct, and your alternatives are more grammatical.  Please, refrain from indignant rants on Wikipedia; your comments would have been much more appreciated if you had just presented the grammatical argument of why a mass amount of people is wrong, and proposed your amelioration.  Also, don't insult writers by likening them to fifth-graders.  Besides, if an 11-year-old really did write the page, he did a great job.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 184.96.156.41 (talk) 13:42, 16 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Some mention also should be made of measuring success. For example the terms "width/breadth of appeal" (how wide an audience it appeals to) and depth of appeal (how deeply it appeals to them). Nearest citation to a definition is http://www.sidhecommunications.com/integrated-marketing-communications.html "Some marketers may want only ads with the greatest breadth of appeal: the executions that, when combined, provide the greatest number of attention-getting, branded, and motivational moments. Others may only want ads with the greatest depth of appeal: the ads with the greatest number of attention-getting, branded, and motivational points Integrated marketing communications within each.". Don't have time to set up as at work. Will come back at weekend & do more research to find better definition & research structure. MaryEFreeman (talk) 10:48, 23 January 2013 (UTC)

Messed up table of contents
This article appears to have a messed up table of contents/structure, where sections such as "See also" and "References" all appear to be sub-sections of "Sales Promotions". 220.244.98.39 (talk) 13:55, 4 July 2010 (UTC)

Category:Advertising structures
I am unaware of whereelse to post this, but perhaps it would be a good idea to make a category for advertising sculptures that have articles (for example billboards). I can think of more, individual examples of billboards too. 92.237.84.66 (talk) 15:19, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

Controversial Advertising
Do any of you believe that this is an important aspect of advertisement? I am studying a lot of "subvertizements" in my Humanities(popular culture) class so I have learned a lot about advertisements and the true meaning behind them. It seems like many companies are using this specific form of advertising to catch the attention of consumers in a negative and positive manner. Have any of you seen the ads that Nike put out that had a lot of people thinking they were bashing on gays? Mjaykicks (talk) 04:12, 2 December 2010 (UTC)mjaykicks


 * Diff Thank you, Jamie, if I may call you that. When I saw that section, my first thought was, "New to the twenty-first century? I don't think so."


 * I also remembered a mid-twentieth century advertising notion, that annoying ads are effective ads. I think the person who formulated this "groundbreaking" idea may have studied Pepsi ads... Web search hasn't found it yet for me, although I found at least one disingenuous ad exec claiming that designing annoying ads is "certainly not intentional," or words to that effect. I will continue to keep an eye out for it, since it seems to be absent from the article. __ Just plain Bill (talk) 15:02, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

gender
When advertising to different genders it is important to remember how men and women process information. Females process information comprehensively.

Males process information through heuristic devices such as procedures, methods or strategies for solving problems. ref cite book|last=Statt|first=David|title=Understanding the Consumer - A Psychological Approach|year=1977|publisher=Macmillan Press|location=London Men prefer to have available and apparent cues to interpret the message where females engage in more creative, associative, imagery-laced interpretation.

This idea according to the ref came before 1977, so why is there the Meyers-Levy's theory of "selectivity hypothesis, first published in “Gender Differences in Information Processing: A Selectivity Interpretation,” Joan Meyers-Levy in Cognitive and Affective Responses to Advertising, P. Cafferata and A. Tybout (eds.), Lexington Books, 1988, p. 219-260. see also http://www.chicagobooth.edu/capideas/sum98/meyers.htm QuentinUK (talk) 08:25, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Too much original research
This article contains too much original research. An article of this size should have twice the number of citations currently used. Many sections contain few to no references. For people who are adding in the info, try to add citations for existing content or for the content that is being added. - M0rphzone (talk) 01:33, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

The content may be referenced, but the number of in-line citations is insufficient. - M0rphzone (talk) 01:35, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

Advertising and Self Image
Advertising can be very harmful to women. It can ve very damaging to their self-esteem, by conveying the message that a woman is only beautiful if she is skinny flawless and surrounded by men. Being beautiful and attracting a man is the only thing deemed as important in many of these advertisements. The emphasis on physical perfection and focus on attractiveness to men causes women to be prone to having a low self-esteem, because most women do not look like the ones portrayed in advertisements. Many of these advertisements have men taking a more powerful role and dominating a woman. Reality TV and magazines are very well known for creating sexist streotypes by portraying girls as weak, unintelligent, subservient to men, and only valued for their beauty. "Reality shows may provide innaccurate or unhealthy information to viewers. . ." Many young girls are very sensative to these advertisements and live under the impression that is acceptable to be exploited by a man. This can lead to the feelings of low self worth and self-esteem. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.174.152.85 (talk) 05:05, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Including Influence of Early Psychology Section
This article was extremely beneficial in my research, however I noticed a lacking in reference to the contributions made by psychologists to the field of advertising throughout the years. Therefore, I thought it would be best if I included at least the introduction of psychology to the field and how it helped shape the advertising industry from the early 20th century. — Preceding unsigned comment added by JPineiro (talk • contribs) 16:46, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

Merging Advertising management here
Advertising management can be merged here, if there are no objections. It's an unreferenced description of what some managers do in the advertising industry. Dai Pritchard (talk) 17:20, 27 November 2014 (UTC)


