Advertising has long been the source of revenue for cable companies. Everywhere we turn there is some sort of advertisement. Even in our own homes brand names are being thrown at us from every direction. Advertising is a great way for manufacturers to get their products out there and to convince consumers that their product is superior to any other. Television ads, in the form of commercials, are a large chunk of the information we receive about various products. These days, however, many commercials are being completely skipped over.
DVR’s and VCR’s are just two of the reasons that television ads are being skipped over. The taping of shows allows viewers to skip over commercials completely. This, in turn, is spurring advertisers to come up with new forms of advertising. On demand ads, hyper-targeted ads, opt-in ads and embedded ads are just a few of the new technologies distributors are coming up with. There is the question of whether or not these new ad forms will be helpful or if they are just a waste of time. However, there is proof that advertising in the form of commercials is indeed effective.
Political ads were invented about a half a century ago. Research shows that due to political ads, campaign knowledge has indeed risen. This shows us that ads are not useless. Strong ads can shape decision making when it comes time to vote. Political ads can also increase democracy by informing voters about the real issues and increase consideration of their own beliefs as well as increase debates and discussions with other citizens. Information from political ads has also increased voter interest in other forms of media, in relation to politics, such as the internet, social networks, and the news. The influx of political ads can also play a large role in which citizens actually feel they have an influence in the final decision making process. Right now many individuals believe the socially elite are responsible for many political decisions, because they can easily obtain information due to their donations to the political candidates. With all of the fairly new political advertising, the average citizen is now able to be more involved and more informed on the issues.
Just this small amount of information about how political ads can effect citizens in such a large scale way proves to us that the new technologies being invented for advertising will be greatly useful as the viewings of regular commercials become more scarce. It will be beneficial for advertisers to have other ways to make citizens aware of their products than simply just having commercials between television show segments.
Cho, Jaeho. (2008) Political Ads and Citizen Communication. Communication Research, Vol. 35 Issue: 4, 423-451
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
The topic of the effects of advertising, especially political advertising, is of interest recently due to the election. Obviously, ads are created to have an influence on the masses, but whether that influence is positive or negative is up for debate. I like how this blog discusses the advances made in the knowledge of political issues due to television and advertising. It is a different aspect of television that is not discussed as much as maybe the negative effects on people. As far as eliminating other advertisements all together, it would be difficult to decide how to get political ads out to the masses without televsion as a medium. Regardless, it is important that the advertisements have had a positive effect on communication.
ReplyDeletebantum.3@osu.edu
I personally found the political ads to be quite annoying, and they didn't sway me to jump to the other party. I see where youre coming from here, because ultimately the ad was created to sway the viewer. Advertisements have always been annoying in my eyes, but I understand that advertisers still need to make money. I think the new techniques advertisers are using to get their ads seen are great. But I also think that in the future there will be a technology to get rid of advertisements in general.
ReplyDeletePolitical ads are important at there core. I believed this year was a great example of how this happened. When Senator McCain's ads were aimed as much more negative, it seemed to really hurt him down the stretch. In turn, Senator Obama stayed more positive, even though he had his fair share of negative ads. People just were tried of hearing the same thing all the time. I look in the future that political ads will have a major turn to the internet.
ReplyDeletenull.30
I was so happy once the election was over becuase all of the politcal ads went away. TV and seemingly every other medium was so saturated it's amazing they were even able to get a message across. I found myself DVRing more of my shows during October 2008 because of the amount of politcal ads so I could skip over them. I'm sure I'm not alone in this measure, and I'm betting that come 2012 politcal campaigns will adopt the new TV advertising ideas that are up and coming. Not just as a means of getting to people skipping over ads, but just to saturate the medium even more than they are already.
ReplyDeleteupp.11@osu.edu
When it comes to technology, the trend or natural progression is towards change, with more advanced technology utilized. With the advancement in better graphics, personalized options, and interactive software, the overall way we lead our daily lives would be completely altered. I personally feel like these changes are for the better for 2 main reasons:
ReplyDelete1.) It is a natural progression for human beings to advance
2.) The possibilities are endless for human beings intellectually
But, to have even simple convinces can make all the difference. For example, I would like to see some more personalization with my basic TV after I got used to an upgraded TV with a flat screen and HD.
ramunno.3
Political campaigns are particularly daunting because they are thrown at us in unprecedented numbers for months on end during the election season. These ads do not appeal to a majority of viewers, so in that case it is not surprising that many people began to utilize DVR technology more frequently during that time. Each candidate tries to center on the negative qualities of the other and much of it is not believable by far. I believe advertising should be entertaing and entice viewers and bring them into your cause, product, or corporation. If the media focused more on providing more appealing content, people would be more willing to tune in.
ReplyDeleteScott.917
I have never been a fan of political ads but i must agree with kristen that they do carry a lot of power with them and are very effective tools especially around election time. I don't really take what is said any politician in their ad as truth, but they do encourage me to dig deeper and research the issue to see what is really going on. This is especially true over "issue ads" where your vote is not for a politician but rather a political issue. I can tell you that everytime my roommates and I saw the issue for the new casino we would always fight about it because they all took what was being said on the commercial to be true and some of it was but some of it wasnt. Nevertheless the ad did its job by keeping the issue and possibly the actual advertisement in your mind so that you might think about it long after the ad has ended which is the exact purpose of most advertisements. This is because the more you think about a product of advertisement, the more likely you are to buy it or in the case of political ads, vote for it or he or she.
ReplyDeleteshaftel.3
With the rise in popularity of DVRs I am very interested to see where advertisers will turn to project their political ads for the next presidential election. During this election season, I know that personally I wish that I had a DVR to fast forward through every political commercial, but I am sure that many people do in fact get their information from this type of advertising. It is very true that the way a political commercial is set-up that it can have a significant effect on the viewer. Just like any other advertisement, the commercials using visually appealing scenes and colors to attract the viewers hope to in turn gain their vote.
ReplyDeleteAttewell.1@osu.edu
I cannot even remember what it was like to watch TV without DVR. All the time my roommates and I are zipping through commercials, pausing our favorite shows, rewinding that crazy hit a DB laid on a receiver coming across the middle. Political advertisements, however, is a different story. The average voter isn't resourceful or willing enough to do the proper research about political agenda, therefore tends to believe anything they see on TV. If political ads were less mudslinging and more facts, I'd be totally onboard with everything you've written.
ReplyDeletethomas.1470
Political ads do play a large part in getting the word out about candidates however I feel that they are not necessarily helping the public. The candidate who promotes the most tends to get votes from individuals who are not fully educated about the issues and the candidates. Companies and politicians will need to start looking for additional ways to reach consumers in order to get past consumers fast forwarding around ads. Advertising must reach a new level in order to have the same impact on consumers.
ReplyDeletejohnson.2802