The Power of Marketing

Its hard to believe how effective the effects of advertising and marketing can be on a population, but I am seeing it happen right before my eyes!

I remember when Facebook first came out. Everyone was still using MySpace at the time. I was not exposed to the marketing campaign, but right after it was launched, I remember everyone asking each other if they had a Facebook account, and talking "Facebook".. this and that.


It came out of nowhere, and everyone did an 'about face' on MySpace.

Curious to see what this Facebook and hoopla was about, I went to their site only to find a very drab looking site, without features that would warrant such a dramatic reaction and mass exodus from Myspace.

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Fast forward to today.

Last year, and certainly a few years ago, I don't remember anyone watching the FIFA World Cup in the US. However this year, with it's apparently stepped up marketing campaign - everyone and their mother is talking about it. "Are you watching the World Cup?", "Did you see the World Cup?" No I didn't.

It's so weird. So weird how a society can make such a dramatic change, seemingly overnight and be so responsive to this marketing.

It is like in that movie Strange Brew where they put something in the beer at the manufacturing plant, and they play a tone over the speakers and everyone turns into obedient robots.

Just to add..

There is a herd-like mentality working here.

Everyone wants to be with the herd, and afraid to be out of it.

a reply to: nOraKat

This is why I threw my television out! How can anyone claim to be a free thinker if they allow the most powerful mind control system ever invented to be in their home, usually occupying the most central position within the home, and watched on average for SEVEN HOURS PER DAY!

I'm with you on the Facebook craze. I don't get it. I set up an account to see what the big deal was. I have no use for it.

My business has a Farcebook account. Seems to be needed these days. However I have yet to look at it as it is administered by my other pilot. we put up photos of our clients experience and they seem to appreciate it. Other than that there is no use for such drivel in my life.

I have yet to tweet a damn thing either. If you want to be my friend buy me a freaking beer at least.....

Facebook's success was in that it was viewed as being the upscale alternative. Because it started out with only allowing access to ivy league students, it had exclusivity going for it early on and because it lacked the customizing options of MySpace, it was benefited from the backlash to annoying profiles filled with crappy cartoon animated gifs and people's terrible choices in background music.

I can't understand how companies profit off of Facebook. Advertising on these sites does not really work. Everyone ignores the advertising. We have acclimated to ignoring it. Of course, the companies selling advertising are saying it works. That is their job I suppose, to trick the companies into paying them for these ads.

Not here on ATS though, we all watch the ads here. We all support the advertisers.

originally posted by: rickymouse
I can't understand how companies profit off of Facebook. Advertising on these sites does not really work. Everyone ignores the advertising. We have acclimated to ignoring it. Of course, the companies selling advertising are saying it works. That is their job I suppose, to trick the companies into paying them for these ads.

Not here on ATS though, we all watch the ads here.

We all support the advertisers.

Most of the money Facebook makes is from selling user data to advertisers. Not from the advertisement themselves.

Remember this old marketing maxim:

"If you can't figure out what the product is .... YOU are the product"

a reply to: nOraKat

People do the same thing at the time of the Olympics. My dad especially drives me nuts, espousing the pleasure of watching womans figure skating and his sudden fascination with mens cycling. No I haven't watched bob sledding, and I am not going to either just because it is on the T.V.

In other words, I hear you.

a reply to: nOraKat

not everybody

originally posted by: nOraKat


I remember when Facebook first came out. Everyone was still using MySpace at the time. I was not exposed to the marketing campaign, but right after it was launched, I remember everyone asking each other if they had a Facebook account, and talking "Facebook".. this and that.

Facebook is a very bad example of this. Ever see an advert for Facebook? Me neither. These kind of things just happen. They reach critical mass and then everyone follows because everyone else is going. That would be the holy grail of marketing, creating that kind of effect, but you can't.

Last year, and certainly a few years ago, I don't remember anyone watching the FIFA World Cup in the US.

That's because there wasn't a World Cup last year. Or the year before that. Or the year before that. It only happens every four years!

The 2010 World Cup got plenty of attention. Does the word "vuvuzela" not mean anything to you?

“The Marketing of Evil” reveals how much of what Americans once almost universally abhorred has been packaged, perfumed, gift-wrapped and sold to them as though it had great value. Highly skilled marketers, playing on our deeply felt national values of fairness, generosity and tolerance, have persuaded us to embrace as enlightened and noble that which all previous generations since America’s founding regarded as grossly self-destructive – in a word, evil.

wndbooks.wnd.com...

i think this has been covered for years -


www.youtube.com...