 * Not any more! Advertising management is now a fully developed article, properly cited, with a strong conceptual framework and focussed on the processes used to manage the advertising function. The article on Advertising has too many problems, not the least that it is primarily concerned with history and social issues. It barely discusses advertising as a marketing function - and in the few places where it does, it is very confused. I am recommending that the Advertising article be merged with History of advertising BronHiggs (talk) 11:18, 4 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Not any more! Advertising management is now a fully developed article, properly cited, with a strong conceptual framework and focussed on the processes used to manage the advertising function. The article on Advertising has too many problems, not the least that it is primarily concerned with history and social issues. It barely discusses advertising as a marketing function - and in the few places where it does, it is very confused. I am recommending that the Advertising article be merged with History of advertising BronHiggs (talk) 11:18, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

'Advertizing'
A note should be included about how the spelling advertizing is considered correct by very few dictionaries and it is rare, even in the US, where it is commonest. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Meemo16 (talk • contribs) 00:06, 1 February 2015 UTC

Online Advertising
I think native advertising should be added to the online advertising section. As a percentage of total social ad spending, it projected native would rise from 38.8% in 2014 to 42.4% in 2017. Since it is a huge portion of ad spending, it makes sense to include it in the article.Adsguru (talk) 15:50, 24 July 2015 (UTC)


 * Dear Adsguru
 * There is already an article devoted to Native advertising. It doesn't make much sense to repeat that content here. Indeed WP has a number of articles devoted to below the line types of advertising including: Branded content; Contextual advertising; Online advertising and Embedded marketing. Much of the content in this article is repeated elsewhere. For instance the lengthy section devoted to the "History of advertising" is repeated almost word for word, heading for heading in History of advertising. The section on traditional media is more than adequately covered in Advertising; Advertising management; Marketing communications and Traditional media among others. The section on new media also receives good coverage on other articles, including most of the preceding and New media; Digital media as well as many narrower topics such as Online advertising and more. The section on "Hierarchy of effects models" is well covered in the article AIDA (marketing) and raises the very interesting question as to why of all the categories of models seeking to explain advertising effects, only hierarchy of effects models gets a mention.  The section on the "marketing mix" is also unfocussed, and covered in a number of other articles including Marketing and Marketing mix while the section on "Advertising research" is covered in the article Advertising research and also Advertising management. The section on "Criticisms" appears to duplicate material canvassed in Criticism of advertising. In fact, I am struggling to find anything in this article that is not actually the subject of another article or a section of a different article. And, most of the time, the other articles provide more informed and detailed coverage than what is provided here. BronHiggs (talk) 01:55, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to 1 one external link on Advertising. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20150402161409/http://www.comcastspotlight.com/sites/Default.aspx?pageid=7608&siteid=62&subnav=3 to http://www.comcastspotlight.com/sites/Default.aspx?pageid=7608&siteid=62&subnav=3

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the —cyberbot II  Talk to my owner :Online 10:02, 25 August 2015 (UTC)

New article on history of advertising
I propose a new article on the History of advertising to include much more detail than the current contents, and a full bibliography. Any suggestions or comments? Rjensen (talk) 04:14, 8 September 2015 (UTC)

Evaluation
Based on my evaluation, some the facts that do work are the ones that explain about the printing press impact to widespread of advertising. Also the example of pears soap is a legit source because it connected to another Wikipedia webpage that defined what it was. Facts that don’t work would be Volney B. Palmer because of I click his name Wikipedia does not give me information or bibliography on him so it could be irrelevant to the article. Some citations that need to be cited in the article from the subtitles of on the radio in 1820’s to Semiotics subtitle because viewers can tell that the article is less credible and more opinion based. It is great that there is research on ads but I would suggest to add more peer reviewed articles on advertising like Theory and method in the study of ad and brand attitudes: Toward a systemic model to make the article seem more professional. Rosedrive (talk) 12:36, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

Effectiveness of Television
Under "television advertising," I removed a couple sentences about a study that found TV to be the most effective way to advertise, since it was sponsored by a trade group that promotes TV advertising. A better source is needed."In 2014, a study conducted over 7 years found that the television commercial is still the most effective mass-market advertising format. The study's findings stated that for every £1 (GBP) invested in TV advertising, it returned £1.79."

- Previous version of the article

Advertising and advertising management
I propose that this article be dedicated to a general discussion about advertising and society (which could include history, criticisms and current trends including new media). A separate article, which already exists as a stub, entitled Advertising management, should be developed to cover the more detailed aspects of advertising theory (how advertising works) and advertising as part of the marketing program (including its role within the promotional mix).

The current page only pays lip service to advertising theory and fails to integrate that theory into a broader perspective of how advertising works. In addition, there are many aspects of advertising that are entirely overlooked in the current article, but are worthy of mention in a comprehensive article on how to manage the advertising function. These topics might include, but are not confined to; different types of advertising campaign, evaluating media options, media planning, scheduling, measuring advertising effects etc.

