An #Ad in @TheOklahoman reminds me What I Got Crucially Wrong about #Marketing - #Advertise #Market #Advertising #Ads

The ad says,

Digital Marketing Summit

Put Your Business on Top 

(Date, Time, Location)

Join us for a free breakfast and Google-seminar as we help your business take off. You will learn how to:
Reach qualified customers - Impact purchase decisions - Drive sales - Grow your business

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What I got crucially wrong? It's probably what a lot of marketing-officials want you to get wrong ... though not the same way I got it wrong.

They want you to think that 'marketing' (the whole industry, not just 'the ads the industry makes') is some kind of "source of income."

You know 'the income-source' is 'the money people pay to for the products-&-services they hear about (usually through the marketing)'—that the producers/providers pay the advertisers/marketers to 'make sure' customers hear about the products. But a) the customers ought to hear about the product/service because of how good it is, so b) the marketer/advertiser should have little-to-no credit/blame for the sale.

That's sort of a complicated way of saying, 'The ad-writer brings nothing to the advertised object, does not improve the customer's purchase at all (and–even if he did–that's not what he's paid-for).'

The marketing-summit shouldn't "help your business take off." It should 'help customers find the product/service your business provides.'

Like I said, this is something most people know (so it ought to go without mentioning ... the way I don't have to remind you to 'keep breathing' while you read this post). It's just me ... I have never had 'salaried- or wage-employment I depend-on' (oh, I've had "wage-employment" before–briefly–but it was 'extra').

So–for the longest time–I subconsciously 'knew' (tho I consciously knew otherwise) that all the advertising-money just 'came out of nowhere' (like 'a blessing from Our Heavenly Father') and had nothing to do with 'all the unseen work & practice & education & investment & pain & suffering that had happened before the publisher printed the ad' 

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The word "Advertise" is built on "to |Turn (cf. |Versus) |To|ward" (to turn someone's |Attention to your product-or-service). 

The word "Marketing" is built on "Wares, Merchandise" (mythical |Mercurius was the God of Exchange; see also the |Process of Moving Goods from Producer to Consumer, with |Emphasis on Advertising and |Sales).

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A friend expresses her opinion of 'advertising that claims to be "personalized" to your preferences, but is really "personalized" to what you've been clicking-on (even if you're only clicking-on it to make it go away😝),' and I think of my AdGuard AdBlocker ... a button on my browser that filters-out all the unwanted advertising webmasters-&-bloggers-etc. try to sneak onto my computer's database!

But luckily, the AdGuard AdBlocker lets you turn the program off-or-on for certain websites; because–as my friend mentions on her 'expressed opinion'–our many sponsors pay our fellow FREE members out of the revenue earned by the site's ads! 

Just like most television-broadcasters (originally only in FREE television, but now 'the TV you pay to see' has gotten in on the ad-bucks as well) won't deliver the news-or-entertainment without advertisements attached!

If you would like the Internet to be ad-free (making exceptions for us webmasters-&-bloggers-etc. whom you trust to only link with advertisements of companies you can trust), you ought to download-&-use AdGuard (available for Windows, for Mac & for Android) and encourage your friends and fans to do the same!