Tobacco advertising was never about trying to persuade existing smokers to switch brands - that was the 'cover story'. In reality it was about trying to persuade young people to smoke their brand rather than some other brand. By young people < 21 years old - people do not start smoking once they get past those formative years. Sure the marketing message was different to what Kellogg's have for Coco Pops, however, the 'sophistication' of the imagery was very much targeted at young people wanting to be 'adult'.
Everything tobacco is controversial, however, how does this relate to online advertising for regular things? The only people who haven't heard of eBay will be people too young to have seen the adverts already. Same with every other brand. Everyone will know you can get everything and anything from Amazon. But there will always be this new supply of kids getting old enough to have their own debit card, they will also have impressionable minds and not have their habits cast in stone. Therefore the high pay per sale per click is actually about getting new life-long customers, in much the same way as it was for Big Tobacco.
The tobacco adverts appeared to be about persuading existing smokers to switch brands yet they had this secret darkside 'get em young' agenda. With online adverts there may be genuine 'switch brands' thinking to it yet in reality all that is effective is 'get em young', where this 'get em young' idea is not even being thought about or being looked for in the analytics.
I think they do a good job via product placement in movies and shows. Sometimes they are in "historic" or period pieces. I mean the ones create today by portraying historical periods. Sometimes there is what seems like a deliberate advertising or showing off someone lighting up. Sometimes it is cool villains so it works on a more subtle level "Oh see we are only show bad guys smoking, so we are dissuading young people to smoke".
Everything tobacco is controversial, however, how does this relate to online advertising for regular things? The only people who haven't heard of eBay will be people too young to have seen the adverts already. Same with every other brand. Everyone will know you can get everything and anything from Amazon. But there will always be this new supply of kids getting old enough to have their own debit card, they will also have impressionable minds and not have their habits cast in stone. Therefore the high pay per sale per click is actually about getting new life-long customers, in much the same way as it was for Big Tobacco.
The tobacco adverts appeared to be about persuading existing smokers to switch brands yet they had this secret darkside 'get em young' agenda. With online adverts there may be genuine 'switch brands' thinking to it yet in reality all that is effective is 'get em young', where this 'get em young' idea is not even being thought about or being looked for in the analytics.