I have already started developing the Advertising management article and have put a more detailed proposal on the discussion page of that article for anyone who is interested. It may take me several weeks to complete the current proposal as posted on the discussion page, but I feel that it would be worthwhile for users who are interested in advertising as a management function rather than advertising as a socio-historical construct. BronHiggs (talk) 23:52, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Crazy table
Here follows a confusing table. Is it a forecast? Or is it actual estimates of adspend? It isn't at all clear from the title - you actually have to go to the code to find out that it is forecasted estimates of adspend. The casual reader may not wish to go to that amount of effort, but is likely to be very confused by the table. Obviously it cannot be actual estimates because we would have to wait until 2018 is OVER before seeing that data (two years away)! If we are in January, 2017, why do we need forecasts of 2015 adspend when that data has been published? Recommend removing the 2015 column and adding forecast to the title so that it is clear what is being presented. Forecast data can be tricky to use in tables. Good titles, column labels and/or footnotes can help to explain.

BronHiggs (talk) 10:32, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

Advertising, PR, Publicity and Generic Brands - very confused explanation in this section
Here follows a passage from the article, and my commentary:

''Unpaid advertising (also called "publicity advertising"), can include personal recommendations ("bring a friend", "sell it"), spreading buzz, or achieving the feat of equating a brand with a common noun (in the United States, "Xerox" = "photocopier", "Kleenex" = tissue, "Vaseline" = petroleum jelly, "Hoover" = vacuum cleaner, and "Band-Aid" = adhesive bandage). However, some companies[which?] oppose the use of their brand name to label an object. Equating a brand with a common noun also risks turning that brand into a generic trademark – turning it into a generic term which means that its legal protection as a trademark is lost.[57]'' [disputed – discuss]"

1. There is no such thing as 'unpaid advertising' By definition, advertising is a paid, non-personal form of communication designed to persuade." (It would be helpful if the article had a decent definition of advertising at the outset)

2. There is no such thing as 'publicity advertising.' Publicity occurs when a company, product or brand receives coverage in the media. Publicity is an outcome, not a marketing strategy. Publicity is usually inspired by corporate copy, generated through Public Relations efforts or Media Relations. And, publicity is not really free - companies have to pay salaries and overheads to keep PR departments going. It might be cheaper than advertising, but it is incorrect to say that it is free.

3. A personal recommendation is often called a word-of-mouth referral or recommendation. It is not a form of publicity or PR. It is a totally different type of promotion.

4. When a brand like Hoover becomes synonymous with the category, this is called a brand going generic and is a branding issue, rather than an advertising or promotion issue. Going generic can happen when brands become extremely dominant in the category and become a household name.

5. Some companies oppose their brand name to label an object. What does that sentence mean? There are laws governing the misuse of trademarks and brand names - it is about protecting the IP in brands. Companies may not like it when their brands go generic, but the reality is that there is little they can do about it. All they can do is sue a retailer or distributor who fails to supply the specified brand name when a consumer asks for it by name. These things are difficult to enforce, and are not likely to change popular usage. Well, that is all very interesting - but what does it have to do with advertising??

6. This paragraph has many conceptual and definitional problems - and it completely loses focus at the end when it gets into generics.

BronHiggs (talk) 10:52, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

Contradictions and other problems!
This article appears to contradict itself in a number of places.

Origins of modern advertising In the lead section and in Section 1.2. (20th century), Edward Bernays is considered the "founder of modern advertising" (1920s) BUT in Section 1.1. (19th century) Thomas J. Barratt from London is credited with being "the father of modern advertising". In yet another section, Volney B. Palmer "established the roots of the modern day advertising agency" in Philadelphia in 1840.

''So, which one and which time? Was 'modern advertising' a product of the nineteenth century or the early 20th century and who gets the honour - Barrat, Bernays or Palmer??? And, what do we even mean by the concept of modern advertising''?

Product placement Why use the term product placement in the sub-heading, but then call it covert advertising in the prose. This is very confusing. A good definition of product placement might also help. It is not just about placing products on film and TV sets, there are examples of books and journal articles that have been written about products when authors have been compensated to feature the product as part of the plot. Bulgari, for example, paid author, Fay Weldon, an undisclosed amount to feature the brand in her novel, The Bulgari Connection. Product placement is now coming to e-books.

Novelties: Novelty items are not considered advertising. They are sometimes called promotional items.

Celebrity branding I think that celebrity endorsements is the correct term. When celebs endorse products, it may or may not constitute advertising. When endorsements are used in advertisements, this is considered to be a distinct executional style rather than a distinct type of promotional activity. Celebrities also brand themselves - e.g. Madonna has reinvented her image multiple times while other celebs launch product ranges with their name. So the term, celebrity branding is very confusing. Does it refer to endorsements in ads or celebs branding their own image or product/brands carrying their name?

Point-of-sale is a form of sales promotion These two sections should be collapsed together.

