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To me this looks almost criminal but I don't know advertising laws in the US. In my country you can't claim you are best in something without substantial eviden

by tyfon 7y ago

To me this looks almost criminal but I don't know advertising laws in the US. In my country you can't claim you are best in something without substantial evidence to back it up. Most just write "one of the best" to avoid having to prove it although that statement in itself has to have some evidence backing it. In any case I have a general rule. If you need to advertise your product it sucks. If you have a quality product you will sell based on word of mouth of early adopters. The first example that comes to mind is Tesla which spends zero on marketing. So for me, if I'm looking to buy a certain item and I see an ad for something in that category it will be the last manufacturer that I consider. This isn't always true but so far this rule of thumb has held up for me pretty well.

harryh 7y ago
Tesla spent $70 million on marketing in 2018. https://ir.tesla.com/node/19496/html https://ir.tesla.com/node/19496/html "Marketing, promotional and advertising costs are expensed as incurred and are included as an element of selling, general and administrative expense in the consolidated statement of operations. We incurred marketing, promotional and advertising costs of $70.0 million, $66.5 million and $48.0 million in the years ended December 31, 2018, 2017 and 2016, respectively."
- tyfon 7y ago
  Ok, not quite zero but close to it. I've never seen a banner ad or tv ad for tesla outside of their stores. I suspect most of this cost is banners and such in their stores and video production for their youtube channel. Maybe they also count reveal event. In any case it pales in comparison to let's say Wv who spends between 5 and 6 billion each year [1]. [1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/286537/volkswagen-advertising-spending-worldwide/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/286537/volkswagen-advert...
  - adrr 7y ago
    Comparing a company that sells 10 million+ cars a year to a company that sells 500k cars.
    - tyfon 7y ago
      Well it's still comparatively low. I've yet to see a Tesla ad on TV, news papers or billboards and they still sell like hot cakes in my country. If we count the full 70 million for tesla spend in marketing against an annual average of about 6 billion for Vw, Tesla comes out at $140/car and Vw comes out at $600/car or about 4 times as much pr car. The main point I was trying to make was that for me ads are a negative towards a brand not a positive as I will suspect the quality of the product if they have to advertise.
astura 7y ago
USA has a broad federal law prohibiting "unfair or deceptive acts or practices in or affecting commerce." (Section 5(a) of the Federal Trade Commission Act (FTC Act) (15 USC §45)) This appears to be in violation
mindslight 7y ago
In the US you can basically lie about anything and it's fine. If it's a relative statement, no one can disprove it. If it's an absolute statement, then it's on the consumer to know that it was supposed to be hyperbole or whatever and not an actual statement of fact. Even numerical specifications can be blatantly fraudulent and it's still fine - eg "6.0 horsepower shop vacuum". A standard wall outlet cannot supply more than 2HP, but manufacturers have devised this outlandish "test procedure" that produces the bogus number. Still, zero prior restraint. The best enforcement we can hope for is a class action lawsuit in a decade where everyone will get a coupon for five dollars off a new shop vac, and the industry will move on to a new fraudulent measure.
- tyfon 7y ago
  Sounds crazy.. and most people still believes what is said in advertisements or do they just accept that it's all fake?
  - mindslight 7y ago
    Yes, both. It's the post-truth era.
fsh 7y ago
As others have pointed out, Tesla actually spends quite a bit of money on advertising. They also got reprimanded in Germany for lying about pricing in their ads: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-06/tesla-to-drop-misleading-marketing-in-germany-touting-model-3 https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-06/tesla-to-...
- tyfon 7y ago
  They had to stop putting the "price after savings" on their web pages in Norway long time ago, it just wasn't compatible with our laws. They also had to pay back money to buyers due to having the combined power of the motors on their web page and not what the battery actually could put out. I wouldn't count a product web page advertisement but I guess definitions vary. In any case they spend close to nothing if anything on regular ads and sell a ton of cars (at least here in Norway).
- notahacker 7y ago
  And one of Tesla's core marketing claims - that their vehicles are equipped with 'the hardware needed for full self driving capability' certainly isn't any more honest than Molekule's claims about the efficacy of their filters.

by tyfon 7y ago

harryh 7y ago

Tesla spent $70 million on marketing in 2018. https://ir.tesla.com/node/19496/html https://ir.tesla.com/node/19496/html "Marketing, promotional and advertising costs are expensed as incurred and are included as an element of selling, general and administrative expense in the consolidated statement of operations. We incurred marketing, promotional and advertising costs of $70.0 million, $66.5 million and $48.0 million in the years ended December 31, 2018, 2017 and 2016, respectively."

tyfon 7y ago
Ok, not quite zero but close to it. I've never seen a banner ad or tv ad for tesla outside of their stores. I suspect most of this cost is banners and such in their stores and video production for their youtube channel. Maybe they also count reveal event. In any case it pales in comparison to let's say Wv who spends between 5 and 6 billion each year [1]. [1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/286537/volkswagen-advertising-spending-worldwide/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/286537/volkswagen-advert...
- adrr 7y ago
  Comparing a company that sells 10 million+ cars a year to a company that sells 500k cars.
  - tyfon 7y ago
    Well it's still comparatively low. I've yet to see a Tesla ad on TV, news papers or billboards and they still sell like hot cakes in my country. If we count the full 70 million for tesla spend in marketing against an annual average of about 6 billion for Vw, Tesla comes out at $140/car and Vw comes out at $600/car or about 4 times as much pr car. The main point I was trying to make was that for me ads are a negative towards a brand not a positive as I will suspect the quality of the product if they have to advertise.

astura 7y ago

USA has a broad federal law prohibiting "unfair or deceptive acts or practices in or affecting commerce." (Section 5(a) of the Federal Trade Commission Act (FTC Act) (15 USC §45)) This appears to be in violation

mindslight 7y ago

In the US you can basically lie about anything and it's fine. If it's a relative statement, no one can disprove it. If it's an absolute statement, then it's on the consumer to know that it was supposed to be hyperbole or whatever and not an actual statement of fact. Even numerical specifications can be blatantly fraudulent and it's still fine - eg "6.0 horsepower shop vacuum". A standard wall outlet cannot supply more than 2HP, but manufacturers have devised this outlandish "test procedure" that produces the bogus number. Still, zero prior restraint. The best enforcement we can hope for is a class action lawsuit in a decade where everyone will get a coupon for five dollars off a new shop vac, and the industry will move on to a new fraudulent measure.

tyfon 7y ago
Sounds crazy.. and most people still believes what is said in advertisements or do they just accept that it's all fake?
- mindslight 7y ago
  Yes, both. It's the post-truth era.

fsh 7y ago

As others have pointed out, Tesla actually spends quite a bit of money on advertising. They also got reprimanded in Germany for lying about pricing in their ads: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-06/tesla-to-drop-misleading-marketing-in-germany-touting-model-3 https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-06/tesla-to-...

tyfon 7y ago
They had to stop putting the "price after savings" on their web pages in Norway long time ago, it just wasn't compatible with our laws. They also had to pay back money to buyers due to having the combined power of the motors on their web page and not what the battery actually could put out. I wouldn't count a product web page advertisement but I guess definitions vary. In any case they spend close to nothing if anything on regular ads and sell a ton of cars (at least here in Norway).
notahacker 7y ago
And one of Tesla's core marketing claims - that their vehicles are equipped with 'the hardware needed for full self driving capability' certainly isn't any more honest than Molekule's claims about the efficacy of their filters.