The Failure of Marketing.

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The Failure of Marketing.

Historically, marketing is plagued by one fundamental, strategical failure. It fails to communicate the notion of "don't buy this shit".

Obviously, "don't buy this shit" carries economical value as a statement, being just as essential a part of the working of any sane economy as "buy this now". Imagine a world where houses looked much like we know them today, except they were built high on 25 foot tall concrete poles. Your house, found on a concrete slab the size of half an acre would reside atop a concrete pole 25 feet high. There'd be no way to the ground except a rickety sort of bridge, connecting each house "yard" to the neighbor's, and a rickety stair, rope and rotten wood, plunging 25 feet into the abyss bellow. Every 12 houses. If you lived in the middle, there'd be a maximum of 6 neighbors you would absolutely have to use the yards of to ever get anything to your house. If one happens to be a Texan, you risk being shot every time you go by. If an owner dies, and nobody buys and upkeeps his house, you risk collapsing with the rotting hulk, unmaintained for decades. If a neighbor has 9 kids, you will need a lot of candy.

People could find themselves living like this. Anyone who thinks people could never find themselves living like this is a flaming idiot who needs to be urgently reminded that people lived, historically, the following ways :

Thinking washing in water is harmful for your health.

Thinking chopping off your vulva is essential for marital bliss

Thinking feet belong doubled over backwards, rotting and festering

In one of these :

Obviously, the message "Don't buy this shit" would have some economic merit. Watch me advertise the stupid houses on 25 foot poles :

"The house of comfort. You never need to take the garbage out"

"Ever wished you couldn't be snowed in ? Decades of research finally makes it possible"

"Closer to the stars. For the star in you"

"Wonderful view, no traffic noise, no pollution"

"Come join us at the top"

You are almost considering buying one, aren't you ? You dumb fuck. Don't buy the shit ! It's the most stupid thing anyone could come up with. I sat here and deliberately designed the most stupid thing ever. You're going to pay money for it ?

But maybe you never hear that. Maybe all you hear is buy buy buy. Maybe you live in a society which has decided to suppress all economical criticism. You could, in principle, live your entire life through endless ads promoting my stupid pole houses, to the point it doesn't sound stupid anymore. It sounds normal. Just another good, just another service in a sea of goods and services. Except a stupid one. Nonetheless, a number of people out of any sample of people will prefer it. The stupid ones.

Or are they ? Stupidity is the inability to make correct judgments based on correct data, not the inability to divine correct judgments based on no data at all. And our current convention is, no data at all. The unwritten (in fact often enough written) rule of advertising is "don't bash your competitors". Say something positive or don't say anything at all.

Well, isn't that the most deludedly puritan thing I have ever heard. If reality appears to fall short of our arbitrary criteria, the only thing to do is ignore reality, and lie to compensate the hole. Only that way will we be true, wholesome Christians, speeding to our death over a 25 foot precipice. Let's pretend there's no boobs. We could for instance have all the girls wear a wooden plank across their chest, and by wear I mean have it well pressed there by a hundred strings. Better yet, let's pretend there's no nasty bits anywhere, and that way we'll be oh so happy, especially when we step in one.

You see, if people advertising were allowed to say negative things about their competition, not only would the customers be better informed, but the competition would not like it. And we care, because when we make rules, we don't care about the well being of the customers, we care about competitions feelings. Bullshit.

The fact you can't say "Don't buy this shit" puts everybody in the ridiculous position of screaming for it. What are people who build normal houses for reasonable people to do when I start running my obscene "Come join us at the top" ad ? Shoot me for being an idiot, for one. Can't do that. Have the crap taken off the air. Can't do that either. Run their own ads explaining how utterly stupid my idea is. Nope, can't be done.

They are stuck screaming at the top of their lungs that my houses are good, but theirs are better. Heck, that's precisely what I was doing to begin with, how in the hell are they to beat me at my own game ? Which explains why, while there's an immense mountain of useless shit currently floating around the globe, nobody seems to have noticed.

You need an SUV, right ? In spite of the fact that most of them are nothing except a normal chassis with 10 cubic feet of plastic dumped on it, powered by the most inefficient engines they could find. In spite of the fact most of them would just fall apart after a ten mile chase of a good old pick up truck in it's native terrain. In spite of the fact they are unparkable, and you can't see shit from behind one. In spite of everything, the house on the pole will be the next great thing.

You also need all the cretin knick knacks all the shops are full of, all the brilliant Rube Goldberg devices you see advertised on Call Now TV (tm), you desperately need the magic salad shaver time saver thing dontcha.

No. You don't. You don't need an all purpose exerciser for your NY apartment. It won't fit and you can just jog. You don't need a salad maker. You hate salad. You don't need an SUV, you need cialis. YOU DON'T NEED THE SHIT. Get over it already.

John next door might have a taller house. It doesn't matter. Your mother's friend Debbie has a salad maker just like they show on TV. Who cares. Your cousin Artie has one of those new pens with a laundromat in them. It's ok, you'd rather be able to lift your pen, right ?

People have a right to hear what utter crap something is, before they buy it and find out for themselves. People shouldn't have to rely on friends to help out with the task. You know why women only shop in herds nowadays ? Because they can't keep track of the shit anymore. If there's 5 of them present, there's a fair chance one might notice the shit in time. And even so, we all know how well that works.

People have a right to tell people how shitty stuff is. If there's a hole in the road in front of your house, you have the right to put up a sign reading "Hole !", and we'd kindly ask you to go do it. Right now if you don't mind, promise we'll hold the thought and wait for you.

Somehow the press has a fundamental and inalienable, constitutionally protected right to tell you how shitty the president is, but john the juice maker doesn't have a right to tell you how shitty billy's brew is. Why not ? Who is in a better position to know precisely how and why billy's brew sucks ? And who has more of an interest to make sure you know all the juicy details about it ?

Oh, so they might falsely claim false things that are false and untrue. Remarkable. Except it won't be any worse than it is right now. Chiefly because advertising is an economic tool, and so it pays the best rewards to those who use it best. Just as long as we don't fuck up and regulate it for them.

Which we won't, not anymore, because quite frankly, we don't know how. Right ?

14 excess marketeers were made glue this year.

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this page was made using a bent spoon. anything else is for failures