Sales promotion and brand loyalty: The primary aim of sales promotion is to trigger a sale or to encourage the choice of a specific brand. It is not clear why this section is linked with brand loyalty which appears to be straying away from the central issue, namely advertising

BronHiggs (talk) 08:46, 10 January 2017 (UTC)


 * Re: the founder of moderm advertising, I'm not sure who it was but I'd say it probably wasn't Bernays. The books used as sources seemed to be focused on the tobacco industry in general; it would make more sense to use sources focused on advertising in general. (And there may be no need at all to identify one person as "the founder".) It does seem like this article has a lot of problems. These include a gap in history coverage from 1870–1910, and some sourcing which might be less than ideal. I'd like to work on this at some point but I don't know how much I can do right now. Cheers, groupuscule (talk) 04:36, 6 May 2017 (UTC)


 * Re: time periods And, not to mention the jump in time from the ancient Egyptians straight through to the nineteenth century (a jump of some 3,000 years). Yet, I have seen serious historians argue for advertising (or at least a form of proto-advertising) in antiquity, in France in the seventeenth century and elsewhere and in Italy much earlier. I remember reading E.S. Turner's, Shocking History of Advertising back in the 1980s and recall that he saw modern advertising emerge in England with the rise of the broadsheet newspaper in Elizabethan England in the 1700s. I think that there are other perspectives and time periods that could be canvassed to make this a much better article.


 * Re: The so-called 'father of advertising Some people credit David Ogilvy with the title of father of 'modern advertising'. I think that how you identify the father really depends on whether you are talking about 'modern advertising' or 'advertising in general' and also whether you are looking at developing the creative idea/ execution or the advertising strategy/plan. Either way, it seems like a moot point since I agree that identifying the so called 'father' is not especially insightful as a major contribution and whoever we decide is likely to be controversial with potential to lead to an edit war. It might be more worthwhile discussing the early pioneers of advertising (in the plural), rather than searching for a single individual to whom can be attached a relatively meaningless label such as father. I am no longer willing to edit articles on WP because I have been targeted by an unpleasant group of editors who are deleting all my contributions over some rather complex history which doesn't bear rehashing. However, if you did want to have a go at the early history of advertising, there is some material that might be useful. I put a timeline and set of references on the Marketing Research Talk Page (See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Marketing_research#History_of_Marketing_Research:_Much_Older_Heritage_than_Nielsen). You will soon see that much of the early development of market research methods was primarily concerned with improving advertising outcomes and many of the research techniques used today were originally devised by advertising agencies. So advertising and marketing research share a lot of the same history. The references used to compile this timeline are top quality and the list also identifies many of the early pioneers with wikilinks to the relevant bios. In addition, you might find that the article History of marketing which I recently expanded/ restructured has some interesting insights that are relevant to advertising and promotion and may provide a bit of context. (I am sorry to say that my conflict with the deleting editors precluded me from finalising the History of Marketing article, but I think there is more than enough there to get a sense of how it all connects.) I also have some more detailed material with references and timelines on my personal computer and am more than willing to share with anyone who wishes to improve these articles. My background is in history and in marketing/advertising, so I am well versed in this area and know my way around the sources. BronHiggs (talk) 07:17, 6 May 2017 (UTC)

useless information
Useless information that doesn't need to be taken note of is how much money the US spent on advertizing in 2015. I understand that it is important to explain how much people spend on it in order to explain it's importance, but the placement at the top after the thesis of the article defines that advertizing is (1)"an audio or visual form of marketing communication that employs an openly sponsored, nonpersonal message to promote or sell a product, service or idea" is useless. Something that does work in the article is how is explains why advertising and markesting are the foundtion of Human civilization and how it gives examples dating back to 4000 BC. Something that I would do to improve the article is talk more about how color is used in advertisment. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.51.93.164 (talk) 22:30, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

Test
Useless information that doesn't need to be taken note of is how much money the US spent on advertizing in 2015. I understand that it is important to explain how much people spend on it in order to explain it's importance, but the placement at the top after the thesis of the article defines that advertizing is (1)"an audio or visual form of marketing communication that employs an openly sponsored, nonpersonal message to promote or sell a product, service or idea" is useless. Something that does work in the article is how is explains why advertising and markesting are the foundtion of Human civilization and how it gives examples dating back to 4000 BC. Something that I would do to improve the article is talk more about how color is used in advertisment. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.51.93.164 (talk) 22:32, 6 March 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 6 external links on Advertising. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://archive.is/20120530044539/http://www.tvacres.com/adslogans_w.htm to http://www.tvacres.com/adslogans_w.htm
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20160804010556/http://www.zenithoptimedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Adspend-forecasts-December-2015-executive-summary.pdf to http://www.zenithoptimedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Adspend-forecasts-December-2015-executive-summary.pdf
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20141218194728/http://www.spotlightlocal.co.uk/annual-newspaper-ad-expenditures-newspaper-association-of-america/ to http://www.spotlightlocal.co.uk/annual-newspaper-ad-expenditures-newspaper-association-of-america/
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20090326200208/http://www.comcastspotlight.com/sites/Default.aspx?pageid=7608&siteid=62&subnav=3 to http://www.comcastspotlight.com/sites/Default.aspx?pageid=7608&siteid=62&subnav=3
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20160507012033/http://www.actnownews.com/deceiving-misleading-ads/ to http://www.actnownews.com/deceiving-misleading-ads/
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20151007111318/https://www.asa.org.uk/About-ASA/About-regulation to https://www.asa.org.uk/About-ASA/About-regulation

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 05:56, 26 July 2017 (UTC)

Research leads for history of advertising
The current article appears to be primarily concerned with the history of creativity in advertising and largely neglects the development of advertising as a scientific discipline and also neglects to consider the economic and social context for the history of advertising.

