The five most important things I learned about THE PERSUASION INDUSTRY:

1. Advertisers are persuaders. They give us what we want, what we want to hear. They use words like,"new and improved","you are worth it", "you come first", "Be everything you want to be". The media targets our emotions. They focus on our needs and desires.

2. Consumers are driven by unconscious needs and impulses. This is driven by market research finding out what people need and want; target marketing, based on knowledge collected about the consumer.

3. Emotional bonding of high concept ads, such as Nike and Starbucks. These large corporations become communities. They create a whole meaning and identity. They are stars in movies.

4. Solution to clutter is to send ads only to a group that are interested. Censer data and information, use subcategories to advertise to particular groups.

5. Advertising is every place; on our clothing, on store fronts, in schools, newspapers, magazines. Our world is filled up with ads "clutter". We need to educate our students to decode media messages.