Week 7 Reading Reflection

I found this article pretty interesting compared to the last one. Although I am not a marketing major and I have very little interest on the topic, the reason why I found this article so interesting is because it reminded me of the show 'Mad Men' right off the bat. The article talks about how in the 1960s its was becoming much harder to predict what consumers wanted. During this time consumer needs where already meet, and although constant products where being introduced most of them where modifications, they were just merely catering mild preferences. Products where less distinctive and the market was just full of verity. So, as a result, marketers had to find a way to sell practically the same product. What they did was place products with people that society wish they were like and they tried to convince individuals that these products where perfect for them. The other way they sold products was to focus on the emotional aspects of the product rather than the functional ones. So they will market the product and relate them to social status, sex appeal and pride. This is practically all that happened in the first couple of seasons in Mad Men. Basically their jobs was not selling good products, it was making products look good, regardless of their quality. Every commercial they pitched was regarding an experience and females. Going just along with the article they depicted women so horrible throughout the show (if I hated anything about it, it was that). But every time they will shoot a commercial it was about the prettiest face, the girl that every women wanted to be like and they would hold auditions based on looks not talents and all the jerks in the office got to pick what girl was featured in the commercial. Not to mention the men in this show have absolutely no respects for women, let alone their wife’s with the countless affairs they have, but that’s beside the point. What I wish the author would have touched more on would have been the section labeled ‘What are we trying to do?’ this is where the author starts to mention product segmentation and how important it is for new CMOs to think about them. I wish he would have mention some bad examples. For instance soda Chap Sticks? Why was that ever thing, the Chap Sticks that where soda flavor, I’m not sure but I thought it was gross as a child. Another example should have been Armand Hammer Baking Soda. Personally when it comes to Armand Hammer baking soda, I don’t know if it’s a cleaning product, a food product or a hygiene product. They just put that stuff in anything. If I could ask the author anything it would be why this topic? I’m assuming he has some sort of interest in marketing far beyond mine. And I would also ask his about mad men and if he hasn’t seen the show I would then very much recommend it.