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Comment by Razengan | Hacker News Reader

> I’ve seen ads for products I would have never bought, because I never knew they existed, and wound up better for it.

Such as?

I can't recall myself purchasing anything [just] because of an ad, or knowing anyone else who did, or even seeing an ad for something I was interested in.

Everything that I've spent money on, has been discovered through manual search, word of mouth (on online forums), voluntarily subscribed newsletters/feeds (like a favorite developer announcing a new game or app) or random recommendations algorithms (like these clips of Mortal Engines and Ultimate Chicken Horse that I just saw on YouTube, or featured spots on the App Store, Steam, iTunes etc.) which I guess may count as a form of advertisement but they show me what a product is actually like.

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I can think of a few things that I bought specifically because I saw them in an ad, and they solved a problem I had. The 12-port usb charging hub that I'm using right now is one. Did I 'know' they existed? I mean, I wasn't surprised, but I'd not used or seen one in the wild, and then it popped up in an Amazon recommendation.

Going a few years back, those lithium-ion-based car jump-starters were a genuine surprise for me. I'd only had experience with the much larger, bulkier lead-acid ones. An ad showed me an impossibly tiny & light combo jumpstarter and powerpack, and now there's one in my glovebox. It's been used, too, and I'm glad I had it.

I would not have known that the Remarkable tablet existed if it wasn't for the FB ads. I want the thing that I hope this is. I have been looking for this, on and off, for years. I've tried tablet computers to do the same thing before, without much success.

Though, I still haven't ordered one. Waiting on some reliable peer review first. So I might be agreeing with you...

Their advertisement was the main reason, that I've bought an Onyx Note

how is it? <seeking peer review information>

Word of mouth is a second order effect of advertising. Subscribed newsletters are advertising. Random recommendation algorithms on steam are advertising.

Then every mention of anything is advertising, differing only in degree of intrusion.

But no, word of mouth being like if I found something on my own and mention it on Reddit or HN etc., then it's not advertisement in the commonly agreed-upon sense of the word.

What does "finding something on your own" look like? Does it look like a product web page? Because that's advertising. Does it look like it was on the endcap of an aisle at a retailer? Because they paid for that placement.

Let's just take a regular product like a smartphone. Assuming you have a smartphone. Let's imagine you ignored all branding or something and purchased the cheapest smartphone on Amazon... but how did you even know that smartphones existed in the world? How did you come to know that Amazon sells these smartphone things?

> * Does it look like a product web page? Because that's advertising.*

Oh boy.

I guess your comments are advertisement about advertising too, then.

This forceful insistence that someone is influenced by advertising even when they repeatedly say they aren't, just affirms the possibility that the ad industry is a sham and a con.

Most people are numb to advertising, not influenced by it.

Oh really? How much of your time has been spent on what brand of salt is in your pantry right now? What informs your type of shampoo in your bathroom? How much weight would you say your friends or colleagues experience with a car brand has influenced the decision you made to purchase one auto manufacturer's model over another? Advertising works and if it didn't it wouldn't exist. While I do understand and am with you on your philosophy of making an informed decision, so much of our impulses as we purchase the things required to live daily are influenced by ads whether we're aware of them or not.

>salt

cheapest one available from nearby stores

> shampoo

tested many brands, found one that works well for me.

>car brand

Absolutely none, unless they are car maniac.

> While I do understand and am with you on your philosophy of making an informed decision, so much of our impulses as we purchase the things required to live daily are influenced by ads whether we're aware of them or not.

I do not dispute that, but isn't this paper arguing that ads aren't fulfilling their informative purpose(the only reason they were allowed to get so prevalent)?

to quote the paper

>In the information age, the only remaining nonredundant use of most forms of advertising is persuasion. To the extent that enforcers wish to return to the mid-twentieth-century view that persuasive advertising is fundamentally manipulative, they may now do so without concern that prohibiting advertising might deprive consumers of the information they need to make purchase decisions

Absolutely none, unless they are car maniac.

That simply isn’t true. Other than those extremely cash-constrained choice of car is a very personal thing, as much as style of clothing.

the only remaining nonredundant use of most forms of advertising is persuasion

Ads are obsolete where brands are obsolete in a world where everything is made in the same factory in China and merely gets a different sticker on the case. Basically any electronics now for example.