Here are a few leads pointing to a much earlier development of advertising thought than the current article credits:


 * 1730s Paris, France. The art dealer, Edme-François Gersaint made extensive use of advertising in the newspaper notably the Mercure of France to promote his business and forthcoming auctions; he also made extensive use of catalogs to sell paintings, decorative pieces and furniture
 * 1730s Daily newspapers in London devoted more than half of their available space to advertising Source: Berg, M. and Clifford, H., "Selling Consumption in the Eighteenth Century Advertising and the Trade Card in Britain and France," The Journal of the Social History Society, Volume 4, No. 2, 2007, Stable URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.2752/147800307X199001
 * 1895 Advertising agency, N. H. Ayer & Son used telegraph to contact publishers and state officials throughout the country about grain production, in an effort to construct an advertising schedule for client, Nichols-Shephard company, an agricultural machinery company (This has been described as the firs application of research to solve a marketing/ advertising problem) Source: Lawrence C. Lockley, Notes on the History of Marketing Research, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 14, No. 5 (Apr., 1950), pp. 733-736 https://www.jstor.org/stable/1246952?seq=1#fndtn-page_scan_tab_contents[Also note that some sources provide an earlier date of 1879 for this event; See for instance Kenneth E. Clow, Karen E. James, Essentials of Marketing Research: Putting Research Into Practice, p. 10] but the first cited source is more likely to be reliable because journal articles are peer-reviewed, while text-books do not undergo rigorous reviewing and as a consequence are more error-prone] Source: Suja R. Nair, Market Research: Text and Cases, 2nd ed., Himalaya Publishing House, 2014, p. 21 Online: www.himpub.com/documents/Chapter873.pdf


 * 1910 George B Waldron was doing qualitative research for Mahins Advertising Agency. This was one of the first instances of an agency using scientific research methods. Source: Lawrence C. Lockley, Notes on the History of Marketing Research, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 14, No. 5 (Apr., 1950), pp. 733-736 https://www.jstor.org/stable/1246952?seq=1#fndtn-page_scan_tab_contents


 * 1911 Charles Coolidge Parlin was appointed as the Manager of the Commercial Research Division of the Advertising Department of the Curtis Publishing Company - which has been described as marking the establishment of organised marketing research. Source: Suja R. Nair, Market Research: Text and Cases, 2nd ed., Himalaya Publishing House, 2014 Online: www.himpub.com/documents/Chapter873.pdf  See Talk above for mention of Parlin.


 * 1923 Arthur Nielsen founded market research & advertising company, A C Nielsen and over next decade pioneered the measurement of radio audiences. He subsequently applied his methods to the measurement of television audiences. Source Arthur Nielsen


 * Late 1920s/ 1930s Daniel Starch developed measures for testing advertising copy effectiveness, and these subsequently became known as Starch scores (and are still used today) Source: http://marketresearchworld.net/content/view/3754/49/ Also note that Starch has a bio on Wikipedia Daniel Starch


 * 1930s [New York] Ernest Dichter pioneered the focus group method of qualitative research techniques and, has been described as the 'father of motivational research."  Source: American Marketing Association (AMA), https://www.ama.org/resources/Best-Practices/Pages/Father-of-Research.aspx. Also note that Dichter has a bio on Wikipedia Ernest Dichter


 * 1957 Vance Packard published his book, The Hidden Persauders in which he criticised motivational research. This work resonated with the American middle class and was largely responsible for inculcating a deep suspicion over advertising methods. Source: Nelson, M.T., "The Hidden Persuaders: Then and Now," Journal of Advertising, Vol. 37, no. 1, 2008, DOI: 10.2753/JOA0091-3367370109, p. 114

If anyone would like to integrate these points into the article, please be my guest. I would like to rewrite this article to make it more accurate, but sadly cannot undertake such a project at the moment. I am being stalked by a small group of editors who have been engaging in vindictive editing and delete most of my contributions on the slightest pretext. After 6 months, I have not been able to shake them off, and have had to pull back and confine myself to making wiki tweaks, minor edits and adding images to articles. BronHiggs (talk) 01:14, 9 September 2017 (UTC)

Color Theory in Advertising
The colors that appear in advertisements are no mistake. I want to expand on the sciences behind color in advertising and how colors can trigger memories, feelings, or even create new ones all together. The subliminal science behind color is complex and a large part of how advertising works. I plan on exploring this topic and creating a better understanding as to why companies choose the logos they choose, and use the colors they choose.

Jamieasson (talk) 18:55, 30 October 2017 (UTC)Jamie AssonJamieasson (talk) 18:55, 30 October 2017 (UTC)


 * Research into the effect of colour in advertising has a very long tradition, dating back to the 1950s. Colour is just one of more than 160 executional elements that have been investigated extensively, in terms of their cognitive and affective (i.e. feeling) effects on prospective consumers. Other executional elements include such things as pictures, imagery, symbols, size/ length of advertisement, size of image, proportional size of image and text, fonts, pace, music and jingles, emphasis, layout, placement, sequence, etc. Most of this research is informed by cognitive science, psycholinguistics and visual imagery (but not subliminal science). I would be very concerned about any references to subliminal science which some might regard as a pseudo-science and hence, a dubious inclusion in an encyclopedia. Subliminal science certainly is not part of any serious advertising research.


