Advertising is the communications arm of the marketing process, and advertising is a method of delivering a message from a sponsor, through an impersonal medium, to many people. (The word advertising comes from the Latin ad vertebra, meaning to turn the mind toward) The roles of advertising are many: It can be designed to dispose people to buy a product, to support a cause, raise money for charity, or publicize union or management positions during a strike. Most advertising is for the marketing goods and services. (J. Thomas Russell, Ronald Lane.1998)
Gaining a broad perspective of advertising's role as an economic and social institution is critical to understanding the day-to-day functions of advertising. Advertising does not function in a vacuum. Rather, it is part of the changing social, cultural, and business environment of which it is a part. It is critical for advertisers and marketers to keep track of shifts in values of their target segments if they hope to deal effectively with the resultant changes in behaviour. The ability to both accurately predict and react to a changing society is basic to successful advertising.
What Advertising Does for People
The most important thing advertising does is-give consumers influence-or more ace- rarely, mare influence-over their economic lives. …
