Advertisers spread their webs far and wide in an effort to attract the poor unsuspecting consumer, namely us. But beware, just like the spiders web, all is not necessarily what it seems. No doubt we have all seen the multitude of enticements that advertisers will use to gain our business. But let us consider the subject in a little more depth.

In the UK recently, there has been a spate of construction companies who have been offering cash incentives if people will buy their houses. These range from cash-backs to free legal and survey fees. There are two questions here. a) If they can afford to give away this money, why don't they reduce the price of the house in the first place, and b) what is in the small print? What conditions are hidden in the small print? What guarantee is there that the cash benefit has not just been added to the original price of the house in the first place. In the real sense of the words it is not a special offer. A real special offer in this instance would be for them to say, "Buy our home and we will reduce the price by $X thousand with no hidden conditions." The same applies to similar offers elsewhere.

Another classic is the commonly known "BOGOF" (Buy One Get One Free) offers that supermarkets run. If this was really true, how is it that those same supermarkets are consistantly, year on year, returning almost identical gross profit percentages? If one had the time and the inclination to run a price check of all the products in a normal shopping trolley for the week of such an offer, and then compared it will the same trolley when that offer was not on, it is probable that the total bill will be virtually the same. The reason is that they will compensate the offer be upgrading the price on other essential products.

Apart from these incentives there are many other ways that advertisers will try to lure us. Another example is the "buy it cheaper elsewhere and we'll redund the difference." This has been proven to be a farce. The conditions usually attached to this include that, a) it has to be a similar store; b) that is has to be purchased within a certain geographical location; c) that it has to be an identical model (if not colour and a better model won't do) and d) that it has to be within a certain time frame, usually very limited.

Non-cash offers from advertisers include such claims as "guaranteed for a lifetime," (whose life?) or "removes 99.9% of all germs,(How can that be proven?). But what about the conditions and the small print? Unless you are going to spend an hour on each purchase reading the conditions, how are you possibly going to know.

What would be a really good offer is "We have made the small print LARGE!

From all of this it is apparent that great care has to be taken when relying upon advertisements to guide purchases, both in terms of special offers and the claims they make. The answer is buy because you want it and it works for you.

Learn more about this author, Paul Lines.
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