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> Meanwhile, a spokeswoman for another trade organisation, the Advertising Association, says that "all advertising plays a crucial role in brand competition, dr

> Meanwhile, a spokeswoman for another trade organisation, the Advertising Association, says that "all advertising plays a crucial role in brand competition, drives product innovation, and fuels economic growth". You know what actually drives product innovation? Not being able to lean on advertising to drive sales, so you're actually forced to improve your product and get the benefit of positive word of mouth instead.

wpietri 4y ago
Exactly. Advertising is an arms race. Coca Cola doesn't spend billions on ads because nobody had heard of Coke. They do it to suppress the more innovative competition.
- trystero 4y ago
  ...which is an argument against advertisement.
- radicaldreamer 4y ago
  It's to remind people to buy a coke, it feeds the craving. Same thing for McDonalds and Starbucks advertising.
  - wpietri 4y ago
    Right, yes, I believe we're saying the same thing. If Coca Cola doesn't remind people to buy their product, they might buy some other product.
  - andrewinardeer 4y ago
    And to make people feel good about their purchase. BMW doesn't really need to advertise as their new cars are only affordable for a small subset of the population. They advertise to re-enforce to their customers they made a great decision parting with their money.
- WalterBright 4y ago
  Coca Cola did innovate - "New Coke". It was a disaster. People like the old Coke formula much better. Some things really don't need innovation.
  - derefr 4y ago
    And interesting point I learned from a documentary recently, that I rarely see mentioned: New Coke failed mainly in the American South, among people who considered Coke to be a wholesome and traditional part of their lifestyle — kind of like sweet tea. But it failed so hard there, with people there getting so angry, that the media capitalized on that failure, running constant articles about it, giving an impression that New Coke was just failing in general. New Coke was actually decently successful in the rest of the world; and especially in younger, more urban markets — i.e. the markets Pepsi is more popular in. New Coke did exactly what it was designed to do: steal market share from Pepsi. Coke's mistake was never really in launching New Coke. Their mistake was in removing the "old" Coke at the same time. If New Coke was positioned differently — not as a replacement for Coke, but just as a "kind" of Coke (like Coke Zero is a "kind of" Coke), they would have cleaned up.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
wlesieutre 4y ago
Word of mouth is increasingly the only source I trust for product recommendations. Once advertisers figure this out I imagine they'll start sponsoring my acquaintances to lie to me about their products in person and I'll have to narrow the field even further.
- feet 4y ago
  I think this is why influencers on social media are a thing
- registeredcorn 4y ago
  You mean referral bonuses? I.e. https://cdn.mycreativeshop.com/images/templates/16618/refer-a-friend-dental-flyer-template-32355-flat1.jpg https://cdn.mycreativeshop.com/images/templates/16618/refer-...
  - deadbolt 4y ago
    If my friend referred a dentist to me just for $50 without mentioning that they were only doing it for the incentive, we wouldn't be friends much longer.
    - registeredcorn 4y ago
      That's one of the things that's confused me about those sorts of programs. Is the friend supposed to mention that they are getting paid for their recommendation? It's such a weird thing.
      - wlesieutre 4y ago
        I'd feel better about it in that case, yeah. Personally have referred somebody to Mint Mobile and they were aware I got a discount out of it.
andrewmcwatters 4y ago
Sounds like the position of a developer who has never had to advertise. Building things doesn't automatically make people gravitate toward them. Believe it or not, you have to go places and promote things. Yes, talking about or inserting something into conversation is promoting. It's advertising. And guess what--almost none of your users or buyers are going to say a word about your product. People need to stop believing this stuff and just accept the dirty fact that if you want something to get used, you HAVE to advertise. You HAVE to promote. Edit: You know what word of mouth is? Worthless for people who don't have eyeballs on a product. Go read around HN and tell me about a product you just heard about being praised that you don't already know about today that is not already the de facto solution or product in a space. You know what word of mouth is? Word of mouth is a signal you have already won. It is absolutely nothing for growth.
- paxys 4y ago
  Not all advertising is the same. Yes every product needs to promote itself, but there are countless organic ways to do so, most of them being industry dependent. How many of the most popular tech products today got to where they are because they put up billboards in the middle of cities?
  - missedthecue 4y ago
    https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EYthp3TU0AYgbty.jpg https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EYthp3TU0AYgbty.jpg
- thot_experiment 4y ago
  While that's obviously true, I'm not sure it's some sort of optimum state. I think if you're in the ocean, it is understandable that you would keep treading water to stop yourself from drowning, but perhaps a better solution is to look for ways to leave the ocean. I'm entirely unconvinced that this isn't a local maximum that we're stuck in. Even if I leave room that advertising (and capitalism) is the only stable system, that doesn't mean it can't be limited and restricted for better outcomes for people on the whole.
- 4y ago
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
grantsch 4y ago
If your product is so damn good Why don't you want to tell more people about it - wouldn't that help them? (and you?) Seriously asking - like I get it if you only want to make $x and call it a day but can you help me understand why you wouldn't want to help more people with your superior offer?
- derefr 4y ago
  There could be per-unit CapEx costs that mean that you actually can't scale up to serve traffic very much faster than organic viral growth allows. Imagine a small cake shop running a Superbowl ad. That'd be dumb, right? Even if they had the money to run the ad, they can't fulfill the number of orders that ad would generate.
  - grantsch 4y ago
    What you're saying is just not true. It's also not what capex means. Most companies do not and cannot "go viral" that is a fantasy for most offers. Unfortunately it's just not that easy There's a reason that millions of Americans work in some form of sales. At big, medium, and small companies of all types. It's not an accident or a mistake actually. Any offer worth enough profit to be worth a human pitching it will get pitched - and so too will many offers that aren't worth pitching for that matter
    - derefr 4y ago
      > It's also not what capex means. Per-unit-amortized CapEx costs, sorry. (Typo.) Think: labor acquisition costs when you're providing a high-touch service. You can only hire so fast. Or acquisition/expansion costs for facilities and capital equipment (factory mechanization), in the case of the small bakery. You can only make so many cakes per hour, by hand, in a room of a given size. And it's 100% true. Look at any consultant. Look at any maker of artisanal goods. If you have "inelastic supply", then there is a certain amount of demand that is saturating, at which point you don't need any more demand — you only need better demand. Every customer you acquire from that point on replaces a lower-value customer on your fixed timetable. Untargeted outreach (advertising) does nothing to make that happen. You need targeted outreach (sales) at that point. Or just some very aggressive lead-qualification of your organic inbound traffic.

