Every leaf speaks bliss to me
flittering
from the
autumn tree.

One of the Many Issues Within Advertising

As someone who hates commercials on the tube or the radio, it’s hard to appreciate those who work their butts off in the marketing world to come up with those 30 second to one-minute clips. The annoying blurbs of color and sound that are supposed to grab our attention and get us to buy something, or convince us we have some hidden disease. Some of the advertising companies thrive by coming up catchy songs, slogans, or stupid commercials that can never be unseen or unheard from our minds again, they are forever engraved, which I guess is one way marketers succeed. One that comes to mind immediately is the radio jingle “1-800-411-PAIN” that a consumer would call if they’ve been in a car accident.

I personally believe that marketers try too hard to get our attention to focus on one product that is ‘better” than the rest. One of my biggest pet peeves that I have with todays marketing behaviors is the manipulation of images of people in commercials and advertisements. I also think this is a large marketing issue because with advertisers using Photoshop to edit, touch up, or airbrush out imperfections to make a photo, actor, or model appear more attractive, what kind of messages are those marketers sending girls and boys growing up? Sometimes this sort of manipulation that is meant to be subtle goes too far.

With young girls being most vulnerable, they are often bombarded with images of “perfect” bodies. With younger minds being more impressionable, in every magazine, commercial, movie, or television show they see it all sends the same message: this is how you should look and behave and if you don’t look this way or act like this then something is wrong with you. These unrealistic goals set out by society, by marketers, is unrealistic and can add to anxiety and stress to growing up and can even last into adulthood.

Of course school counselors and parents try to teach their children the differences between what is real and fake, but with the amount of ads a child or teenager sees on a daily basis, it can still be hard to differentiate as a young person. Below is a link to The Perfect Lie, a short video on how the ads of women we see in our day-to-day lives, cause young girls and even adult women to think and how Photoshop works.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wUb5PZHcovA

“Advertising is the art of arresting the human intelligence just long enough to get money from it,” said Chuck Blore, a partner in the advertising firm Chuck Blore and Don Ruchman, Inc. While this quote may be true in the world of marketing, how far must you go to “arrest” someone’s mind to implant an idea in order to make money off it, if how you are going about selling the item is detrimental to the generation growing up?

I think marketers today would get a lot more attention, praise, following and money if they were to keep their photos and commercials as realistic as possible. Sending a positive message to young girls and even boys growing up that it is okay to be who you are, look how you look, and act how you act because we all think differently and are unique, but that is what makes us beautiful. Marketers need to be a leader of their own brands that they advertise to society everyday, not a follower of other marketing strategies and norms. I guarantee that marketers can find a way to show a commercial or put out a picture of a girl advertising their brand in a magazine or on a billboard, without making girls feel like they need to achieve some unrealistic goal of being perfect.

Companies like Dove and American Eagle have successfully advertised their products without enhancing pictures of their models. Dove specifically advertises women with full healthy figures, instead of having a tall size zero models like Victoria Secret. I applaud companies like such who decide to step outside the box of marketing strategies to make the “perfect” girl, because there is no perfect girl. Once big name companies grasp what these two companies have realized and jump on the train to success, girls and women in society can feel comfortable in their own skin, marketers can stop lying, and those companies will get more appreciation and money from their target audience.

A Tainted Truth

Many people believe every age marks something significant, that you should accomplish a certain something by a certain time. Your first kiss, losing your virginity, getting married. Learning to drive, knowing what you want to be, succeeding in your goals. But that’s not true. Let things just happen. Make sure you’re ready. Stay wise. Give yourself time to develop. There is no rush to live.

THERE IS A LITTLE TRUTH BEHIND EVERY 

{ just kidding }

A LITTLE CURIOSITY BEHIND EVERY

{ just wondering }

A LITTLE KNOWLEDGE BEHIND EVERY

{ I don't know }

AND A LITTLE EMOTION BEHIND EVERY

 { i don't care }