False Advertising Use Of Weasel Words example essay topic

1,105 words
We buy things everyday and are willing to pay any price for them. Some do not know what they are buying until they open the package and see what is inside. It is true that for some of us that it is very easy to determine which product is good or bad, but advertiser had increased its way of advertising to those way. So nowadays, there are so many disappointments with what is bought. First, they tend to use small labels that cannot be read easily by every consumer. The second one is using weasel words to exaggerate the meaning of the product to make it more stand out, trustworthy.

Finally, they would use the word "natural" as a way to make consumer think it would be a clean buy. In this decade, marketer and advertiser use these different types of trick to lure consumers into their net for a profitable gain. For a clean gain, most advertiser use small label, usually at the bottom of the flyer, to lure consumer into their net. Small label has been used widely all over the world. It is most highly used in contract work, but nowadays people use it to advertising for their product. When it comes for consumer to buy, they tend to not care if the product really up to its claim.

They just go in and buy without hesitation, and without reading the small print that is usually at the bottom of the ads. When consumers see that the product does not work as what they expected, they try to return it. But here the catch, the sellers usually say that the product is fine with what they claim it to be. Then most sellers would point out the small print at the bottom or in the box of the product to show that consumer cannot return a product it is working correctly. There is nothing the consumers can do to get his money back. Small label can be very powerful when it is used in a right way, or it can be useless if not handle correctly.

Using weasel words is a way for advertiser to advertise their product and make it looks as good as a pumpkin pie, but it really just a salty egg that has been disguised itself to look as good as the pumpkin pie. Weasel words can be very convincing when it is integrated into a product's ad. Words such as "best", "help", "virtually", "new and improved", "acts fast", "like magic", and many more are examples of weasel words. These words say to consumer that they need to have this product and they would be stupid if they do not buy it.

That is the image consumers always get when they are into a specific product they want to buy. Advertisers use this benefit to strategize their way of advertising to fit the image. It is good that the advertising for a product is impressive, but can the product be up to its claim? There are many products out in the market are not what they claim to be and some are unusable by consumers. Even though we got trick by the ads, we cannot blame the company who advertises the product. We can only blame ourselves for getting excited over a product because of the weasel words they use, and start overlooking the true form of the product.

"Natural" is a word that can be very deceiving to a lot of consumers. Almost all the marketer use "natural" to make their product looks freshly make from the core of its root. That is what fool many consumer nowadays. They really think that natural really mean natural. Rarely a product is really natural, but most or even all products are just faking their product as nature make.

Take strawberry juice for example, they use di calcium, tri sodium phosphates, and some colors depend on what color the product is going to make. There is only 5 percents or less of the actually strawberry juice is in there. Not many people out there really care about searching information to a product that they buy, especially in the food department. Like comparing two companies, one says that they have orange; the other one says that they have natural orange. Without researching about the product, which one would you buy? You would tend to buy the natural orange, am I correct?

The word "natural" can be very simple and innocent, but the usage of it is very powerful in daily advertising. False advertising can be very dangerous and misleading. These are some examples of false advertising in this decade. The first one is from Phone Company, such as Verizon, Sprint, Cingular, and AT&T. They say there will be no charge for roaming all for all call, but they never tell you the limit of locations you could call in. People get charge because they thought that it is free to call while roaming, but they cannot do anything about it. The ads do point the location but in a very small print in the contract when we signed the agreement paper.

It is our fault for not reading the contract in the first place. Second, a lot of us might have heard about weight loss issue and how a fake weight loss program is very hard to determine. Many of us want to lose our weight but do not know what to do. So they rely on fast weight loss pill and other kinds of diet.

That is when marketers show their skill of advertising to those who are desperately in need of losing weight. Marketers make a lot of profit this way even with fake product with a really good ad. There are many more products out there that are being advertised using weasel words, small labels and other technique of advertising right now at this moment, but the bad part about it is that no one really knows which product is good or bad. From now on, we should be on high alert when ads use weasel words or small labels.

We should read and check everything carefully to see its real form before we hand them our credit card. I know it is tough, but that is the only way to stop false advertising.