Frontline: The Persuaders

What are some things that you learned about advertising after watching this video?
That advertising has switched more to emotional belonging, a cult like effect, to get consumers to be die hard devoted instead of just fans.

There are unconscious emotions buried deep in our brains for every product we buy.

Buzzwords or the twisting of words can send completely different messages while still saying the conveying the same thing.

What are some of the main problems that plagues contemporary advertising?
The creation of clutter and trying to break through the clutter.

Many advertising creators lean more towards advertising to themselves, and doing what they want to do by making it artsy, funny, or clever. This leads to them not reaching the original goal of trying to sell the product to the consumer.

The 30 second TV spot is no longer as strong as it once was, and because of DVR being able to fast forward through commercials the advertisers are looking to integrate their products with the tv shows themselves in some sort of hybrid product placement.

What are some of the ethical concerns about advertising that we need to be aware of?
Once a culture becomes synonymous with advertising it ceases to be a culture.

Things like narrowcasting can invade our privacy to pull at us emotionally and to send messages that might conflict with other people to the individuals who want to hear it. It can be dishonest.