Something I’ve been wondering lately and wasn’t quite sure where to start researching. I was hoping you lovely folks might be able to help explain:
How do commercials for medicines, deodorants, toothpastes, etc. come up with the “4/5 doctors recommend” / “9/10 experts recommend”?
Comments
the company whose commercial it is pays to do a study, so they’re conducting and paying the doctors in the study.
It’s incredibly easy to manipulate numbers in studies when you can hand pick who is in the study. It gets even easier when your company can lie and make up numbers without consequence in this endless commercialized dystopia we live in.
it entirly depends on the exact individual statistic.
it could literally be them asking 10 dentists “would you recomend brushing with our toothpaste or none at all?” where 9 said “toothpaste is better”
or it could be 10000 dentists given the question “which toothpaste brand would you recomend” where 9000 said “this brand”
The number on the box is basically just advertising fluff. you can make it say whatever you want if you are careful with your questions.
Marketing.
You don’t need an ad to tell you to buy something.
I’ve heard that they send the survey to doctors offices. The survey says that if the doctor doesn’t return the survey it is considered a “recommendation”. Most offices just throw it away just like we all throw away junk mail.
So, if you send it to 20 doctors, 16 don’t return it and 4 return it saying they don’t recommend it they will say that 4 out of 5 did “recommend” it.
It is just marketing. They survey some doctors/dentists/whoever and then make up whatever they want.
Could be that the survey asks “What would you recommend for X (check all that apply)” and then they select multiple options that are fine and one of those is the brand being marketed.
Or they get a survey from 20 people where 4 recommend and 16 don’t recommend but they pick a subset of 5 people where 4 recommend and 1 doesn’t.
Also could be that 100% recommended the thing but 9/10 is more catchy and more believable than 10/10.
42% of all statistics are made up on the spot (this one included).
Everyone here is saying they commission studies, and sometimes they do. Most of the time they make the statistic up, and leave wiggle room for any kind of lawsuit.
While the likelihood of it being actually investigated by the FTC (especially with this admin) a professor explained the exact procedure you use.
Create a list of 5 people of whatever criteria you are seeking, ask your question to 4 of them. If they give you the answer you seek, stop and use the statement in marketing. If 3 say yes and the 4th says no, ask the 5th. If they say no then start over and repeat until you get it with another group.
Where you can shore up and shape the message that the people say is in the delivery of the question. The idea of the American hearty breakfast being a good idea came from marketing. You start with asking “Is breakfast important?” followed by “Is a nutritious breakfast with protein, grains, etc. a good idea?” and this is (a rough summary) the way bacon became a standard breakfast in the US.
I always thought that they used the highest believable amount, keeping it most importantly, legal. If you find many doctors claiming the opposite, in court the company could argue that they alla belong to the last 20%.
If a cleaning product does not work at all to 100 types of germs, these all could be in the 1% it does not clean. But it does clean the 99% it advertises. Of coooourse they tested everything.
It always is a point away from a perfect score, simply because you can easily call the bullshit on the 10/10, and now the company can defend everything else from a false advertising lawsuit.