BS in Audio Gear Marketing

[Jim]

Good dialog, Chris. You certainly know your stuff.

Seeing as how you straddle more than one discipline, like me, you can probably concur that when you read trade rags on film and video equipment, that the advertisers are more likely to tout features and benefits, as opposed to having testimonials. There are, of course, exceptions... like Walter Murch promoting Final Cut Pro and various cinematographers lauding Eastman or Fuji stock. And admittedly, some cinematographers are indeed prone to using some flowery terms. But on the whole, it's an industry that's less inclined to hyperbole. You've never seen an ad praising the "warmth" of an analog VTR. It's an industry that just seems to respect it's customers more than audio does. Maybe this is due to the fact that music now takes less talent than ever before, and the market is not populated largely by professionals.

Your point about car ads is well taken. They're selling the sizzle and not the steak. And as every good ad person will tell you, the sizzle (shizzle) is what you emphasize when your product is inferior compared to its competition in the marketplace.

If you can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bullsh••.

Sure, those guys have to eat and all, but I'm just saying that they'll get more mileage out of customers like me if they treat me like a pro, and not a gullible moron.

As I'm prone to say, we live in the age where Salieri Rules.

[chrispick]

Good dialog, Chris. You certainly know your stuff.

Seeing as how you straddle more than one discipline, like me, you can probably concur that when you read trade rags on film and video equipment, that the advertisers are more likely to tout features and benefits, as opposed to having testimonials. There are, of course, exceptions... like Walter Murch promoting Final Cut Pro and various cinematographers lauding Eastman or Fuji stock. And admittedly, some cinematographers are indeed prone to using some flowery terms. But on the whole, it's an industry that's less inclined to hyperbole. You've never seen an ad praising the "warmth" of an analog VTR. It's an industry that just seems to respect it's customers more than audio does. Maybe this is due to the fact that music now takes less talent than ever before, and the market is not populated largely by professionals.

Your point about car ads is well taken. They're selling the sizzle and not the steak. And as every good ad person will tell you, the sizzle (shizzle) is what you emphasize when your product is inferior compared to its competition in the marketplace.

If you can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bullsh••.

Sure, those guys have to eat and all, but I'm just saying that they'll get more mileage out of customers like me if they treat me like a pro, and not a gullible moron.

As I'm prone to say, we live in the age where Salieri Rules.

I hear you, man. Believe me. you'd be shocked at the number of medias pros I've dealt with that should aspire to be mediocrities! But, luckily, most are bright, cool and decent people, despite the CW.

And man, I've still got tons to learn. There are people who frequent this site who know their audio sh*t a lot better than I do. I'm playing catch-up ball for sure. I'm trying though.

I think when you're talking about film/tv technicians, yeah, they like their ads serves with cold nuts, bolts and stats. Maybe it is advertiser respect; I don't know. I suppose it's proportional related to the amount of right-brain artistry a tech job requires?

Shrug...

I do think film/tv product hockers do pitch to other, less-pragmatic sympathies though. With every evolution in "prosumer" gear (it's a blurrier line these days) comes more "democratization of the media" rhetoric. Now, I'd love it if some girl in smalltown Indiana would create the next, great American film as Coppola purported. Hell, I even want to believe it'll happen. But what's cheaper than a pen and pencil? And where's the next great American novel?

All I see is more chaff.

Oh, but I ramble...

In any case, the point is to try to make cool music (or whatever art, be it commercial or not) that gets you hyped, I think.

Lastly, Walter Murch. Now, that guy's the sh*t if ever the sh*t there was.

[epidot68]

Chrispick-

Your deifnitions are dope, man.

Seriously, I think you guys have both made very valid points. Next we should pick on the A&R dorks and their use of ridiculous language to describe what they want to "see" in a song. Peace.