Using Subliminal Advertising

[gabrielcrowe]

Something that's always fascinated me is those adverts that flash up a concept, or product, and your mind makes you go out and buy it.

I have looked around for the legality of subliminal advertising, and found very little information on the subject, barring some very badly written information from dubious sources.

Here is s snippet to make one in Actinic. Make a new fragment on a page (doesn't matter where), with a blank template. Use this as its template, then select an image, using the fragments image selector. When the page loads, the image will flash up for 0.3 of a second, after 5 seconds of waiting.

<img id="tylerblip" style="display:none; position:absolute; top:50px; left:50px;" src="<actinic:variable name="FragmentImageFileName" />"></a>

<script>
	var tylerimg = document.getElementById('tylerblip');
	setTimeout('tylerimg.style.display = \'block\'', 5000);
	setTimeout('tylerimg.style.display = \'none\'', 5030);
</script>

I'd like to run an experiment, where some of us run images of a product, that we don't sell, on a prominent page.

Do these adverts really work? Opinions?

[george]

You seen that clip on YouTube? People in a car or something travelling through a city? (on my favourites at home, I'll post the link up later if I can find it).

Very interesting.... it it was true (obviously).

[acompton]

I thought subliminal advertising was just a 1960's myth, with no scientific basis.

[jont]

Columbo caught a villain using subliminal advertising in a cinema once!

If something blipped my screen I would assume some trojan downloader was messing in the background that my pop-up blocker had missed ... leave the site and run a full virus check ... hopefully finding nothing and then visit a site that did not flash unknown images at me that I had not requested and spend my £3500.00 there instead.

[jont]

Gabe - how can your code be changed to use an onclick function instead?

[gabrielcrowe]

<img id="tylerblip" style="display:none; position:absolute; top:50px; left:50px;" src="<actinic:variable name="FragmentImageFileName" />"></a>

<script>
function Blipppy() {
	var tylerimg = document.getElementById('tylerblip');
	setTimeout('tylerimg.style.display = \'block\'', 5000);
	setTimeout('tylerimg.style.display = \'none\'', 5030);
}
</script>

then later:

onclick="Blippy();"

untested. btw.

[gabrielcrowe]

Columbo caught a villain using subliminal advertising in a cinema once!

If something blipped my screen I would assume some trojan downloader was messing in the background that my pop-up blocker had missed ... leave the site and run a full virus check ... hopefully finding nothing and then visit a site that did not flash unknown images at me that I had not requested and spend my £3500.00 there instead.

this one

however, you are in the top percentile of people who would do this. You'll notice that the rest of the people on the net arent as tech savvy.

though we may ahve lost your sale, 3 other people may have got the message. i'm not saying that these kinds of adverts are fair, or appropriate, but i think they may have some use. to sell things that people don't need, at prices they cant afford.

[Duncan Rounding]

Darren Brown and similar evidently use this technique a lot.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyQjr1YL0zg

[george]

Darren Brown and similar evidently use this technique a lot.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyQjr1YL0zg

Thats the one I meant, cheers for posting it fella.

[jont]

this one

Thats the one ... he takes a load of pics of the killers office and slips them into the film .. he sees them and goes to check his hiding place for the gun .. which is hidden in a lamp! Got to love Columbo

[orcahouse]

I'd check the legality with the Committee of Advertising Practice http://www.cap.org.uk/cap/advice_online/

They set the rules for broadcast and non-broadcast advertising. I think this comes under 'misleading advertising' and is certainly banned in the UK for use on TV but not sure about ecommerce - don't want a knock on the door do we?

[gabrielcrowe]

I'd check the legality with the Committee of Advertising Practice http://www.cap.org.uk/cap/advice_online/

They set the rules for broadcast and non-broadcast advertising. I think this comes under 'misleading advertising' and is certainly banned in the UK for use on TV but not sure about ecommerce - don't want a knock on the door do we?

On the contrary, i'd do anything to get my ecommerce site receiving so much media attention. No publicity is bad, etc.

In the event that these people get a complaint, then the procedure is simply to 'tell them to stop'. The only way that anything serious would happen, is if your adverts had something terrible in them, like a tall man eating a kittens head off.

[george]

like a tall man eating a kittens head off.

You have a problem with tall people then Gabriel?

[gabrielcrowe]

no, kittens.