wpietri 4y ago

Exactly. Advertising is an arms race. Coca Cola doesn't spend billions on ads because nobody had heard of Coke. They do it to suppress the more innovative competition.

trystero 4y ago
...which is an argument against advertisement.
radicaldreamer 4y ago
It's to remind people to buy a coke, it feeds the craving. Same thing for McDonalds and Starbucks advertising.
- wpietri 4y ago
  Right, yes, I believe we're saying the same thing. If Coca Cola doesn't remind people to buy their product, they might buy some other product.
- andrewinardeer 4y ago
  And to make people feel good about their purchase. BMW doesn't really need to advertise as their new cars are only affordable for a small subset of the population. They advertise to re-enforce to their customers they made a great decision parting with their money.
WalterBright 4y ago
Coca Cola did innovate - "New Coke". It was a disaster. People like the old Coke formula much better. Some things really don't need innovation.
- derefr 4y ago
  And interesting point I learned from a documentary recently, that I rarely see mentioned: New Coke failed mainly in the American South, among people who considered Coke to be a wholesome and traditional part of their lifestyle — kind of like sweet tea. But it failed so hard there, with people there getting so angry, that the media capitalized on that failure, running constant articles about it, giving an impression that New Coke was just failing in general. New Coke was actually decently successful in the rest of the world; and especially in younger, more urban markets — i.e. the markets Pepsi is more popular in. New Coke did exactly what it was designed to do: steal market share from Pepsi. Coke's mistake was never really in launching New Coke. Their mistake was in removing the "old" Coke at the same time. If New Coke was positioned differently — not as a replacement for Coke, but just as a "kind" of Coke (like Coke Zero is a "kind of" Coke), they would have cleaned up.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]

wlesieutre 4y ago

Word of mouth is increasingly the only source I trust for product recommendations. Once advertisers figure this out I imagine they'll start sponsoring my acquaintances to lie to me about their products in person and I'll have to narrow the field even further.

