Soc2172a Advertising and Society

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Soc2172aAdvertising and Society

• Lecture 2
• Brief History of Advertising

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Rise of Advertising (Singer)

• ad. function to announce, inform, persuade
• advertising can be used as tool to study society
• social factors leading to rise of advertising
• emerged with money economy, growth of cities,
  slow rise of industrialization and mass society,
  especially in the 19th century

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Singers Eight Periods 1. Preliterate Period
300-400 BC

• oral advertising main form
• pictographs or cunieform writing on clay tablets
• remnants of clay tags found in Mesopotamia

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2. Classical Period 400BC-100AD

• oral still predominant
• however, found iconic ads on public walls
• proclamations early type
• beginning of literacy

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3. Classical - Middle Ages 100-1400

• town criers became 1st state-sanctioned ad medium

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4. Late Middle Ages 1400-1600

• oral still main form esp. criers
• with invention of printing press came 1st written
  ads
• Gutenberg movable type 1450
• 1480 1st ad poster advertising religious rule
  book
• Martin Luthers proclamation of Protestantism
  nailed to church door in Germany in early 1500s
• early print ads mostly promoted books

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5. Early Mass Media Period 1600-1900

• 1591 - 1st newspaper ad for book on plants in
  Germany
• by 1600s ads for coffee, tea appearing in
  British Press
• 1660 - 1st toothpaste ad promised to give whiter
  teeth and reduce bad breath
• individual personal classified ads became
  dominant form
• ads started earlier in Europe
• 1752 1st newspaper ad appeared in Halifax Gazette
• mostly billboards, calendars, almanacs,
  catalogues
• Late 19th century saw rapid growth in periodical
  media
• by early 1900s, US advertising worth 95 million

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The Great Transition

• Around 1900, three main changes
• 1. Better and faster printing - also half tone,
  colour
• 2. Brand Name
• 3. Ad Agency

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6. 20th Century Mass Media Period

• 1st ad. journal Economic Advertising (later
  Marketing) 1908
• Rapid growth of advertising and persuasive
  technology
• Use of ads in war - also women became target
  because men away
• Trying establish self as independent and
  self-regulating
• New social type created by advertisers the
  Consumer
• Ads promoted rise of consumer consciousness

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7. Era of Electronic Advertising 1920 - 1980

• New electronic media i.e. radio, TV.
• Advent of behavioural research - Jon B. Watson
• More focus on women

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8. Information Society 1980-now

• Rapidly changing trends
• VCR threat to advertising
• Computer threat to print media and TV
• Now Internet completely commercialized
• Telemarketing ubiquitous

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Examples from the Past

• See the Duke University Scriptorium for more than
  7000 examples of early US and Candian ads from
  1911 1955 at http//scriptorium.lib.duke.edu/ad
  access/

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Post World War II Trends(described by Agee,
Ault, Emery)

• 1950s The Product Era
• 1960s The Image Era
• 1970s The Era of Comparative Advertising
• 1980s Era of Target Advertising, Marketing, and
  Advocacy Advertising
• 1990s Era of Adjustment to the New Media
• 2000s ???

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Current Trends and Problems

• Audience fragmentation
• Clutter
• Zapping
• Loss of advertising revenues
• More sophisticated targeting of market segments
• Growth in minority populations
• Global advertising