Direct Marketing and Advertising Ads

You have only to look around to agree with the estimate that the average person in this country is exposed to hundreds of advertising messages, perhaps as many as several thousands, every single day. We know that it is a numbers game. If ads are shown to 20 million consumers, only a very small percentage will go to the store and buy the product. But if ads are shown continuously, year after year, an image is created and maintained.
Advertising is the root of every free-market economy. It creates product awareness and stimulates consumer demand. Consumers who don’t know a product won’t but it. Advertising not only determines what we buy, but it shapes our view of the world. It tells us remedies to take for headaches and indigestion, how we should dress, and what we should eat. The power of advertising is art/poetry of taking little and making it much.
It is the form of promotion over which the organization has the greatest control. In an advertisement, you can say whatever you want, as long as you stay within the boundaries of the law and conform to the moral and ethical standards of the advertising medium and trade associations. Of the various forms of promotion, it is the best for reaching mass audiences quickly at a low per-person cost.
Together, the nation’s 100 largest advertisers spend more than $52 billion a year on advertising. The percentage of income that a company spends on advertising varies according to the product and the market. A major company like Coca-Cola may spend 30 percent of total earnings to promote its products in a highly competitive market; a company that manufactures heavy industrial machinery may spend less then 1 percent. In most small business, the typical advertising budget is 2 to 5 percent of income.