“The real fact of the matter is that nobody reads ads. People read what interests them, and sometimes it’s an ad.” – Howard 

Advertising, the techniques and practices used to bring products, services, opinions, or causes to public notice for the purpose of persuading the public to respond in a certain way toward what is advertised. Most advertising involves promoting a good that is for sale, but similar methods are used to encourage people to drive safely, to support various charities, or to vote for political candidates, among many other examples. 

An advertisement (often shortened to advert or ad) is the promotion of a product, brand or service to a viewership in order to attract interest, engagement and sales. Advertisements come in many forms, from copy to interactive video, and have evolved to become a crucial feature of the app marketplace. 

Advertisements are very much part of everyone’s life these days. There are hoardings on roadsides and posters on walls, trains, buses and other public places. The basic function of an advertisement is to make known to the public about a certain product. Advertisement influences our day-to-day choices. They can help us decide which shirt to buy, which fashions are best suited to us, what we should eat, which scooter or car is better, which technological gadget is better. Which housing area is good and safe etc. There are hardly any newspapers and magazines which do not have advertisements in them.  

With the increase in trade due to globalization, many products and services came to India. The increase in products and services gave rise to intensive advertising due to intensive competition between products and services. People now have variety of options to choose from and advertising needs to be appealing to consumer, as they have to make a choice from the plethora of option in front of them. 

It is advertising that keeps media independence alive. Ad money pumps life into newspapers, magazines, radio and television stations. Without this money, the media would depend upon government or on parties having vested interests for survival and would loose their freedom. 

It is important that consumers are protected by the ill effects of false advertisements. Many a times advertisements are misleading and ambiguous. Consumers may not always notice the flaws in a given advertisement. To address this problem ASCI exists. 

The Advertisement Standards Council of India (hereinafter, “ASCI”) was established in the year 1985 under Section 25 of the Companies Act, 1956. It has been defined as a “voluntary, self-regulatory council” which has been registered as a non-profit company. The view with which the ASCI was formed that all the advertising activities in India must be legal, truthful, decent, honest, with a sense of social responsibility and in line with fair competitive conditions. 

Creativity is the soul of advertising. With increasing competition and platforms to advertise including digital platforms, plagiarism and copying is very common. Such situations only deceive consumers with duplicate goods and services; therefore, it needs to be curbed. 

Thus, in developed and developing countries, healthy competition is considered to be the engine of the economy, on the contrary, unfair competition in these countries is considered to be against of what it is customary and usually accepted practices in industrial and commercial matters. 

More often than not, this kind of practices go beyond of what it is accepted, and legal, therefore, International Treaties and domestic legislation have had the need to legislate these unaccepted conducts and catalogue some forms of it as Industrial Property and commerce infringement. 

Advertising and advertisements are a huge advantage to consumers but also if this medium conveying a message about a product or service is misused it is also a disadvantage to the consumers. Thus, we have to be very careful in what we choose and not fall prey to misleading and false advertisements as advertisements have an influence on our lives. 

References, 

https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=be70f75c-e6bc-45b6-a925-46bb5964e030

https://www.ibfindia.com/advertising-standards-council-india-asci

https://www.britannica.com/topic/advertising

Aishwarya Says:

I have always been against Glorifying Over Work and therefore, in the year 2021, I have decided to launch this campaign “Balancing Life”and talk about this wrong practice, that we have been following since last few years. I will be talking to and interviewing around 1 lakh people in the coming 2021 and publish their interview regarding their opinion on glamourising Over Work.

If you are interested in participating in the same, do let me know.

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If you would also like to contribute to my website, then do share your articles or poems at adv.aishwaryasandeep@gmail.com

We also have a Facebook Group Restarter Moms for Mothers or Women who would like to rejoin their careers post a career break or women who are enterpreneurs.

We are also running a series Inspirational Women from January 2021 to March 31,2021, featuring around 1000 stories about Indian Women, who changed the world. #choosetochallenge