The resistance effect

The Resistance Effect

by Günter Faltin (excerpt from " David versus Goliath ")

We find a slogan tempting, but we can almost smell that it's bait, intended to lure us into making a purchase. Like an experienced fish swimming around and eyeing the bait, so do we. There are baits laid out, lots of baits. We know that, but often the temptation is just too big, we bite, we can't resist the temptation, like the fish. Once again we found out that we had made an ill-considered purchase that was not in our economic interest. We'll be even more suspicious next time. We humans are increasingly developing resistance to advertising. [1] Bait economy needs to upgrade to overcome our resistance to resistance effect.

And she's gearing up. Uses research, is embraced by it, as if it were the most natural thing in the world to research good baits, lay them out and keep improving them.

In 1968, talk of consumer terror seemed exaggerated. Today the uneasiness is widespread. It's a vague trepidation, the feeling of being constantly duped and, although you know that and suspect or even see through the deception, still play along.

It is economically very attractive to work with baits. The cost of the bait is a fraction of what I get when the fish bites. Stupid, then, who lays out no good bait. The better the bait, the higher my profit. If I want to maximize profit, I have to make the lures maximal and virtuosic. In any case, it is the buyers who pay for the bait, directly or indirectly.

With a small worm I get a big fish. If I use a metal fly instead of the worm, I can even reuse the bait multiple times. This is also the case in the bait economy. The customer snaps, buys the product, but the bait remains: the advertising slogans, the advertising space, the colors, the impressions, the emotional charge of the goods.

Digitization gives companies even more tools. A majority of consumers already feel threatened that they are being spied on when they make a purchase, with the intention of being able to influence future purchases. The threat is even felt to be greater than that from hackers and criminals. And surprisingly, significantly higher than the threat from government agencies, as it became known from the NSA affair. [2]

Count the number of mailboxes in your neighborhood that say “No advertising please”. There are surprisingly many. A reaction to the flood of advertising. Marketing must override the defense and immunization of people against advertising. We believe advertising less and less. Where credibility falls, the cost of materials must be increased. When the copywriter's messages no longer work, you hire real people to highlight the products: Influencer marketing is born. Marketing must constantly upgrade to override the resistance to advertising.

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[1] An example: More and more consumers are complaining about unwanted telephone advertising. The Federal Network Agency received 220,000 complaints in 2016, said Jochen Homann, head of the agency, at the presentation of the annual report. The number of consumer inquiries and complaints in the telecommunications sector thus reached a new high in 2016. For comparison: 178,000 complaints were received in 2015, compared to 139,000 in 2014. Source: www.spiegel.de/wirtschaft/service/bundesnetzagentur-record-bei-beschwerden-im-telekommunikationsbereich-a-1146693.html

[2] In a study by the market research company Edelman with 15,000 participants in 15 countries, consumers were asked what they consider to be the greatest threats to their privacy from the Internet. 51 percent of those surveyed chose the threat posed by companies selling data. The threat from hackers and secret services followed a long way behind in second and third place. Quoted from: Steve Lohr: The Privacy Paradox, a Challenge for Business, New York Times, 06/12/2014 https://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/ 2014/06/12/the-privacy-paradox-a-challenge-for-business/ (accessed 2018-10-23)