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Post Hoc Ergo Propter Hoc: Understanding Cause And Effect
In Advertising
By David Hanson, Pres. H2M
It is seemingly just so obvious; you bump your glass of wine
and it spills. You throw a baseball at a window and it breaks.
Simple cause and effect. At least on that level it is pretty
foolproof. But even these simple examples of the apparent
connection between a cause and its effect is considered a
fallacy by several schools of philosophy.
Post hoc ergo propter hoc: In Latin that means that because
one event happened before another, the earlier event caused
the later one. It is a particularly tempting error because
temporal sequence is integral to causality — it is true
that a cause always happens before its effect. The fallacy
lies in coming to a conclusion based only on the order of
events, which is not an accurate indicator or reality in many
cases. That is to say, it is not always true that the first
event caused the second event in any direct manner.
A post hoc error example of assuming the consequent can be
expressed as follows:
1. A rooster always crows prior to sunrise
2. Therefore: the rooster's crowing causes the sun to rise
Ok, that’s easy to understand the error, but when you
apply that to advertising is it so obvious? For instance,
we may think:
1: An ad is placed in a newspaper for a leather sofa
2: A person sees the ad and purchases the sofa because of
the ad.
Direct cause and effect? The function of advertising is routinely
considered the cause that creates the effect of a purchase.
But is this really an accurate representation of how cause
and effect really works? Did the newspaper ad actually cause
the effect of the sofa purchase?
Of course there is some connection between the two events,
but the ad is only one causal link in a chain of many that
precipitated the purchase. If, as a marketer, you believe
your ads directly caused someone to buy the sofa, then fine,
go with it, after all, the effect desired did eventually occur.
But in reality it is a drastic oversimplification. If you
dig a little deeper into the causal chain of events, you find
it is a misrepresentation of advertising and marketing to
be thought of as the definitive cause of someone’s purchase
behavior. Like much else in life, any human behavior is complex,
unpredictable and over-determined. What I have learned from
experience about how advertising really works is that it functions
as part of a loose causal chain that is begun by activating
one or several possible ‘in-points’ to the human
psyche.
Such in-points may include:
Activating a dormant desire
Excitation of the possibility of solving a current problem
Appealing to desired socio/economic status aspirations
In truth, no one purchases a thing because of an advertisement
unless there is a preexisting predisposition to buy the thing
in the first place. You can easily confirm this by closely
observing your own purchasing decisions. You will discover
that unless one of the many ‘in-points’ of the
psyche is stimulated, no action, either physical or mental
will occur. Car dealers understand this perfectly. That’s
why they run ads almost everyday; they know that people are
either predisposed to buy a vehicle that day or not. If they
aren’t, they won’t even ‘see’ the
ad. And of course car buyers know that car dealers advertise
daily, so they know exactly where to look when they are the
most predisposed to buy. It’s a symbiotic relationship
rather than one-sided, advertising-down.
So for the agency/client relationship to be symbiotic as well,
there need be an understanding of the dynamic of this consumer
predisposition to purchase before a correct analysis of advertising
can be affected. There is an old saying that you only shoot
while the ducks are flying. Marketers desire to ‘move’
a dormant market. But the facts are such that a dormant market
is dormant for many interconnected reasons and the cost to
move it is much greater than marketing to a receptive market.
Direct Marketers will often assert their craft is more accountable
and more effective; almost a direct linkage between the advertisement
and the purchase. But don’t be fooled. Even within that
discipline, direct marketers know there must be a propensity
to buy before their ‘fast-acting’ copy can do
its work. Direct marketers know they are often speaking to
the choir. For those not in the choir, they are known as junk
mail.
In today’s multi-channel marketing world, it is tempting
to tout the Internet and online advertising as the next silver
bullet. The Internet is certainly powerful in its ability
to target personalized content and advertising messages, but
the fact that a predisposition to buy must be present for
action to take place still holds true.
Understanding how things work goes a long way towards making
them more effective. Misinterpreting or over-simplifying cause
and effect leads to over-reliance on advertising technique
and the urge to constantly tinker with messaging, imagery
etc in the attempt to find the the magic bullet. Consistency
and frequency are far more powerful in catching the predisposed
than almost anything else.
dave@h2m.biz
© 2003-2005 H2M Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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© 2003-2005 H2M Inc. All Rights Reserved
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