Since the first radio commercial aired in 1922, the U.S. has been considered an ad society, meaning American culture can be changed and influenced by marketers and advertisements.
In today’s fast-paced and ever-changing media landscape, we are forced to put up with an endless showcase of advertisements. Everywhere I look, I see an ad — on billboards while driving down the highway, on streaming services while trying to watch shows, and on Instagram while I’m scrolling through my feed.
The term for this excessive amount of advertisements is “ad clutter,” which is said to be a direct
result of people not paying attention to television commercials. Marketers know people use commercial breaks to make snacks, go on their phones, or talk to their friends, so they have started getting creative with ways to make consumers see their ads.
Unfortunately, those plans have backfired.
Instead of ad clutter increasing the viewership of commercials, it is decreasing brand recall, increasing ad avoidance and negative brand perception, and contributing to ads’ diminishing ability to effectively convey their messages.
Commercials used to be more simple and to the point. Now, companies rely on gimmicks like jingles, catchy songs and slogans, celebrity endorsements, or complex storylines and characters to engage audiences.
Jake from State Farm is an example of a company using a singular character to reach audiences and increase the viewership of their ads. Jake from State Farm’s TikTok account now has more than one million followers, and in recent videos, he has collaborated with Caitlin Clark, Patrick Mahomes, and Aidan Hutchinson.
This TikTok account is also an example of businesses diversifying advertising outlets and moving to social media. Subtle advertising used to be a Pepsi can in the background of a popular sitcom. Now it’s Jake from State Farm talking about his 2025 resolutions in a TikTok video.
According to recent research, Americans see an average of 5,000 ads per day, compared to about 500 a day back in the ‘70s.
We are so used to seeing ads everywhere that we have started to ignore them, which makes it harder for marketers to captivate us as an audience.
Commercials on streaming services or cable television typically last for 15 to 30 seconds, a relatively short amount of time to keep an audience’s attention. However, Microsoft came out with a new study claiming the average person’s attention span is around eight seconds.
We are exposed to more ads than ever before, and our attention spans are shorter than ever.
Between hour-long YouTube ads, posters on bus benches and public transportation, targeted social media endorsements, commercials in movie theaters, and internet pop-ups, there is nowhere we can go to get away from the ads.
Certain marketing firms have even confirmed AI listens to conversations through phone or laptop microphones and targets ads accordingly. Phone-targeted ads are the best strategy advertisers have come up with to cut through all the ad clutter.
This sort of ad targeting is shaping consumer behavior in America without consumers even knowing.
Ever since the invention of radio marketing, U.S. advertising has turned us into a materialistic, consumerist society.
Certain advertisements and commercials promote particular lifestyles and create unrealistic expectations for the consumer. For example, some cologne ads might suggest wearing the product will cause beautiful women to flock to the scent, which is simply untrue.
Ads can also influence cultural values through stereotyping or depicting culture and customs in a certain way. The content we see in recurring advertisements partly shapes our perspective and worldview.
Advertising holds power in our country that we need to be aware of. We must educate ourselves on the meaning behind certain advertisements, what to avoid, and how to cut through the ad clutter.