Not only has advertising changed over the years, but online advertising has been changing a lot over the years as well. Online advertising is well established with its banner ads, pop up ads, and pop-under ads. Online advertising has recently moved onto more proactive types of advertising such as "paid search advertising" (358). "Paid search advertising has become the dominant format of Web advertising" (358). Basically paid search advertising is google, msn, and Yahoo's way of making a boat load of money. They sell ad space and information to companies who are looking for what we, as consumers, are looking for. Whenever I am on Facebook, I see ads like "Do you like baseball?" or "Create your teams jerseys here!". Everything has its own page or website nowadays too. Every movie, TV show, and sports team allows you to follow along online.
There are many different strategies when it comes to advertising. Some companies go out and get a huge superstar to promote their products, while others use more creative approaches. The best example I can think of for a superstar promoting products is Tiger Woods promoting Nike products. Yes he still is sponsored Nike, through all the controversy. Tiger Woods is such a big name not only in Golf but throughout professional sports it is known how much of a great athlete he truly is. Have you ever seen those commercials that are super annoying? You know the one where you go "ugh, this commercial again?". Well thats actually a companies goal is to annoy you. "Used more in local TV and radio campaigns than in national ones...irritation advertising: creating product-name recognition by being annoying or obnoxious" (360). The best example for all of you living in the Buffalo area is the Airport Plaza Jewelers commercial with the big chicken that says "I buy it!". Very annoying, but it gets you to remember that Airport Plaza Jewelers will buy all of your unwanted gold. Also, those Dos Equis beer commercials where "the most interesting man in the world" tells you to "stay thirsty", that is a type of approach called snob-appeal. This is when a company tries to seem better than all the rest of the competition. These are just a few of the many strategies that companies have for advertising.
Advertising campaigns can influence a large amount of people. That being said, if they wrong message is being advertised, then it could be very dangerous to the public. For example, if a certain medicine says it will help you sleep, and it actually keeps you awake all night. Or if an ad says that cigarettes are healthy for your lungs, when they are actually not. One of the biggest issues regarding false advertisement is ads directed at children. The group, Action for Children's Television (ACT) was created to combat this issue. "In the 1980's, ACT fought particularly hard to curb program-length commercials: thirty minute cartoon programs...developed for television syndication primarily to promote a line of toys" (368). Shows like G.I. Joe, My Little Pony and Friends, and The Care Bear Family, were created just so that kids would see these toys and ask their parents to buy them. Another a big problem with advertising aimed at kids was of course Joe the Camel from the cigarette commercials. Joe the Camel was forced to be taken off the air because his cartoon like figure was seen as a tool to get kids to think that smoking was cool. It just goes to show that some companies will stop at nothing to get their name out there.
