BELIEVE IT OR NOT

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 2, Issue 331, 19 September 1932, Page 4

BELIEVE IT OR NOT

Following hard upon our advocacy of a courageous plan to effeetively advertise Rotorua on national lines comes a telling article in the Chamber of Commerce review by Mr. T. H. Grenfell, advertising manager for Maclone products. Mr. Grenfell's facts apply forcibly to the Rotorua position and should be taken cognisance of by those who have the district's improvement at heart. No written message, he says, focuses attention on what you have to say more quicldy than the daily newspaper. People will buy according to influences, and the one sure way to influence a public is by making known through the daily Press. the salient points of one's product. Advertising means the same to a firm as a first class salesman does. However, the real danger in advertising is not the amount you spend — but the amount you do not spend. Faith means as much to the advertiser as it does to a siek person. We must not look for tangible results right now. We must have faith in advertising and look at the matter from a logical point of view. The fundamental purpose of national advertising is to acquaint and subconsciously interest and impress the public to a point of enquiry, and the fundamental purpose of a definite saies plan is to educate and enthuse the retailer and his assistants so that they may intelligently turn enquirers into actual

saies. From experience I am inclined to think that more advertising campaigns fail through the latter than the former. Thousands of children are learning to read and write every day — thousands are reaching that stage of maturity when they are able to choose for themselves. Parents no longer teach their children their preferences. Invariably it is the opposite. That is why we cannot alford to neglect to provide a yearly advertising allocation regardless of the economic conditions. Neither the advertiser nor the dealer knows when consumers are ready to buy — consequently it is the advertising that is being directed at them before they are ready to buy — before they are able to buy, that will prove the most profitafole when purchasing time comes.