"Breaking through the clutter"-reflections

"Breaking through the clutter" definitely helped put into a better perspective what advertisers want to accomplish when putting together their ad campaigns. Most of the time I watch commercials and either think they stink or they are funny. Rarely do I get the sense that I really understand what the ad is trying to convey. But after watching this video I feel compelled to ask myself what do advertisers want me to Think/feel/do after being exposed to their ads. I also now wonder how many advertisers spend the time to do quality formative research on their target audience; so many times I see ads that seem to play up a stereotype of a target audience. I found it interesting that one of the advertisers felt uneasy about people opening up to the researcher. He was uncomfortable by this because he wasn’t sure if it was right to have people share more than they were asked to in order for advertisers to understand their customers. I think it was more a question of how are we using this information and is it ethical. This is what I ultimately got from watching this video; how are we using formative research? And for whose benefit?