 * Another consideration is the focus you intend to give to any contribution. Just looking at the proposed references, only one appears to have any direct bearing on advertising. One is concerned with colour and tipping behaviour (not advertising); another is concerned with colour of corporate logos (promotional, but not advertising) while a third is concerned with the relationship between colour and product failure. The connection with advertising effects is not at all clear in the set of references given here.


 * Finally, the article is about advertising - and it is already quite a long piece. If you decide to write a long section on colour, some people might say, why not include some or all of the other 160 executional elements. Of all the elements, why is colour singled out for special attention? In fact, the avaialable research appears to suggest that the combination of text and image has the greatest bearing on the amount of attention given to an advertising message and that colour is a relatively minor consideration in terms of grabbing attention and getting the message noticed. It would be much easier to make a strong case for the inclusion of a little more detail on text and pictures than for a detailed discussion of the use of colour. Wikipedia articles are intended to give readers an overview of a subject, rather than to write everything that is known about a subject.


 * I wonder whether some content about the science of colour might be better placed in the article on Color where a new section entitled Color and advertising could be added. You could then link to that from the advertising piece. If you decide to continue with this plan, please get back to me as I have some excellent references on this subject which focus on the relationship between colour and advertising effects (i.e. Cognitive effects (attention, awareness, noticing)' Affective effects (liking, preferences, feelings); Conative or behavioural effects (e.g. intentions, purchasing, etc) which I would be happy to pass onto you.

BronHiggs (talk) 02:52, 16 November 2017 (UTC)

Removing tags
Recently an editor removed the article tags (except citation needed tags) without any discussion on the talk page. At the time of inserting the tags, the issues were amply discusssed on the talk page. Simply removing the tags without discussion, does nothing to address the problems inherent in this article. and the tags arguably should remain until the problems are resolved. The article remains confused about many things:
 * Who founded or fathered modern advertising? Was it Thomas J. Barratt in the 19th-century, Volney B. Palmer in 1840 or Edward Bernays in the 1920s?
 * Perhaps other individuals were developing different aspects of the advertising industry? Some evidence suggests that advertising practices in the 16th and 17th centuries were quite sophisticated. (See, for instance Brand management; History of marketing;  Mail order for examples of early advertising practices)
 * Why do we even need a section devoted to the history of advertising when there is an entire article devoted to this topic? (See, History of advertising and also see History of advertising in Britain)
 * Were there no developments in the history of advertising between the time of the ancient Egyptians (4000BC) and the 19th century; an interval of almost 6,000 years? How did manufacturers communicate product information prior to the advent of mass media? How did consumers learn about products and services in pre-literate societies?
 * What was the role of trade cards; advertising postcards and posters in the 16th, 17th & 18th-centuries? Also see Edme-François Gersaint for an example of an elaborately decorated trade card dated 1740. Did these perhaps perform some of the roles of advertising?
 * Were modern developments primarily confined to the US, or were there developments on the other side of the Atlantic? In Britain, and Europe? (See, for example, Positioning (marketing))
 * Is advertising primarily about creative executions, or is there a bit more to the development of advertising as a serious discipline? What about advertising planning, strategy development, media scheduling?
 * Many of the concepts are poorly understood and incorrectly defined - e.g. point-of-sale etc and novelties are types of sales promotion rather than advertising. Product placement is not a type of advertising. These activities do not fit with the given definition of advertising as provided in the article - and important internal contradiction which should be remedied before users become too confused. In other words, the article has a poor focus, and continually discusses activities that are not properly part of the advertising repertoire.
 * Finally, it is difficult to understand how any history of modern advertising could ignore the contributions of David Ogilvy (businessman) who pioneered the positioning concept of brand image/ brand personality in advertising;Rosser Reeves who developed the concept of the unique selling proposition (USP) and J Walter Thompson who established one of the earliest advertising agencies. And, there were many others who developed different facets of advertising that are still used today. BronHiggs (talk) 08:08, 19 March 2018 (UTC)

More fathers of advertising?
Eighteen months ago, this article claimed that there were three different 'fathers of advertising' with each claim being made in a different section of the article. Over the ensuing months, these were whittled down to one so-called 'father of advertising' namely Thomas J Barrat of London. Now, suddenly, we are being treated to no less than five fathers of advertising!

The most recent addition is as follows:

"'Fathers of Advertising
 * later 1700's - Benjamin Franklin - 'Father of Advertising in America'
 * late 1800's - Thomas J. Barratt of London - called 'the father of modern advertising' by T F G Coates.
 * early 1900's - J. Henry ('Slogan') Smythe, Jr - 'world's best known slogan writer'
 * early 1900's - Albert_Lasker - the 'father of modern advertising' -- defined advertising as “salesmanship in print, driven by a reason why.”
 * mid 1900's - David Ogilvy - advertising tycoon, founder of Ogilvy & Mather, and known as the 'Father of Advertising'"

