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All you have to do is look at the Christmas stuff sitting on the shelf next to the closeout Halloween candy and you know it’s that time of year again – the lead-in to the consumptive orgy that we refer to as “the holiday season” or “Christmas”.

We’re used to being hammered with ads. We’re used to being guilt-tripped into buying stuff we don’t need. Heck, computer companies talk about new laptops like they’re stocking stuffers – not much should surprise us anymore, right?

The thing is, they keep running those ads because they still work – on people much less intelligent than this blog’s readers, obviously, but success is success! To hit the rest of us though, they’re continually looking for new ways to get their messages into our brains.

Enter The Warning Pitch

In recent years, they’ve come up with another super-sneaky strategy to get their message into our heads. For lack of a better w0rd, I call it the “warning pitch”.

A “warning pitch” is when a manufacturer uses a product safety warning of some sort to mention a (usually unlikely) product benefit that we’d probably never believe if they told it to us directly.

A large health/wellness chain has mastered this in their ads. “If you lose more than twenty pounds in your first week using this product, consult your product specialist to adjust your program”.

Think about it for just a minute. “If you lose more than twenty pounds in your first week”. Not only is there the implication that you actually might lose more than twenty pounds in your first week, there’s the additional implication this happens enough that they need to warn people about it!

If they’d gotten on the radio and said “Lose twenty pounds in your first week!” they’d have to include a fast-talking guy at the end saying things like “results not typical”. But if they phrase it as a warning, it slides.

So how do we tell a “warning pitch” from a regular warning?

The Features Of The Warning Pitch

  • It actually sounds like a warning. In fact, it sounds like the sort of warning that a government regulatory agency would require them to include. Losing weight too fast isn’t considered medically safe, so the above warning qualifies.
  • The warning is about excessive desired results. Losing twenty pounds in a week is something that dieters would probably love to see happen. The warning is that the product might actually get you to your goal faster than doctors would consider safe.
  • It’s prominent in the ad. When you’re going to lose all of your hair and have discolored skin due to a product, that’s in an ultra-fast-talking disclaimer at the end. If the warning is read at a close-to-normal speed in the middle of the ad, odds are good you’re dealing with a warning pitch.
  • It’s repeated. Most negative disclaimers don’t get repeated, because airtime is expensive! If they’re repeating it, it means it’s something they really want you to take notice of.
  • It’s conceivable, but unlikely. Twenty pounds in a week? It might have happened to one test subject who had a crazy reaction to the stimulants in the weight loss product, but the odds of it happening to you are minimal.
  • If the warning event did happen, it warrants the action recommended. If you do lose twenty pounds in a week, it would be smart to see somebody to figure out how to dial that down to a sane level – although I’d suggest a doctor, not the “product specialist” from their company.

Not all warning pitches have all of these features, but the more there are the greater the likelihood you’re dealing with a sneaky advertiser!

The Warning Wrap

I haven’t seen too many of these yet, but I’m assuming that’s because it’s a relatively new ad technique. The weight loss chain I mentioned, plus a few nationally-advertised “male enhancement” products are the examples that I can think of right offhand.

I’d predict that in five or ten years we’ll see a lot more of these ads.

What about you? Have you heard any ads using this technique? Do you think it’s effective?