Even 'fine' Singapore cannot escape from the onslaught of intrusive
marketing - the latest controversy to arise saw mobile telephone network
provider M1 somehow manage to sneak an ad campaign onto rival SingTel's
network.
Basically, this meant that each time a SingTel customer used his or her
phone, an M1 voice ad would play.
Whether or not this was fair play, or even whether it was a good
marketing tactic or not, is not the issue.
The issue is this: is nothing sacred?
Is there nowhere left untouched, nothing left unscathed by marketers
desperate to reach their targets by fair means or foul?
Yes, advertising makes the world go around.
It makes possible things and services which would otherwise never
exist.
But what is becoming more and more clear is the mercenary cynicism
behind every new ploy.
You want to sell diapers? Fine. Sell diapers. But to sell diapers by
coming up with a bogus marketing concept which plays off the emotional
bond between a mother and her child?
Come on.
There are some things which should be sacrosanct - for example, AIDS
victims should never be used to sell jumpers.
Consumers should never have to endure advertising when it is
unwelcome.
Consumers should be given the choice - to turn off the TV, to flip to
the next page in a magazine, to opt out of receiving ads on their mobile
phones.
Which brings us to the Internet. These days, you don't even need to
click on half the banners on the site you're visiting - simply passing
your cursor over the ad will automatically take you to the advertiser's
site.
Then there are those hugely annoying "pop-up" windows which squat on
your PC screen like warts on a toad.
And let's not start on those secret links which mean that even if you
attempt to close the site you're on, another site automatically
loads.
Try to shut that one down, and boom! Up pops another one unbidden.
No one objects to advertising as such. A lot of us actually enjoy it and
appreciate its benefits.
But no one wants to have their noses rubbed in it.
So the next time someone suggests what they think is an incredibly
clever, new marketing tactic, ask yourselves: "Would I like it as much
if it was someone else doing it to me?"
Chances are you'll say "no".
