The Persuaders Questions
Answer each in a sentence or two.
1. What approach did Song airlines decide to take with its new campaign?
2. What are the “er” words? Why have they ceased to be effective?
3. Describe the change in advertising in the early 1990s.
4. Do you agree with the assessment of “pseudo-spiritualism” in advertising?
5. One advertising member decided to research why people join ______ in order to determine how best to market shoes and other brands. What is your response to this?
6. What is a “lovemark”? Do you recognize any attempts to create lovemarks in your world?
7. Why are 30-second TV ads now reaching fewer people?
8. What are your feelings about product placement in television and films? Do you feel that it negatively impacts your entertainment?
9. “Once a culture becomes advertising-friendly, it ceases to be a culture at all.” Do you agree with this statement? Why or why not?
10. Do you agree with Clotaire Rapaille’s ideas about why people buy what they do?
11. What impact does “It doesn’t matter what you want to tell the public, it matters what they want to hear” (in other words, the work of Frank Luntz) have on politics and on our culture?
12. What is the difference between a “broadcast” ad and a “narrowcast” one?
13. How did Democrats use narrowcasting to give Kerry the win in the New Hampshire primary in 2004?
14. How did Republicans use narrowcasting to affect Georgia politics in 2001?
15. “Sorted and sifted, we slip into our own demographic needs and tribes.” Do you agree that this is happening in the US?
16. (Answer in about a paragraph). What do you see as Rushkoff’s thesis? Do you see the kind of problems here that he seems to? What parts of the film do you find most important?