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Comment by pwillia7 | Hacker News Reader

This reminds me of how if you ask almost anyone if marketing works on them, they'll say no or not the deceptive parts. Yet, logically, marketing must work on most people or Coke wouldn't spend 4 billion dollars a year on it. Feels hubris-y to me. We forget we all have the same equipment.

https://www.investopedia.com/articles/markets/081315/look-co...

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Idk, it could still be wrong or not as useful as thought of.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/augustinefou/2021/01/02/when-bi... :When Big Brands Stopped Spending On Digital Ads, Nothing Happened. Why?

Interesting article. I know the big CPGs have been challenged by digitally native brands like harrys and the shave companies. It's also clearly not true if you're not a globally known brand with a lot of monopolies. I wonder if it holds true in all markets for the big brands. I also wonder if it would open them to more competition from smaller brands over time. Like the other commenter said, hard to name too many non coke/pepsi carbonated beverages.

I just wanted to comment on the Coke point specifically. They already have achieved market penetration at such a high level that I wonder is it really still worth it for them to keep spending 4B on ads a year. Uber also had a similar experience: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25623858

People always say marketing doesn’t work on them until you ask them to name non-Coke carbonated beverages...

I'm not sure if I understand you correctly, but at least around here thers RC Crown Cola, Solo, Farris, Pepsi, Pepsi Max, Eplerose, Oscar Sylte Pærebrus, Monster energy, Red Bull, 7-up etc and I don't think I am special at all for knowing them.

In case it matters, a number of these don't advertise, at least not in the same league as coke (multiple national campaigns a year).

> I don't think I am special at all for knowing them.

I would guess that at least 80% of people off the street would only be able to name advertised carbonated beverages. In that case, yes I think you are special.

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