Informative Advertising: The Dangers Of Manipulative Advertising

Advertising is designed to get information from the companies to the consumers. With that being said, there are several ways in which companies will go about this to ensure that their information is relayed to the consumers effectively and efficiently. According to George N. Root, from Demand Media, “advertising uses misguided promises of desired results to convince customers to purchase a product.” Nancy Day expresses in her book, when there are many of the same products, companies need to convince the public that their product is superior. Which results in an increase in the demand for advertising (7-8). This is when informative advertising turns into manipulative advertising. Root goes on to explain that advertising agencies use manipulative techniques such as “expert” opinion, attractiveness, lifestyle, and fear to control their audience. Most people feel more obligated to buy something if an expert recommends it. For this reason companies will trick people by using actors who have played well-known characters on T.V. For example, actress S. Epatha Merkerson, most commonly known for her role in Law and Order, is a spokesperson for Coricidin HBP, a product specifically designed to “relieve

With that comes a huge responsibility for the advertising industry to make their advertisements appropriate and reasonable according to staying true to facts about their product; but there is also a responsibility for the consumers: to be aware of what we are is ingesting day to day and whether the desire we feel for a product is genuine. According to David Lamoureux, author of “Advertising: How Many Marketing Messages Do We See in a Day?” the average person will encounter as many as 3,000 to 20,000 advertisements a day. Which means that as consumers, we need to be aware of where and why advertisements are directing our attention to a specific