In a competitive society or in a capitalistic country like ours, advertisements are a necessity. Factories mass-produce goods and shops, and firms sell them. The advertisement of these goods is meant to attract a wide variety of customers to buy them.
We look at the innumerable posters, notices, small boards, and hoardings (called ‘billboards’ in American English), huge boards on the outside of buildings, and banners for advertisements at road crossings and street corners or in busy public places. At night, the advertisements are well lit.
Advertisements introduce new products to the general public, for example, the public comes to know readily of some new medicines for diseases, effective techniques of constructing houses through companies having specialized knowledge, availability of new methods of teaching, new and useful fertilizers and equipment for agriculture that can add very rapidly to agricultural production, and so on.
The government advertises its schemes and policies to inform the public and to make it participate in them. It has advertised in the past its new housing plans, savings schemes, educational policies, issue of identity card, etc. from off and on.[the_ad id=”17141″]
Advertisements in newspapers for jobs in government departments and private organizations are highly useful. They help the offices and agencies to get readily trained manpower from the public. They help the educated public to get jobs and employment. The labour force gets work in government offices, marketplaces and production centres through newspaper advertisements.
The education private sector mostly depends on advertisement and publicity to attract students to educational institutions. The huge posters, billboards, and newspaper ads provide information about courses and studies in different schools and colleges.
Advertisements of cigarettes, undesirable dress, expensive foods, harmful soft drinks, and timewasting games should be discouraged. Cosmetics and items of make-up that cause waste of money and negative effects on health should not be put up at public places.
The visual pollution caused by the numerous pictures, signs, slogans, and writings on billboards (hoardings) should immediately be checked. In the big cities, all the main roads and public parks are crowded by these most of which are a kind of nuisance (something annoying and disturbing).
Advertising should be developed as art that pleases and informs the people right about the best products and services.