The Hidden Hook

I like to think I don’t consume a lot of media or expose myself to a ton of advertising. My favorite ads are the freeway billboards for VALUES.com. Seriously, I don’t know why we can’t have more of these types of messages infiltrating the various advertising spaces and media platforms. I guess because they aren’t really selling anything. Well at least that is what I thought when starting this post.

While reading Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook this week, I couldn’t help but think of my favorite freeway billboard and wonder if there are companies who are solely about the jab. (What would be the point, right?) I follow VALUES.com, a part of The Foundation for a Better Life on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest—surprisingly, I couldn’t find an Instagram for the NPO. Not that it really matters to me since I rarely use any of these accounts. However, in search of answers I checked out the organization’s pages on each of these social media sites. From what I could tell in my quick review, the marketing team (or maybe an organization acting on The Foundation’s behalf) does a good job of speaking the various social media languages but all they do is jab, jab, jab. I don’t see much hooking…wait, let’s call it selling in this context.

Something didn’t add up though and after some reflection I couldn’t believe that I was so oblivious to what looked like feel good jabs were actually attempted hooks! How could I have failed to see until writing this that The Foundation for a Better Life is selling an ideology?  I just happen to agree with their beliefs, more or less, so I was an easy mark. Further adding to my naivety was that the ads don’t ask for money (According to The Foundation’s FAQ page, they do “not solicit nor accept monetary contributions of any kind”.) See how I might think this is all so innocent? I’m not saying The Foundation is bad, at least from my perspective. It’s just that now I’m back to the drawing board in looking for lone jabber and this time with greater skepticism.

You’re likely much wiser to the ways of the marketing world but is there a time you have been blinded by an organization’s hidden hook?