Monday, March 26, 2012
My Visual-Cortex Ad-Blocker
Today there will be 2 billion display ads, 3 million radio ads and more than 300,000 television commercials. However, don’t worry because you personally will be pitched a combination of these ads only 3,000 times today.
Mathematics tells a simple truth that the armies of advertising salespeople across the country are desperately trying to keep silent.
If you are awake from 6:00am to 11:00pm that’s 61,200 seconds of conscious activity. If you gave only 10 seconds of attention per ad (barely enough time to understand what the ad is about) you would lose over 8 hours each day.
It’s a classic darwinian scenario. Our brains have had to develop a way to completely block out advertising. Our very survival depends on us NOT paying attention to all the ads that some well meaning merchant across town has invested their hard earned money in. Nature has equipped us with the ultimate pop-up blocker.
What the armies of advertising salesman failed to mention to the well meaning merchant is that 99.9% of their advertising will never be noticed.
In this day and age there is one thing that gets peoples attention, and believe it or not it’s the same thing that has been motivating buyers since the beginning of time.
Need and trust.
When people have a need they turn to those that they trust.
Here is where it gets REALLY interesting. The need to share good news with each other actually has positive psychological effects. Where advertising is going the way of the dodo bird, humans will never stop needing to tell each other about something that is exciting, interesting or innovative.
Here’s a radical idea. What if you put the money you are spending on useless advertising into understanding what problems you solve for your customers, and then improve upon that solution?
When you take the time to really understand the problem you are solving (for extra credit understand the results of the problem) then your customers will WANT to tell others about your solution. They will literally have a psychological need to share your solution with anyone who is experiencing the same problems they were facing.
Either that or you can run another coupon.
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