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Wednesday, July 12, 2006
Hummer: Restore Your Manhood
Marketing gurus tell us that people buy for emotional reasons, then find facts to support their decision.
I saw a great commercial on TV last night which can clearly show you how to market to people's emotions. The scene opens with two men at a checkout counter in a supermarket. The first man is buying "good for you" food, like tofu. He looks uncomfortable and embarassed as the clerk continually tries to price-scan the tofu and it won't pick up the price. He glances to the second man, then down at what the second man is buying: He-Man food, like pork ribs for his barbeque.
Obviously, the first man has had enough of being a wimp! He leaves the supermarket, goes directly to a Hummer dealership, and buys one of the huge trucks.
As the ad closes, the tagline reads, "Restore Your Manhood."
Can a truck really, really make you feel more like a man??? I guess so, according to Hummer.
Hummer is in a difficult position right now, with gasoline prices rising. It will be fascinating to watch how they play on people's emotions to "spin" the story of Hummer, desperately trying to sell more of the gas-guzzling vehicles.
For all you small business owners out there, take some time to watch TV commercials, and for each one, ask yourself, "What emotion, what promise, are they really selling?" It gives you something to do while you watching all those annoying ads. After all, advertisers spend millions of dollars to produce those ads; you might as well learn marketing theory from them, eh?
posted by Karyn Greenstreet @ 8:25 AM
I admit that I didn't watch either Ad on line. With my computer the ad wouldn't be any fun really, that is one problem with dial up. But if the burger king add is the one I think it is, I never took it seriously it is so over the top that it came off as a parody to me. I prefer the one where some hot chick is dancing in front of an expensive car with burgers. From how the Hummer ad was described it sounds funny. People remember funny. Volkwagon does just the opposite with that one where everyone is looking at there cars in the glass building and the tag line is something like "low ego emisions" they really have some great ads. I admit I would love to get paid to come up with ad ideas that are clever and funny. In terms of the dodge ad I thought that was funny.
Advertisments of that degree rely on maipulating emotions and making you feel that whatever they are selling will fix your "problem".. which we never knew we had until these commercials/ads told us.
It gets me frustrated at times, but as the article you included suggests.. we can just think about it from the perspective of what they might be trying to sell/manipulate etc. With that we can feel better about ourselves knowing that we figured it it and we know better. haha.. when I was around 20, frustrated by the immense amount of lame ads in a girls magazine, I took it (and others) and ripped out all of the ads that had a manipulative element. I was left with just a few sparse articles.
As for the BK ad.. 'manly mans men' persona does nothing for me. Hopefully no one will truly buy into that "be a man, eat a burger" mentality. But the power of ads can have a strong influence..
So, Hummers attempt to conteract the gasoline price issue, is using the tag line, "restore your manhood"..?!?! ick, thats a low blow. gasholes!
Good stuff to think about.
um. yeah. i hate hummers, and people that drive/like them so much I can't even think of words to write about it.
Great... just what the world needs the "cute baby" of a robot and a monster that go around smashing up a town. Perfect!
And the "manhood" one sounds terrible.
And that burger king ad is horrible. Dodge had to edit the 'fairy' one, but that is OK?!
This is the kind of shit that makes me embarrassed to be an american.