Scammy banners on site - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: Wartex
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: September 25, 2011, 01:32:43 am
content: Saelig ad says "Want a scope for free?" Then in small print "well, you have to pay for it". IMHO this stinks of used car dealer marketing. Someone decided to be clever and instead sounds like a dick. I'd accept the ad where if you spend X dollar you get a free scope, but when the ad says "yeah, this is not real" right on it - that's just lame.

author: hacklordsniper
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: September 25, 2011, 04:51:42 am
content: that is one of clever marketing methods, not a scam. They found a way to catch your eye and actually read the ad and they even managed you to talk about them. And sure somebody will go to see it and say "that scope is cheap and buy it"

author: Bored@Work
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 25, 2011, 08:56:13 am
content: Quote from: hacklordsniper on September 25, 2011, 04:51:42 amThat is the old "there's no such thing as bad publicity, as long as they print the name correctly ..." argument. Even the thickest marketing weasel these days learns that this isn't true, although they don't hesitate to claim it is.Bad news travels faster than good news. And while it might be that this advertising and the discussion about it will bring them a few customers, if it is bad it will lose them others. They can measure the additional customers, but they can't measure the potential customer loss.I often judge marketing and advertising by asking myself the questionHow stupid to they think I am?. If the answer is they must think I am pretty stupid I typically don't give the product a second thought.

author: Wartex
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: September 25, 2011, 03:52:31 pm
content: Quote from: BoredAtWork on September 25, 2011, 08:56:13 amPretty much, I was about to click on the banner to check out the specs but then didn't bother and I might even buy something of that manufacturer, but definitely not from that seller.

author: hacklordsniper
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: September 25, 2011, 04:27:10 pm
content: Its a clever marketing for low end, cheap oscilloscope. I dont see why there is a problem in it?Recently i was searching ebay for some sine inverter and found an listing full of sexy half-naked girl photos holding an inverter in all poses, now that is stupid.

author: reagle
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: September 25, 2011, 07:23:53 pm
content: Funny way to get attention for sure. Saelig is local for me, and they are a pretty good company- dealt with them a few times before. No complaints there

author: baljemmett
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: September 25, 2011, 09:14:15 pm
content: Quote from: hacklordsniper on September 25, 2011, 04:27:10 pmCouple of years ago I bought a replacement power supply for an old HP Unix workstation from an eBay seller who used that tactic. It was the cheapest option, but I still felt like I'd fallen for the low-cut-top tactic instead(What's worse is that it took an age to arrive -- I suspect the seller didn't notice the Buy-It-Now when he got back from the holiday the listing advertised -- and was somewhat mauled in the post. Oh, and it didn't actually fix the problem. One day I'll have to see if I can troubleshoot the machine properly.)

author: Unknown
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: September 25, 2011, 10:58:07 pm
content: Quote from: hacklordsniper on September 25, 2011, 04:51:42 amI'm planning to email them asking for price breakups calculations on volume buys including shipping and extended warranty, When I get a reply, I can reply with, "I was hoping my price could have dropped to zero like in their add but that I was glad I had got their attention".

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: September 26, 2011, 01:40:03 am
content: Well, I guess their job with an ad is to catch your attention right? It obviously worked!Whilst I don't necessarily like the approach myself, I don't inherently see anything wrong with it, because it is very clear that the scope isn't free.If you had to click through to the site to find out if it's really free or not, then I think that would be dodgy, and I'd be asking them to remove it.It's actually rather a clever ad.Dave.

author: Bored@Work
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 26, 2011, 06:03:38 am
content: Quote from: EEVblog on September 26, 2011, 01:40:03 amNo, that is not "their" job. "Their" job is to generate sales. Just like with tits and arse type of advertising, generating the wrong kind of attention doesn't help to generate sales.For me it has come to the point that whenever I see the word "free" in advertising I start to look elsewhere.

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: September 26, 2011, 06:24:32 am
content: Quote from: BoredAtWork on September 26, 2011, 06:03:38 amYes, the ultimate goal is to generate sales, but to do that an ad has to catch your attention and help sell the product, potentially against all the other ads.QuoteSure, your choice. People react to advertising differently, that's just the nature of the beast.Companies have to weight up all advertising as to how effective it's going to be. Sometimes that includes pissing some people off, be it by "shouty" ads, titty ads, or whatever. And some of those ads do actually work.Dave.