So, let's have a closer look at them:
 * 1. Benjamin Franklin- the cited book makes many claims for Franklin's roles, but sadly fathering advertising is not one of them
 * 2. Thomas J Barratt of London - this claim has no source, but mercifully a source is provided for this person elsewhere in the article
 * 3. J. Henry ("Slogan") Smythe - said to be the "best slogan writer" - but I question whether slogan writing is equivalent to fathering an industry. If he was so good at writing slogans, it assumes that the industry already existed, so making any claim about fathering is not logical
 * 4. Albert Lasker - the source is Wikibooks, a circular reference, which allows the article to reintroduce one of the three fathers from the article's previous incarnation
 * 5. David Ogilvy - unreferenced claim; as far as I know the only person who has ever claimed that Ogilvy was the father of advertising is Ogilvy himself - and the earlier version of this article made this claim about Ogilvy using a reference to Ogilvy's website. I think anyone would struggle to find a reliable source that claims Ogilvy was the father of an industry - and I suppose this is why this line remains without a reference.

What is the penchant for identifying 'fathers of advertising' all about? Is it even necessary? Scholarly histories of advertising point out that advertising evolved in an incremental way following the development of magazines and newspapers in Europe from around the 16th century. There were, however, some examples of advertising such as posters that predate that.

Apart from mentioning Thomas J Barrat of London, why is the list so American-centric? In London, the advertising agency W. S. Crawford's was using the idea of advertising a brand personality from the first decades of the 20th-century. Scholars suggest that the concept of brand personality, which was central to modern advertising, was developed independently and simultaneously by both Crawford's in the UK and J. Walter Thompson in the US in the first decades of the 20th-century. After all, the industrial revolution and the associated era of mass marketing began in Britain, so just logically, we would expect that the earliest attempts to communicate with mass audiences would have begun in Britain rather than the US.

Why are we so determined to give Ogilvy (1911-1999), who was active from as late as 1949-1973, a role in 'fathering' an industry that was clearly very already well established before he became an active participant? Certainly, he was influential in developing the Positioning (marketing) concept, but it's a really big stretch from that to a claim that he 'fathered' an entire industry! But many important developments preceded him - not the least the rise of radio advertising in the 1920s.

And, why are we so determined to write a history of advertising that is only concerned with the development of advertising copy-writing/ creative execution, and ignores the other aspects of advertising such as media planning, measuring advertising outcomes, advertising research etc.?

Finally, given that WP already has one article dedicated to History of advertising and another similar article with a narrower focus History of advertising in Britain, along with snippets of advertising history embedded in multiple marketing-related articles including, but not confined to: History of marketing; Brand management, why does this article need to have a history section at all - couldn't it just link to these articles?

I really wish that someone would read one of the excellent histories of advertising, whether in a book or article form, and present a coherent and serious treatment of the history of advertising. It is actually really very interesting to learn how modern advertising evolved over many centuries.

BronHiggs (talk) 00:31, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 6 March 2019
Please change section Classification as following:

The term above the line (ATL) is used for advertising involving mass media; more targeted forms of advertising and promotion are referred to as below the line (BTL) .[50] The two terms date back to 1954 when Procter & Gamble began paying their advertising agencies differently from other promotional agencies.[51] In the 2010s, as advertising technology developed, a new term, through the line (TTL) began to come into use, referring to integrated advertising campaigns.[52] Hiten Jha (talk) 21:32, 6 March 2019 (UTC)


 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done for now: I'm not sure I understand what you want replaced. The text in your request is the same as in the article except for the sources. Are you wanting to replace the existing web article sources  with a singular book source and change the placement of the sources?


 * I'm all for adding additional reliable sources when needed but I don't see the need to remove the existing sources as they still work.    Alucard 16  ❯❯❯ chat?    12:27, 7 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes check.svg Done Added source see discussion at my talk page.    Alucard 16  ❯❯❯ chat?    12:51, 7 March 2019 (UTC)

Extended protected is more good — Preceding unsigned comment added by 110.136.59.236 (talk) 06:17, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

Citation suggested
Examples of online advertising include contextual ads that appear on search engine results pages, banner ads, in pay per click text ads, rich media ads, Social network advertising, online classified advertising, advertising networks and e-mail marketing, including e-mail spam.

The 'Fathers of advertising' tab should be moved
In my opinion, the 'The Fathers of advertising' tab should be moved to before the 'See also' tab as in my opinion it looks strange to have it after the 'See also' tab.

Semi-protected edit request on 9 March 2021
Would like to add relevant thumbnails of examples of advertisements. AdrianWilliamsGA1 (talk) 22:10, 9 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Semi-protection-unlocked.svg Not done: According to the page's protection level you should be able to edit the page yourself. If you seem to be unable to, please reopen the request with further details. &#8209;&#8209; El Hef  ( Meep? ) 23:07, 9 March 2021 (UTC)

Article page Semi-protected write a request by going to the talk page and then clicking new section. ( User talk: Not Logged In ) Japanese Advertisements are annoying to us a lot. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.205.126.83 (talk) 12:50, 16 March 2021 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 26 April 2021
Advertising and marketing are not two separate specialties. Marketing is a part of Advertising, meaning that marketing was invented when corporations started to have their own advertising team in house. AdvertizenOy (talk) 01:25, 26 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 01:43, 26 April 2021 (UTC)

