by Zaf R.

Created on: April 09, 2008

To say that false ads have led people to be jaded is an understatement. Can anyone name any business, institution, or politician in existence anywhere on earth, who can claim that they don't have to work harder every time, to convince their audience that their message is what they say it is?

The lengths that advertising agencies now have to go to, perpetually pushing barriers further and further, are evidence that the public is becoming more unimpressed after each campaign. Whatever happened to "build a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to your door?" There is more focus on the world, than on building better mousetraps. And today that path is the "information super-highway", and the door is the internet, television, and radio.

If people are jaded it's not because of the prevalence of the marketing "sales puff" that typically accompanies the advertising of wares. People have come to expect a certain degree of creativity when sellers tout their goods over the competition. It's when "certain degree" is replaced by the "nth degree" that causes one to become wary. Sales puff is one thing, but flat out lies, and crafty advertising with the intent to deceive, would cause anyone to lose faith in what marketers say.

As long as there has been the ignorant and the gullible, there have been con artists to prey on them. These days even the educated and well-informed seem to be no match for these sophisticated, twenty-first century charlatans, masquerading as legitimate businesses. Their secret is to prey on their fears and inadequacies. To the balding, the wrinkled, the short, the fat, the skinny, the poor: you all can grow more hair, look ten years younger, add four inches, lose twenty pounds, make an extra $10,000 a month- easy and with a money back guarantee!

Not only do they prey on our fears and inadequacies, but also our perceived fears and inadequacies- that they invent! Have you ever heard of "Restless Leg Syndrome?" It's no wonder why now we take everything they throw at us with a pound of salt, and then some. The internet is now replete with sites and blogs that sift through the mountain of scurrilous claims to point the consumer in the right direction.

The result is the vicious cycle we see today- consumers getting more tired, weary and skeptical, and advertisers in turn doubling their efforts throwing everything but the kitchen sink. The fallout however, hurts the impact of genuine campaigns, so in the end nobody wins.

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