There’s a fundamental problem within the marketing industry, that almost nothing that’s being sold is something you even remotely need. Economics says that consumers are rational. If that’s the case we would almost never buy anything. Marketing exists at odds with that principle.
If you won’t buy it unless you need it, then they have to create need with their marketing.
If they’re selling you a pen, any pen will write, but this pen will change the way you write! It’s life changing! You need this pen, it’ll be the last pen you ever buy!
If they can’t convince you to need it, you won’t buy it.
There’s another problem, and that’s that we, collectively, are losing our attention spans. The constant access to new media means we never have to spend long on anything, something new is always at our fingertips, and we, collectively, aren’t really that patient anymore.
Before you comment on this with some anecdote about how you’ve only gotten more focused, actually. That’s missing the point, in general we’re getting worse, not better.
So now ads can’t take the time to tell you how great this pen is, really, even if it will change your life, they only have about 5 seconds before you’ve forgotten about it forever. So they have to be louder, more aggressive, and more pervasive. In whatever breed of tiktok style content you choose, you’ll stumble across videos that are blatant ads for a product that make no mention of it. Ads disguised as content, in the modern format. “Hi guys so I just got this pen and it’s l1t3rally life changing” over the top of a cool looking pen writing smoothly.
Will it work on you? Probably not, advertising gains take place in tenths of percentage points. You’re a smart consumer and never fall for such blatant ads, and for you they have a tactic too. Every single piece of content you consume is just full of ads, subtly conditioning you towards every product on the planet. Because if they don’t, you’ll keep your old shit that still works and never buy anything.
I’m a big fan of Pilot G2s, though I find the finer ones don’t last through an entire cartridge.
I specifically used pens because how pointless a good pen is, when the 5 dollar box of 60 Bic Round Stick Ms is perfectly acceptable and it’s literally the only pen most people will use every day if they use one that frequently.
A great pen is only a little better than a good one, and bad pens are available at every price.
There’s a fundamental problem within the marketing industry, that almost nothing that’s being sold is something you even remotely need. Economics says that consumers are rational. If that’s the case we would almost never buy anything. Marketing exists at odds with that principle.
If you won’t buy it unless you need it, then they have to create need with their marketing.
If they’re selling you a pen, any pen will write, but this pen will change the way you write! It’s life changing! You need this pen, it’ll be the last pen you ever buy!
If they can’t convince you to need it, you won’t buy it.
There’s another problem, and that’s that we, collectively, are losing our attention spans. The constant access to new media means we never have to spend long on anything, something new is always at our fingertips, and we, collectively, aren’t really that patient anymore.
Before you comment on this with some anecdote about how you’ve only gotten more focused, actually. That’s missing the point, in general we’re getting worse, not better.
So now ads can’t take the time to tell you how great this pen is, really, even if it will change your life, they only have about 5 seconds before you’ve forgotten about it forever. So they have to be louder, more aggressive, and more pervasive. In whatever breed of tiktok style content you choose, you’ll stumble across videos that are blatant ads for a product that make no mention of it. Ads disguised as content, in the modern format. “Hi guys so I just got this pen and it’s l1t3rally life changing” over the top of a cool looking pen writing smoothly.
Will it work on you? Probably not, advertising gains take place in tenths of percentage points. You’re a smart consumer and never fall for such blatant ads, and for you they have a tactic too. Every single piece of content you consume is just full of ads, subtly conditioning you towards every product on the planet. Because if they don’t, you’ll keep your old shit that still works and never buy anything.
I now want to buy this pen about which you speak.
You also missed a golden meta opportunity to shill out your post to BIC®
My ad blocker seems to be having issues, I can see this comment which is an ad /s
I’m a big fan of Pilot G2s, though I find the finer ones don’t last through an entire cartridge.
I specifically used pens because how pointless a good pen is, when the 5 dollar box of 60 Bic Round Stick Ms is perfectly acceptable and it’s literally the only pen most people will use every day if they use one that frequently.
A great pen is only a little better than a good one, and bad pens are available at every price.