第九类 广告

01 Do advertisements make products appear better than they really are?

1.1 Yes

1.1.1 海飞丝

It's perfectly natural for shampoo commercials to exaggerate their effects. For example, the selling points and slogan for Head &Shoulders is anti-dandruff and oil-control. In the ad, a man with tons of dandruff tried the shampoo, and somehow all the dandruff disappeared. I was very troubled by dandruff in middle school, so I gladly bought a big bottle of Head & Shoulders, but it did not work at all. I felt like a fool.

1.1.2 康师傅牛肉面

Ads always disappoint me. The real product is never as good as it appears on TV. For example, I once was naively excited by the amazing tasty videos of Master Kong's instant beef noddles. In the ad, there was tons of beef, and like five different kinds of vegetables, not to mention the killer juicy seasoning. So I rushed to the small shop downstairs, bought a boxful of Master Kong's instant beef noddles, just to find out that there was no beef at all, no vegetables, no juicy seasoning, but only a small pack of salt and pepper.

1.2 No

1.2.1 农夫山泉

Not every ad exaggerates the merits of its products. For example, the famous slogan for Nongfu Spring water is: A little sweetness in Nongfu Spring Water. Indeed, when I tried it for the first time, it was sweet. And it has been sweet all these years without any change. It has become my favorite brand of bottled water ever since. If you compare it with Wahaha or Yibao, you will notice that the latter two brands all have this subtle bitter taste, which I do not enjoy at all. So this is one of the ads that do not attempt to beautify the product.

1.2.2 宝矿力

Most people wouldn't believe it, but there indeed are some ads that decrease the sales volume of their product. For example, I once saw an ad for POCARI Sweat on a double-decker bus. I was just about to cross the street on foot, and I saw the slogan, painted markedly on the body of the bus. It goes,“Different from the taste of sweat?” and I was like,“what the hell is it trying to express?” I was thinking, of course, the taste of my favorite sports beverage should taste different than that of real human sweat, and the next time when I was about to drink POCARI after a badminton match, I inevitably recalled this slogan, which made me feel that I was about to drink a whole bottle of human sweat. I had stopped drinking the brand for like two months, until I made myself forget about this horrible slogan.

1.2.3 脑白金

If there is a poll for Chinese to vote for their least favorite ad, I bet the ad for Melatonin would win. It's not that the ad sucked. It was OK. But the problem is, the company ran its ad too frequently, to the point that people started to feel sick. The ad was aired, if I remember correctly, about 10 years ago, when I was in middle school. We were asked to watch CCTV news every night at 7:00 p. m. , and the ad was placed right before the news started. So, in other words, we were forced to listen to the repetitive and invariable ad for years to come. Most adults have the habit of watching news to keep up with current events. In a way, they are forced to watch the ad as well. The result is, of course, aesthetic fatigue. When people are overexposed to something, they will hate it eventually. I guess I will never buy Melatonin for the seniors in my family, just because of this terrible ad.

02 Do you think advertisements have great influence on what we buy?

2.1 巨大影响

2.1.1 激发情感

Advertisements have great influence on what people buy, because they somehow convince us that we can fulfill our desires if we merely buy a product. For example, Dior's commercials are not about the introduction of their products. They are more like dramas about handsome guys and beautiful women wearing those clothes and bags. They tell nothing about the bag being sold, which is not worth about $2,000 at all, but they tell everything about the fancies and dreams of those who might buy them. And every time I watch this commercial, I want to buy that bag the woman is carrying. And I wish to be as beautiful as the woman in the ad. I feel I would be so confident walking with a Dior bag.

2.1.2 名人效应

Usually, people are more likely to accept an advertising claim made by somebody famous, a person we admire and find appealing. We tend to think they are trustworthy. You might have a car commercial that features a well-known race car driver. Now it may not be a very fast car. It could even be an inexpensive vehicle with a low performance rating, but if a popular race car driver is shown driving it, and saying“I like my cars fast”, then people will believe the car is impressive for its speed.

2.2 没有影响

I am totally immune to advertising, because it is deceptive. I once watched a car commercial, which referred to its roomy cars over and over again. There was a guy who kept stopping and picking up different people.He picked up three or four people, and each time the narrator said,“plenty of room for friends, plenty of room for families, plenty of room for everybody”. The same message was repeated several times in the course of the commercial. People get the sense that it's a spacious car, but the reality is that it's a very small car. So, you see, most advertisements are not trying to help people make better decisions. They're usually trying to harvest their money more efficiently by engaging them emotionally. I don't watch advertisements at all.

03 What is your least favorite ad?

3.1 虚假广告

I don't like any advertisement related to instant noodles because it makes its products seem much better than they truly are. Usually, in an instant noodles commercial, there is a guy who is enjoying his delicious noodles, with lots of toppings, such as pork, shrimp, and lobster. It just seems so divine. What makes me feel angry is that, there is no meat at all in the instant noodles I buy in the supermarket. The“Chicken” flavor only includes chicken fat or powder, the“Beef” flavor includes beef fat and the“Shrimp” flavor includes shrimp powder. It just makes me feel indignant as a consumer. Why can't the commercial just tell the truth?

3.2 重复广告语

I hate advertisements that use repetition as a strategy. I once watched a car commercial, which referred to its roomy cars over and over again. There was a guy who kept stopping and picking up different people. He picked up three or four people, and each time the narrator said“plenty of room for friends, plenty of room for families, plenty of room for everybody”. The same message was repeated several times in the course of the commercial. People get the sense that it's a spacious car, but the reality is that it's a very small car. And I got very bored when the statement“plenty of room” is repeated often enough.