Is advertising simply a superficial exercise in making people buy something they don’t actually need?

Everybody knows Listerine.

A few people know it was used as floor cleaner and a cure for gonorrhoea before it hit it off big as mouth wash.

Listerine offered a cure for halitosis.

Nobody had heard of halitosis.

But suddenly everybody had it.

They wanted a cure and Listerine offered it.

So surely Listerine created an artificial need?

Of course not.

Listerine did not invent bad breath- they named it.

Bad breath has always been about.

They found a solution.

This is what most advertising does:

identify a problem and solve it.

Of course, there is some advertising which creates a superficial need.

There is advertising which simply panders to an existing need.

And there is advertising which informs.

But the best advertising spots a problem, and solves it.