The new face in selling beauty products
Sex! – now wanna buy the toaster?
Gorgeous young models are used to sell everything from computer processors to car tires. But such a strategy can sometimes backfire, says University of Colorado marketing professor Paul Herr.
If customers want quality – when buying a new computer laptop, for example – an attractive model can hurt a product’s credibility, said Herr, who also is an associate professor at Binghamton University in New York. “If the customer has time to process the ad, and the attractive model doesn’t fit, it’s almost like this bias detector goes off,” he said.
Herr and the late Yong-Soon Kang, an associate professor of marketing at Binghamton University, polled more than 200 college students, using ads for disposable razors, computer processors, shampoo and laptops.
The results of their marketing study, “Beauty and the Beholder: Why Pretty Faces Don’t Always Help Sales,” will be published in the June issue of the Journal of Consumer Research.
Put Billy Mays in a speedo! I’m sure a lot of the bears in SF will love to see that 🙂
People may research what they will. Advertisers will always sell sex, ’cause it works.
Just remember Hi Karate.
Hell, that’s why I quit selling insurance in 2 weeks. I was too pretty to close a deal.
Sometimes I see a really cool commercial, laugh, discuss the funny points with friends and/or coworkers, and have absolutely no idea what their trying to sell. Or like Bow-Flex; I would never buy one of the damned things, but they’ve got some really cool guitars working in their commercials.
Hogwash! Beauty always sells. Just ask King Agamemnon and his thousand ships.