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Your `T.V. baby,' Ad man's delight
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`Pester Power' is what kids exercise on their parents to buy a product seen on television. ANJU GEORGE finds a strange co-relation between Ads and kids
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`YEH DIL mange more' sings your li'l boy and pleads for a packet of his favourite chips. He pleads endlessly till you yield. `Mummy ka magic chalega kya', he begins to petition again for a new something he has seen on T.V. Your `T.V baba' is the Ad man's delight as he proves the perfect conduit to sell a product.
Do you remember the time, when the only advertisements that targeted young children were those of toys or of biscuits? Well, gone are those days. Today all the advertisements are targeted at children, be it of cough drops or painkillers, tooth paste or floor cleanser, vacuum cleaner or water purifier, energy drink or soft drink, fast food or branded edible items, automotives or home appliances.
Well, there used to be a time when the customer was referred to as the 'King'. That was the time, when the right to choose and the will to buy, ultimately lay on the adult male of the family and in this regard, fathers were real `Kings'. But, what about the new-age dads? The only thing they get to do today is to pay the bill for things that their kids choose to buy. No wonder, these days, the customer is no more the `King', but, the `Prince', making the `cradle to grave' strategies designed by the modern Ad. Gurus is extremely effective.
In India, the number of kids influencing the family's decision-making about major purchases is leaping up. A recently concluded visual media convention at Mumbai found out that a vast number of children watch TV, prefer it to reading, and 71 per cent of kids in India influence their parents' decision when buying high-priced goods like a car. The phenomenon was termed by the experts as `pester power' (the power of kids to pester their parents into buying a certain object) and was not urban but extended to the interiors of the country as well, although a study in this regard covered only Mumbai, Delhi and Chennai. The news that `bal-panchayats' (children's committees) are being set up in villages, and the fact that kids are often the only literate members of a family in villages adds up to the fact that `pester power' is growing everywhere. That is why industrialists and Ad-men are one on the theory that to develop tomorrow's markets, it is necessary to understand the kids of today. It will be quite upsetting to see just how much advertising is deliberately targeting children and what products in particular are being promoted. And the results are rather amusing. At six months of age, the age when babies start imitating simple sounds like "ma-ma," they form mental images of corporate logos and mascots. By age two, the kids start speaking clearly and what exactly is that your tots speak?-names of soft drinks and bits of Ad. jingles, that too, even before they learn to say their own names. The moment they are ready to articulate, they start saying, `do the dew', in a different accentuation, perhaps (though an average adult can see nothing good about that ad) and `thanda matlab Coca-Cola'. The first full sentence voiced by a child is invariably seen to be taken from an advertisement.
According to recent marketing industry studies, a person's "brand loyalty" may begin as early as age two! In more lucid terms, your two-year-old toddler is more brand-conscious than you are. And that exactly is what these commercials are bent on- creating `Brand-Conscious Babies.'
However, adults who love to watch these ads necessarily don't buy the products. But, it's never the same with kids. If they find a commercial easy to digest, they will definitely want their parents to spend money on that. So, what should the parents do to minimise the influence of advertisements on their children. They need to understand the power of advertising on young children and limit the time they spend watching TV.
Ad gurus are never reluctant to target or exploit anyone who could be their potential customers. And children are their best bet.
Target-Kids
WHY ARE kids are overtly targeted, by T.V Ads? A recent study carried out in this field, revealed some interesting finds.
Television advertisers want children and teens to develop brand loyalty as early as possible. Very young children are quite vulnerable or susceptible to advertising.
Usually, just one or two commercials are enough to influence their choices.
For children ages 6-17, the number-one activity after school is watching TV.
The majority of children under age six do not understand that the purpose of a commercial is to sell a product.
Children who watch four or more hours of TV a day are less likely to spend adequate time on school work, indulge in outdoor games or have hobbies and are more likely to believe claims made by advertisers.
It's estimated the average child sees more than 20,000 commercials every year - that works out to at least 55 commercials per day. (Another researcher indicates that by the age of 21, an average child watches 1, 000,000 commercials.)
Before teens reach the legal drinking age they watch 100,000 alcohol commercials.
It is true that advertising found a new facet with the foray of television and countless channels and print or radio Ads have never been able to catch the fancy of children.
Children appear especially influenced by TV advertisements because of the medium's multi-sensory stimulation and its potential for product over-representation, a feature no other medium can match.
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