Subliminal advertising is the use of messages with a subliminal and unconscious character in advertising spaces whose main purpose is to create stimuli and impacts on the public without direct knowledge of it.
Through this type of advertising practice, the recipient is not aware that information about a particular good or service is being transmitted to them by means of subliminal messages. In this way, you are receiving out of your knowledge details or characteristics about a product to shape or influence your decision-making power as an individual, through consumer preferences .
The use of this type of marketing techniques at the subliminal and unconscious level has been intensively discussed and criticized since its birth and expansion in the 1960s , mainly in terms of effectiveness and about the usefulness of these impacts and their subsequent translation into sales. .
This type of practice is common in cases of advertising of soft drinks, alcoholic beverages or tobacco brands, trying to subliminally associate the consumption of these products with an idea of success and triumph. For this, it is common to find suggestions related to topics of various kinds, including sexual ones.
How is subliminal advertising carried out?
Subliminal advertising is generally used by means of audiovisual messages (fixed, such as magazine or poster images or moving by means of frames) emitted under the threshold of conscious perception . This means that they reach the human brain but unconsciously for people. Information is deposited in their heads so that they do not find out directly. The objective is that this information will push consumers’ desire towards a certain product, creating a need for it and influencing their behavior as buyers.
Using the perception capacity of the human eye and the brain (which work differently), subliminal messages are transferred that stimulate sensations or ideas such as anxiety, hunger, panic or thirst, aiding suggestion .
In subliminal advertising, he is persecuted and punished by the authorities as a general rule. Despite this, its effectiveness is constantly questioned and its usefulness is sometimes considered even as a myth in the world of marketing .
