Advertisement. It’s everywhere…

It is around more than people realize. We are constantly subjected to advertising and its manipulative ways of convincing us to buy particular products. Whether walking down the street, surfing the web, watching television, driving to a particular destination or even reading a magazine advertising is literally everywhere.
Advertising today takes place in the common major cities: New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, Atlanta, etc. While it may have taken years for advertising to reach its scale it is now at its full potential and society is eating out of the advertiser’s hands. According to allbusiness.com, there are ten objectives that a successful advertising company tries to reach during each campaign.
1. Go after the right target audience.
2. Highlight their competitive advantage.
3. Establish an image.
4. They must spend money in order to make money.
5. Location. Location. Location. You must advertise in the right areas.
6. Never allow the budget you are given to determine your advertising campaign.
7. Diversify.
8. Don’t try to be everything to everyone.
9. Test the ads in advance before actually releasing.
10. Monitor all ads once they have been published.

While these tips may seem simple and small, they are the ten best ways to run a successful ad campaign. The first rule is simply based off the fact that each advertisement must target specific audience members. It would not be profitable to create an ad for clothes and try advertising in front of a tire company. Ads have and will always be aimed towards whatever product the company is trying to promote. In order to successfully fulfill the first objective persuasion is needed. In the advertising business there are many different ways and types of persuasion. Individual versus cultural; individual persuasion mainly focuses on the appeals and emotions that benefit that particular individual, while cultural focuses on the norms of society in order for individuals to not feel ‘left out’ of the loop. Both of these ways are successfully used in ads in order to correctly draw individuals in to that particular advertisement.
Due to the successful business of advertising, many effects follow behind. There are four different levels of understanding with advertising effects:
1. Awareness of a brand or company
2. Comprehension of the product and what it will do for them
3. Conviction that you should buy the product
4. Action
These effects are so efficient with the viewers of advertisements. Researchers are able to study these effects through different ways such as: audience research which is done so by gathering basic data about the audience, media research which is done so by studying the characteristics of a medium, and copy research which is the comparing of reactions of sample audiences. While these are three main ways to complete media research there are also other ways, i.e. consumer research, lifestyle research, applied research, quantitative research and qualitative research. These research formats are helpful because it allows research companies to target their audiences appropriately and run a successful advertising campaign.

The journey through journalism

It is hard to believe my first semester of college is actually over. My first steps in the journalism field have passed, and now it is up to me to continue on this journey towards my future. I walk away with more knowledge than I had expected to obtain over this semester. The laws and ethics, the journalism ecosystem, Stovall on the culture of journalism, writing and reporting, when to quote: what are simple lectures to some is great advice for aspiring professional journalists. 

The amazing part about all of this is that I arrived to my first classes of my college career already feeling prepared. In my mind, I knew majority of everything being taught to me, there was nothing new I could possibly learn as a freshman and until I got into the upper-division classes nothing I learned would be interesting. If only I was flexible enough to put my foot in my mouth. The truth is, I have learned more this semester than I learned in a year of high school. The real world is a scary place, but I am able to attend my classes, learn something new and leave excited about what is yet to come. My journalism courses bring out a certain passion in me allowing me to realize that this really is something I want to do for the rest of my life.