Page:The Science of Advertising (1910).djvu/58

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54
The Science of Advertising

So the modern manufacturing advertiser, instead of putting out a cheapened, unmarked and unidentified article to be sold to the dealer till some more profitable one comes along, marks, identifies and claims his article which he establishes directly in the favor of the people and which can not be supplanted at the dealers' wish, but only when a better one appeals to the people.

For he does not immediately compete with those trying to make a cheaper product for the dealer. He has to compete only with those who, like himself, have the consumer directly in mind; and the sure tendency of their competition must therefore be in quality, value and satisfaction to the consumer.

This must be the primary effect upon the product of the action of advertising. The accompanying economic action has less social but perhaps more business importance.

Advertised products—foods especially—are popularly regarded as usually more expensive than the non-advertised articles of the same sort. And although the great and increasing sales of all proper, advertised articles proves in the most conclusive way that the people regard the advertised articles as, on the whole, purer and better than the unadvertised brands, yet the belief still clings firmly that in buying an advertised article, the buyer must "pay" for advertising.

It seldom seems to occur to most people that