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| Image by Hysterical Bertha |
A while back I went through the Publisher’s Clearing House process online to register to win a million dollars.
Yes it’s a long shot and no I don’t normally sign up for these kinds of contests, I guess I was bored and figured, why not?
A little while into it I began to notice how I was skipping through all the advertisement pages offering magazine subscriptions. They were there, I saw them, but I didn’t look at them. All I wanted to do was get to the end of the registration process and cross my fingers for a million.
Being that so many people register to win the million, I’d be willing to bet a large number of registrants to the contest really don’t care about ordering magazines. Like me, they keep clicking until the page says, “Enter Your Name Here.”
Once I noticed how I was skipping through to the end, I started analyzing the blind marketing system these magazine companies are doing.
Obviously it’s working for them to some extent because they keep advertising and the contest keeps going. But in general, business owners need to be aware of how their customers view, act, and react to their marketing strategies. Don’t piss them off. Be careful not to spend your advertising dollars in places people skip through in order to get to the area they really are there for.
Sometimes people get mad. If you advertise in the wrong place people will get frustrated. “Why is this here? I don’t want this,” they’ll tell themselves subconsciously.
And if you’re the one offering the advertising, be careful how many advertisements you put your customer through. Too many and they’ll hate you for it.
Test your advertising avenues before spending huge. And choose those avenues you take wisely.
June 18th, 2008 at 11:47 pm
Hi John,
That’s so true. We do become very blind to ads. Blogs are often that way too.
With Publishers Clearing House they always say “you don’t have to order to be illegible to win”, but there’s almost a hidden message in that. I think a lot of people think their entry might be thrown out if they don’t order.
Barbara Swafford’s last blog post..The Biggest Mistake I Made In Blogging
June 19th, 2008 at 6:53 am
LOL – I know I always do! But I tell myself if they were caught doing that they would be in big trouble.
Who really knows though.
June 20th, 2008 at 2:02 pm
I’m just so tired of deceptive advertising and marketing “tricks”. I’m all for doing things like using colors people like, free trial offers so that people get to see how great your product is before deciding to buy it, making navigation easy, offering a complimentary product (like amazon tells you what books others buy along with the book you just purchased), and so on. But trying to get you to subscribe to a magazine by playing on the secret fear most people have that if they don’t buy something their chances of winning $1,000,000.00 will decrease? Come on! I’m seriously thinking of going on advertisement fast.
Marelisa’s last blog post..The Elasticity of Time (Part 2)
June 20th, 2008 at 2:51 pm
LOL Marelisa. I like the fasting idea. The problem is, fasting from marketing could in itself be a marketing idea! Kind of like how Seth Godin doesn’t allow comments on his blog, so instead, people talk about him, his books, his blog, etc. all outside his website.
Or the way the rock band Pearl Jam is against Ticket Master and MTV, however, they’re still a success.
I agree 100% with you on the free trials and all.