feet 4y ago
I think this is why influencers on social media are a thing
registeredcorn 4y ago
You mean referral bonuses? I.e. https://cdn.mycreativeshop.com/images/templates/16618/refer-a-friend-dental-flyer-template-32355-flat1.jpg https://cdn.mycreativeshop.com/images/templates/16618/refer-...
- deadbolt 4y ago
  If my friend referred a dentist to me just for $50 without mentioning that they were only doing it for the incentive, we wouldn't be friends much longer.
  - registeredcorn 4y ago
    That's one of the things that's confused me about those sorts of programs. Is the friend supposed to mention that they are getting paid for their recommendation? It's such a weird thing.
    - wlesieutre 4y ago
      I'd feel better about it in that case, yeah. Personally have referred somebody to Mint Mobile and they were aware I got a discount out of it.

andrewmcwatters 4y ago

Sounds like the position of a developer who has never had to advertise. Building things doesn't automatically make people gravitate toward them. Believe it or not, you have to go places and promote things. Yes, talking about or inserting something into conversation is promoting. It's advertising. And guess what--almost none of your users or buyers are going to say a word about your product. People need to stop believing this stuff and just accept the dirty fact that if you want something to get used, you HAVE to advertise. You HAVE to promote. Edit: You know what word of mouth is? Worthless for people who don't have eyeballs on a product. Go read around HN and tell me about a product you just heard about being praised that you don't already know about today that is not already the de facto solution or product in a space. You know what word of mouth is? Word of mouth is a signal you have already won. It is absolutely nothing for growth.

paxys 4y ago
Not all advertising is the same. Yes every product needs to promote itself, but there are countless organic ways to do so, most of them being industry dependent. How many of the most popular tech products today got to where they are because they put up billboards in the middle of cities?
- missedthecue 4y ago
  https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EYthp3TU0AYgbty.jpg https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EYthp3TU0AYgbty.jpg
thot_experiment 4y ago
While that's obviously true, I'm not sure it's some sort of optimum state. I think if you're in the ocean, it is understandable that you would keep treading water to stop yourself from drowning, but perhaps a better solution is to look for ways to leave the ocean. I'm entirely unconvinced that this isn't a local maximum that we're stuck in. Even if I leave room that advertising (and capitalism) is the only stable system, that doesn't mean it can't be limited and restricted for better outcomes for people on the whole.
4y ago

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

grantsch 4y ago

If your product is so damn good Why don't you want to tell more people about it - wouldn't that help them? (and you?) Seriously asking - like I get it if you only want to make $x and call it a day but can you help me understand why you wouldn't want to help more people with your superior offer?

derefr 4y ago
There could be per-unit CapEx costs that mean that you actually can't scale up to serve traffic very much faster than organic viral growth allows. Imagine a small cake shop running a Superbowl ad. That'd be dumb, right? Even if they had the money to run the ad, they can't fulfill the number of orders that ad would generate.
- grantsch 4y ago
  What you're saying is just not true. It's also not what capex means. Most companies do not and cannot "go viral" that is a fantasy for most offers. Unfortunately it's just not that easy There's a reason that millions of Americans work in some form of sales. At big, medium, and small companies of all types. It's not an accident or a mistake actually. Any offer worth enough profit to be worth a human pitching it will get pitched - and so too will many offers that aren't worth pitching for that matter
  - derefr 4y ago
    > It's also not what capex means. Per-unit-amortized CapEx costs, sorry. (Typo.) Think: labor acquisition costs when you're providing a high-touch service. You can only hire so fast. Or acquisition/expansion costs for facilities and capital equipment (factory mechanization), in the case of the small bakery. You can only make so many cakes per hour, by hand, in a room of a given size. And it's 100% true. Look at any consultant. Look at any maker of artisanal goods. If you have "inelastic supply", then there is a certain amount of demand that is saturating, at which point you don't need any more demand — you only need better demand. Every customer you acquire from that point on replaces a lower-value customer on your fixed timetable. Untargeted outreach (advertising) does nothing to make that happen. You need targeted outreach (sales) at that point. Or just some very aggressive lead-qualification of your organic inbound traffic.