Advertising is a Marketing tool, but Marketing is not just Advertising. They are two separate categories/entities where Marketing encompasses Advertising, Public Relations, Market Analysis & Research, etc. --Ejenriquez (talk) 02:57, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

Better Example Photo
Is it possible to have a better example photo for advertising? Billboards? How difficult is it find in a public domain? --Ejenriquez (talk) 03:08, 15 December 2021 (UTC)

Is it really necessary to mention disposable diapers as an ad meduim?
I was having a meal while reading the article. I did not expect to read that word, it's disgusting and have spoiled my meal. There is a lot of places you can put an ad on, why specifically mention diapers? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Juriy9 (talk • contribs) 02:50, 19 December 2021 (UTC)

Vikas
Techno Gamer Gra. 5 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 42.105.121.225 (talk) 06:57, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

How Advertising Targets Our Children
I always wanted somewhat cynical children, at least where advertising and proselytizing are concerned. That is, I wanted my children to grow up alert to the silken, studied salesmanship of those who want your trust but are not really your friends. I grew up in the era of unfettered television advertisements for tobacco. I remember all the jingles — but I also remember the welcome cynicism of Mad Magazine parodies in which gravestones discussed the great taste of cigarettes and Hitler endorsed them as terrific mass murderers. In serious discussions of advertising today, I sometimes miss that harsh humor. Researchers have long focused on the effects of cigarette and alcohol ads on children — and more recently, on the effects of subtler marketing through product placement in movies and TV shows. Studies show that advertising does help push children and adolescents toward unhealthy behaviors, but also that it is increasingly difficult to shield them as marketers exploit the Internet and social media. In a study published last month in the journal Pediatrics, Jerry L. Grenard, a health researcher at Claremont Graduate University, and his colleagues followed almost 4,000 students from seventh through 10th grades, assessing their exposure to alcohol advertising on television and asking about their alcohol use. A large body of literature shows that advertising does increase the odds of underage drinking, Dr. Grenard noted. But his new results take the concerns a step further. “This study linked exposure to alcohol advertising to an increase in alcohol use among adolescents and then that in turn is associated with higher level of problems with drinking alcohol, getting drunk, missing school, getting into fights,” he said. Adolescents who see alcohol advertising are being sold something that we would prefer them not to consume in any amount. Food advertising raises different issues, since children will certainly eat and will certainly have — and express — food preferences. Jennifer Harris, the director of marketing initiatives at the Yale Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity, told me that television advertising remains very important in the ways that foods are marketed to children. According to the center’s data, every day on average in the United States, children and teenagers see 12 to 14 food ads on television. But parents may not realize that their children are also subjected to messages from advertisers coming in from other directions. “They have Web sites with reward programs. They’re advertising on other Web sites, social media — Facebook is huge — Twitter, mobile marketing, mobile apps,” Dr. Harris said. Many children are playing “advergames” online, for example, intended to promote products. Parents may be completely unaware, she said. And what are they marketing to children? According to Dr. Harris, the top four products are fast foods, sugared cereals, sugary drinks and candy. Thomas Robinson, a professor of pediatrics at Stanford University and Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital, has studied childhood obesity and its links to screen time. In experiments with preschoolers, he told me, “even a 30-second exposure to a novel product, one that you’ve never seen before, changes their preferences for brand.” In another study, researchers looked at the effects of branding by giving 3- to 5-year-olds two portions of identical foods, one set out on a McDonald’s wrapper. The children were asked to point to which foods tasted better and, Dr. Robinson said, “overwhelmingly, for hamburgers, French fries, baby carrots, milk or juice in a cup, kids would say the one on the McDonald’s wrapper tastes better.” Up to the age of 7 or 8, children are thought to be unable to understand the nature of advertising — developmentally, they can’t identify the underlying persuasive intent. Older children may have a better understanding of commercials, but they are vulnerable in other ways. “Coke is the most popular brand on Facebook,” Dr. Harris said. “It has 58 million fans.” When adolescents “like” Coke, they receive posts every day, which they may then “share” with friends. “That whole tapping into the peer relationship that kids of that age have is, we think, very deceptive,” Dr. Harris said. “They don’t necessarily recognize that it’s advertising and also very manipulative.” What can parents do? With young children, the most important strategy is probably to reduce screen time, and the number of messages, and to keep track of what they’re seeing when they do watch TV. And when a child asks for something, parents should not simply refuse. “Respond, ‘Well, why do you want that? Where did you hear about it?’ ” said Dr. Robinson. And if the answer is that the child saw it on TV or on the Internet, “Say, ‘Well, they want you to want it, they’re trying to sell you that.’ And then have a discussion.” And what about my aspirations of nurturing young cynics? Though teaching critical viewing skills does enhance children’s awareness, Dr. Robinson told me that relying too much on notions of media literacy can actually play into the hands of the advertisers. “That takes the responsibility away from them and puts it on the kids to be educated consumers,” he said. Know what your children are watching. Watch with them. Talk about what you see — the images on billboards or on touchscreens, the Super Bowl commercials, the Web sites they visit. In an information-rich world, we need to know the messages children are receiving, and help them decode and understand what the world is trying to sell them. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 167.217.31.28 (talk) 18:39, 28 January 2022 (UTC)