Sex and Cars Still Sell
Todays ‘Boob Award’ goes to this ad for the Mercedes Class S, which I found on 10 Advertising. I believe the message was suppose to be that the car had eight airbags.
Everyone is fully aware that sex sells. Sex in Advertising has been used for decades and even more so over that past twenty years or so.
“Post-advertising sales response studies have shown it can be very effective for attracting immediate interest, holding that interest, and, in the context of that interest, introducing a product that somehow correlates with that interest.”
The advertising and marketing research firm of Gallup & Robinson have an intriguing essay on Sex and Advertising. With over 50 years of testing the effectiveness of advertising, G&R point out the obvious…
…”sex is a Code Red advertising technique . . . handle with care . . . seller beware; all of which makes it even more intriguing.”
Do a search for Sex in Advertising you’ll be surprised by what you find. Sex in advertising is such a powerful tool that there are whole college courses devoted to it’s study. For instance, Richard Taflinge, a professor at Washington State University’s Edward R. Murrow School of Communication, teaches a course on the subject. At first I thought the following ad was for automobiles but then I realized it was actually selling the tiny grease guns she is holding in her hands. Well, I guess sex doesn’t always work, does it?
Narrow that search to ’sex in automotive advertising’ and start wandering the 2,000,000 results. Start with Selling the Car Culture through Advertising, a course taught at the University of Wisconsin. Although the ads shown are a little bit outdated, they do illustrate the point.
But Does It Sell? And who is the better target, men or women? And what is the difference between using sex, and being sexy. Mazda tried sexy with this commercial for the MX-5.
