Butter, perfume and music: Sex doesn't always sell

Taylor Swift

Carol Forsloff — It’s a common belief that sex sells, but the experts don’t think so, at least if one wants consistent and positive response over time from anything from music to butter.

According to behavior experts, overt sex revealed too frequently can be a turnoff. People begin to wonder about motivation and see it as driven by less talent concerns than the desire for attention. The problem is the attention is short-lived.

An Iowa study found that people are likely more able to remember the advertising in advertisements when they are not surrounded by sex or violence. Many experts observe that the notion sex sells is a false one. In fact less is more is the dictum for “selling”. In other words, more modest, sexually-oriented material has more lasting appeal, and actually sells more products or services, than the overt, more blatant types.

Psychologists say this: “Sexually graphic, intensely violent television programs are selling only one thing: the message of excessive violence and sex.

It is a coarsening and degrading message. It is a message of hostility and misogyny. And it doesn't even work!”

Journal of Consumer Research, presented research by Janne van Doorn and Diederik A. Stapel of Tilburg University in the Netherlands that also concluded that too much sex has the reverse effect on sales, with folks less likely to have long term interest or memory of the product being sold.

Scientific research has also demonstrated that women do not respond favorably to flashy magazine advertisements with sexy women.  A University of Florida research study of 100 women of college age found that after being shown a number of advertisements with flashy, seductive photos, the young women expressed boredom and disinterest. Researchers concluded that male marketers miss the mark when putting out very seductive photos for advertising, with respect to how women feel.  Women tend to gravitate to an attractive woman, like Katie Homes, or in music someone like Taylor Swift, both of whom have that down-home, prettiness as opposed to the overtly sexy model from a Victoria Secret Ad.

So the next time you want to sell perfume, butter or music, it’s best to know what the facts are with respect to sex and advertising and getting the effect you want. The best approach is that less is more, substantiated not just by science, but the old adage we once learned as well, especially women, not to show it all and expect respect — or sales.

2 billion job losses predicted. Is yours one of them?

[caption id="attachment_14137" align="alignleft" width="300"] Taxis in New York[/caption]

Carol Forsloff - According to Futurist Thomas Frey 2 billion jobs will disappear from the world during the next  15 to 20 years.  Will you be among those losing your entire occupation?

Technology has already shifted or eliminated many jobs, even as new ones are created, requiring more and more technical knowledge that itself becomes obsolete as even newer technology is developed.  For example, how many VCR technicians remain now that the digital age is upon us?  CD players, now popular, are reduced by MP3 players and other gadgets that allow thousands of music files to be accessed in the palm of one’s hand.

For the next twenty years,  Frey predicts five large industries will be impacted by job losses.  As the power grid shifts from national to micro grids, power lines will come down and along with it the repairmen and other personnel associated with the old systems.  Driverless cars will replace buses, taxis, delivery drivers and other forms of transportation, causing thousands of jobs to be lost.  Teachers, administrators and support personnel in the educational systems can be replaced, as well as universities and schools, as online courses, like Apple’s Open Course Ware,  continue to be available for free.   3D printers can allow the printing of virtually any three-dimensional object, including clothes and shoes, as well as construction materials.  What happens to the manufacturers in these areas?  Again,  lost jobs.  Robotic technology, Frey tells us, will reduce even more jobs, as people who do various service jobs are replaced with robots.

Journalists have already been impacted negatively, as journalism departments in many universities have closed, as more and more high schools no longer offer courses in the subject, as the democratization of the news by citizens is imbued with the energy of Facebook.

In the brave new world that’s already upon us, education and re-education are the keys to maintaining current.  But to be current, one will have to be constantly learning new devices that require increasingly sophisticated skills.   That education solution is founded upon the basic education in reading, math and the sciences.  With a high dropout rate from the nation’s schools, will young people be able to compete and learn those new skills?

The downside of technology, Frey reminds us, will create shifts in politics, social movements and attitude changes as well.  In can create serious social upheaval as people are replaced with robots that can be engineered to either build or destroy.

Other than the issues described by Frey, other business professionals in employment maintain retooling is the answer to the changes that are here and others that are coming.  “The jobs that are vulnerable are routine and repetitive and don’t require continual face-to-face contact like health care,” is the opinion of Phil Gardner, director of research at Michigan State University’s Collegiate Employment Research Institute.

That brave new world that is embraced by youth as empowering may indeed have the elements to force significant change that will impact billions of people.  Those who can’t, or won’t, change to keep up will be those who will suffer most, according to those like Frey who look at these advances from many perspectives.