Tell me lies, tell me sweet little lies
So are all marketers just a bunch of raging liars? Well, if you listen to Seth Godin, author of "All Marketers are Liars," they sure are. He was featured on today's episode of Marketplace from American Public Radio. If you have speakers (a rather ridiculous thing for me to say, but I've gotten used to asking it, since my computer at work is speakerless), you should check it out. I think it's only five minutes, tops.
Godin gives an interesting take on marketing, and really public relations as well. He says that there's not enough time or money to tell the whole truth of a product or an organization, so instead we tell stories. And consumers have been trained to rely on stories, so much so that he argues people now need a story or they won't buy a product (or join an organization, or give to a charity, etc.). Depending on how cynical you are, one could even take this to mean that Americans need to be duped into buying something.
This makes me think of some of the stupidest things I've bought in my life, because I was duped by advertising. Hands down, number one has got to be the "Turbo Grafx 16," this video game system that came out in the early 1990s. I was pleased as pudding when I bought it, and then three years later when my friends were jamming on their Playstations, I was sitting on my ass playing Bonk's Adventure and watching Toys R Us discontinue (painfully, slowly, day-by-day) every single item that had to deal with my machine. As you can imagine, I was one pissed off, acne-plagued 14 year old. "First they cancelled The Golden Girls, and now this," I thought. Thankfully, my video game fix didn't last once I got into high school, but still, the trauma was there.
The second most stupid thing I can think of off the top of my head was just a couple weeks ago. I bought Burger King chicken tenders, because the sign outside said they were shaped like "lightning bolts and stars." I ate three of them, and then it hit me, "Wait a second...chicken isn't shaped like lightning bolts and stars!" Gross. I don't even want to think about what Burger King must do to their chicken tenders to get them to look like celestial beings...
Anyway, I digress...check out the Marketplace spot with Seth Godin. Catch ya' later.
Godin gives an interesting take on marketing, and really public relations as well. He says that there's not enough time or money to tell the whole truth of a product or an organization, so instead we tell stories. And consumers have been trained to rely on stories, so much so that he argues people now need a story or they won't buy a product (or join an organization, or give to a charity, etc.). Depending on how cynical you are, one could even take this to mean that Americans need to be duped into buying something.
This makes me think of some of the stupidest things I've bought in my life, because I was duped by advertising. Hands down, number one has got to be the "Turbo Grafx 16," this video game system that came out in the early 1990s. I was pleased as pudding when I bought it, and then three years later when my friends were jamming on their Playstations, I was sitting on my ass playing Bonk's Adventure and watching Toys R Us discontinue (painfully, slowly, day-by-day) every single item that had to deal with my machine. As you can imagine, I was one pissed off, acne-plagued 14 year old. "First they cancelled The Golden Girls, and now this," I thought. Thankfully, my video game fix didn't last once I got into high school, but still, the trauma was there.
The second most stupid thing I can think of off the top of my head was just a couple weeks ago. I bought Burger King chicken tenders, because the sign outside said they were shaped like "lightning bolts and stars." I ate three of them, and then it hit me, "Wait a second...chicken isn't shaped like lightning bolts and stars!" Gross. I don't even want to think about what Burger King must do to their chicken tenders to get them to look like celestial beings...
Anyway, I digress...check out the Marketplace spot with Seth Godin. Catch ya' later.
posted by MikeJ at
7:16 PM
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