Good! That's exactly what advertisers want you to think! The savviest consumers are aware that they can be manipulated and understand how that is possible.
Everyone knows about the test where the exact same detergent was placed into two different boxes, one a single color and one with two colors, and consumers preferred the one in the two-color box as it was better to look at. But what about novel cover art?
The typical formula for it is something like this: there is usually a monstrous threat in the image for the consumer to fear. There is also something that the threat is threatening, usually, sexistly enough, an attractive woman. The third element is a figure for the reader to project themselves into, usually a muscular, good looking and heroic Tarzan type.
Here's the amazing part: this cover art formula actually is proven to work just as well on women as on men!
2 comments:
Deep down I think everyone is a little bi so not only is the danger exciting (we want to know about the scary thing to avoid it, even though it's fake) but we're also attracted to the sexy people. I'm hot for the sexy dude but when you have bikini girls on the cover I enjoy that too. Just because I prefer guys doesn't mean I don't like to look at the ladies once in a while. And even straight dudes aren't just projecting themselves into handsome men, they're enjoying seeing those men, even if they don't want to have sex with them.
Personally, I think ads are more enjoyable when you know how they work. Some really anger me because they send bad messages but others that might be equally as bad are entertaining to me because they're creative. Sometimes the ads are the best thing on TV.
I don't know if the desire here is sexual, necessarily...in the Air Force most drill and emergency voices are female because of studies that show both men and women alike respond to a female voice better than a male.
I agree with ads being more enjoyable when you know how they work. The ads during soap operas for instance generally have useless men, which is spot-on.
I've also heard that the colors of a McDonald's, red and yellow, are designed to be extremely uninviting and encourage people to get in, get their food and leave. Frankly that sounds like voodoo psychology to me, since response to color is social instead of biological. (Not all cultures have black as the color of evil and death, for instance.)
As for the ads being the best thing on, I have to admit I was utterly charmed down to my withered black heart by those Coca-Cola ads with the polar bears.
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