Does Advertisements Work?

Forbes released a list of the 100 most valuable brands in 2016, sitting on top of the list is Apple Inc.

Apple has a brand value of $154.1B, the brand revenue was $233.7B with company advertising cost pegged at $1.8B.

Gillette at no. 29 made a revenue of $7B and spent $8.3 on company advertising.

This confirms the theory that extensive advertisement does not always translate into huge sales.

Customers lured by ads are not always loyal, this same truth has been discovered by magazines and other publishing media that rely heavily on advertisement to sell their wares.

There are a lot of advertisement tactics being utilized by various companies in other to sell their products and services, TV spots, contests, unsolicited telephone sales

Most of this advertisement tactics only succeed in annoying consumers, this has been the reason for the success of Tivo and other Tivo like products because it allows consumers to eliminate intrusive ads.

Why is Overdependence On Advertising is Harmful?

To an extent, advertisement is addictive, once you are hooked it becomes difficult to stop.

Once you become accustomed to putting a fixed advertising cost on your budget be it Facebook ads or Forum ads, you will be afraid to stop because of the baseless fear that once you stop, your flow of new customers will dry up, and your previous investment will be wasted.

On Occasions a particular ad can produce lots of business, a flash in the pan success which most businesses are not always ready for, this bring an initial flow of customers to the business.

Most loyal long term customers are turned off when customer service declines due to the business stretching itself too thin, and most new customers are not repeat customers.

There are various lies that advertising supporters tells business owners, they include:

The ad can always be improved.

People who saw the ad but did not click were reminded of your business and may patronize you in the future.

The effects of advertising are cumulative keep on advertising forever.

Those theories have huge holes in them, an ad that does not resonate well with the consumers would have no effect and may even create a bad reputation for the company.

A good example is Sony, in anticipation of the launch of Sony’s ceramic white PSP, the company embarked upon a bizarre ad campaign featuring over 100 unique images and adverts with the motif of black vs. white.

To the surprise of, well, nobody, many people found these ads, which featured racial representations of ‘black’ and ‘white’ characters violently attacking one another, rather offensive, to say the least.

Sony denied that there was any racial message intended and that the aesthetics were simply chosen as a representation of the ‘blackness’ and ‘whiteness’ of the respective consoles.

This goes a long way to show that advertisement if not properly handled can backfire.

What are your thoughts on the opinions I have expressed in this post, do you think that advertisements are very effective, let me know in the comments.