About car buying: I think you missed his point. (Or else I'm missing your point.) He's not saying that his choice of car as not personal, he's saying (as would I) that the kind of car your "friends or colleagues" buy has nothing to do with the kind of car he (or I) buys.

Speaking for myself, I bought cars based on what I valued, which was often different from what friends and colleagues valued--which is exactly the meaning of "personal."

the kind of car your "friends or colleagues" buy has nothing to do with the kind of car he (or I) buys.

I get what you’re saying but lots of people do do that. Certain demographics flock to BMWs for example. Within a pretty narrow range you could guess a BMW driver’s occupation, and you would almost certainly be correct about their personality. Another demographic loves their Subarus. Or Porsche, classic choice of the male midlife crisis.

But pretty much everyone who can afford to, buys a car that they feel reflects their lifestyle or the lifestyle they aspire to.

> How much of your time has been spent on what brand of salt is in your pantry right now? What informs your type of shampoo in your bathroom?

I pick these up from store aisles more or less at random.

> How much weight would you say your friends or colleagues experience with a car brand has influenced the decision you made to purchase one auto manufacturer's model over another?

None, I don't own a car, but I can see the point you're trying to make with that one.

> Advertising works and if it didn't it wouldn't exist.

There is a possibility that it actually doesn't and is a case of the emperor with no clothes, an unnecessary industry perpetuated by those in the industry.

This is an argument you can't win in my experience. I don't know why some people are so adamant I bought something because of advertising... And I mean the "shotgun" ads - on TV, radio, online, in papers, etc

All of these untargeted ads are meaningless to me. Even before the Internet, if I needed something I went and looked for it when I needed it. An ad on TV for a product I need? Yeah, I'd just take note and look for something cheaper/better, which I always found.

On that note, avertising does work for many products if it's at least somewhat decently targeted, otherwise it's brand awareness, so not a total waste of money.

Because most people have this dumb idea that they are smarter than all the other plebs and marketing doesnt work on them.

People that think this are delusional. Just because you've convinced yourself you are impervious to it doesnt mean you are.

Yes, and speaking for others insisting that something works on them even if they say it doesn’t, is a smart idea and not delusional at all.

Almost like religious fanaticism, forcing people to acknowledge gods and demons and boogeymen.

Case in point

Salt: cheapest own-brand. Shampoo: read the labels for something without too many nasties. Car: check lots of reviews, test drive some candidate models.

More broadly, the question isn’t whether advertising works, but whether it has positive or negative social value. If it largely just reallocates spending, then everyone (including the firms currently engaged advertising arms races with other firms) would be better off if it were abolished.

This is a good point - that choosing the cheapest own brand salt implies a very strong omnipresent food regulatory system (which most countries have).

Where we lack independant, reliable regulation, advertising is more valuable because it provides brand trust.

I stopped using shampoo just over a year ago and even though I've known many people say shampooing is pointless I was still amazed at how little effect the change had on my hair. The current lockdown is an ideal time to try it.

In the context of advertising and marketing it is interesting to consider why we use shampoo at all.

Do you still scrub your hair, just with water, when you're in the shower?

Yes

>Advertising works and if it didn't it wouldn't exist.

The obvious comeback is [1]. All the existence of advertising indicates is that either the producer or the consumer is not an ideal perfect-information homo economicus. It doesn't say which of them it is.

Every large company with economies of scale has a waste budget: the amount of inefficiency it can tolerate before competitors without its scale advantage will eat its lunch. As long as irrational behavior doesn't go beyond the waste budget, it may well persist, as the article shows of online advertising.

[1] https://thecorrespondent.com/100/the-new-dot-com-bubble-is-h...

Re: the shampoo thing, I've been purchasing the same brand for more than 15 years now. The same goes for the vast majority of personal hygiene and cleaning products, if not necessarily the same brand then similar looking products from the same company.

Nothing ""informs"" the type of shampoo for most normal people. Almost nobody spends time on what "brand of salt" is in their pantry.

When people need things like those they just pick whatever they've always been using, or whatever's available and they don't associate any previous bad experiences with.

What kind of bizarre disconnect from reality do advertisers have? Is it like they're watching some kind of Matrix rain of numbers and choosing to see what they want to see?

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