Week 7 Reading Reflection

The aspect of this article that really surprised me was the length in time marketing has been studied. Ever since World War II marketing has continually evolved from demographic focused marketing, to finding emotional connections in marketing, to even trying to tap into the consumer's subconscious in order to advance marketing efforts. Before there were even televisions to air advertisements companies used other means to send their message out. I think oftentimes we forget how much we as a cultural have evolved and it is astounding to look back on it and see it full circle.

I think that the table underneath the section titled "What is at Stake?" could have been a little clearer. Some of the information included in the boxes was confusing in terms of being able to understand what the author really wanted to drive with his point. For example, the bottom row of boxes gave some examples but didn't elaborate on the examples making it difficult to relate to what the author really wanted to express in his example.

The article discusses World War II as being a big point in history where consumer products really launched from and became important in terms of marketing. What are some examples of marketing tactics that were used during this time? With a difficult way to distribute mass media to the public, besides the newspaper, how to companies successfully do this during this era?

I know one of the big terms that is used now is customer acquisition costs. This article kind of touches upon it when it discusses segmenting the market in order to gain customers with purchasing power. My question is what is a range in customer acquisition costs that would be the most optimal? How do these companies go about discovering the customer with the most purchasing power for their product?

I think this author offered an interesting article that really provided the history and a variety of ways that marketing segmentation takes place. I believe that the author did a great job with this article and did a lot of research to back up his points. He presented many facts that are difficult to argue with as a reader.