Re: TAN - Are TV ads effective?

In rec.arts.tv.soaps.abc on 08 Nov 2003 17:32:31 -0800  in Msg.#
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, walt <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> Ain't that the truth!  I can't imagine buying a product because
> the company PAID some fatcat celebrity to endorse it :-/

I am not necessarily swayed one way or the other. It's according. But,
of course, since our culture of celebrity has gotten so completely out
of hand, s'leb endorsements have too, as well as names & logos on
things. I still think that if we're wearing an advertisement for their
product they should pay us! 

Some of it is troubling though. Take for example Magic Johnson & the
HIV+ cocktail drugs. He does ads for them. You'd think from the ads
that he takes them & attributes his healthy state at least partly to
them. Not so. He took them & immediately began having the side effects
& went off of them. Yet he is on the tube, on mag pages, in the subway
on posters, ... for a whole bunch of them. It's a perpetuation of a
health myth that is dangerous, I think.

> It's simply beyond my comprehension why the ad execs think the
> billions they spend on endorsements actually influence anyone
> to buy.

They work.

> I hope to God they're wrong about the intelligence of the
> American consumer.  If they're right -- the U.S. is in BIG
> trouble.

Well, when you get right down to it, measuring these things is not a
science it's an art. Because it's all in how you gather your group,
phrase your questions, interpret your replies, etc. Focus Groups for
soaps are an even better example of that possible folly!

-- 
DonnaB  <*>  8^>    "One of the few perks of being in hell: everybody smokes 
cigarettes - except TV executives & lawyers. They get to smoke Cuban cigars - for a 
job well done." - the ghost of Roger Smythe to Greenlee, AMC, 10-22-03