"Oh, it's a small marketing firm in The Loop..."

How many times have you heard this answer mumbled at a bar, a party, a very sad networking event, or just about any other location in the city? If you live in Chicago, it's an all too familiar encounter. Thus, here is what you might think about these people upon hearing about their choice of profession (the negative and positive)...

Negative:

A bunch of brainwashing, money sucking, commercial junkies that only care about gaining your dollar and diving into the human mind to spread the most unsophisticated of messages to a large portion of the population, dumbing down the world one client at a time. Sure this might be an extreme, but it's good to provide a far reaching end of the spectrum.

Positive:

A group spreading the word of clients, big and small, to tell a story allowing the masses to interpret and create meaning based on the product, in order to create an informed or educated opinion about said product. A necessary business service for today's modern companies

Wherever you stand, you can't deny that marketing and advertising is something that has evolved from simple, straight forward ads of buying and selling opportunities, (starting all the way back in the early 1700's, with modern market research not coming around for another 200 years) toward grabbing our emotions by the face, staring right through our eyes, and into our pathos (and wallets). 

So why is this the topic of the day?(great question) This is something that EVERYONE is bombarded with on a daily basis, sometimes knowingly but also unknowingly. This is probably what makes people uncomfortable about the subject, so I believe the best way to fight those feelings about the industry (that isn't going anywhere, since the Chicago marketing industry has nearly doubled since 2005) is to become more educated. 

Talk about commercials, ask about the process, dive deeper into client and product messages. One of my favorite websites to help provide perspective is Adweek. Their facebook page has some of, what I think is, the most informative posts on ads and marketing tactics around. So the next time you're at the bar and you find yourself faced with that well acquainted response to, "So where do you work", bunker down, buy the next round, and dive in.

B (update: my beard is still growing...)