Advertisements, by Zainab Salman

Here are the answers by Zainab Salman, to the two questions which were shared in Session 37:

What do advertisements do to make you want what you do not need?

Advertisements have their own strategies to make us buy a lot of stuff that we don’t really need. To capture one type of people, they use things that will attract the attention of that particular kind of people. For example, an ad which shows a doctor telling that one type of soap will be more efficient will attract the attention of those who are health concerned. They further use researches and experiments to prove themselves right.

Many innocent people believe them and start using their products which leads to profit to the particular brand or company.

They have started making ads like long videos or movies that have a whole plot, dialogues and a script! They exploit human feelings and make touchy ads that make one cry.

In short, advertisements do almost everything they can to make us buy what we don’t need.

How do advertisements change the perception of reality?

Advertisers have a strategy for changing  our perception of reality. Like the Pepsi ad we saw in an earlier session, it changes the perception of reality by showing people holding empty Pepsi bottles with some sort of affection. Though in reality, nobody likes empty Pepsi bottles- they are loved only when they are full.

Of course, they cannot change reality, but this is how they change the perception of reality.

Below is an article, already published on Zainab's blog, titled ‘The Problem with Advertising’.

The Problem with Advertising

In our society, advertising plays the key role for excessive buying. The ads that our media presents urge people to buy products of a particular brand. The companies that make the stuff we buy have a strategy: They advertise the things that are not our needs. There is no need to advertise for our needs! We have to get our needs, no matter what. They mainly advertise for our wants our secondary needs in the papers and T.V.

The companies do their best to make their ads flashy. They include people like film stars, cricketers, doctors, scientists, cartoon characters and statements, music and actions, anything that would appeal to their targeted customers.

Advertising is simply a trap. They get us in their cycle only to earn money. Often, we fall in to their trap of the ads and buy the unnecessary stuff. Their job is to get their stuff sold, while our job is to prevent ourselves from buying them.  Though what we really do, is buy their stuff. Whenever we go to the supermarket, we fill our trolleys with all the food, drinks, clothes, shoes and accessories advertised on T.V.

We rarely think about it, but we do have to answer for the excessive buying that we do without thinking.  And for that, we need to be courageous enough to see through the ads, and buy what we need.