Truth Doesn't Sell

In pooh-poohing the need for sterner Government rules against deceptive advertising, agency chiefs like to argue that today's consumer is too smart to be hoodwinked. That comfortable belief has now been shaken by a study presented at a recent gathering of the American Marketing Association by Seymour Lieberman, president of Manhattan-based Lieberman Research Inc. His key finding: deceitful ads can be far more persuasive than promotions that tell the simple truth.

Lieberman enlisted the aid of the Kenyon & Eckhardt agency to create one deceptive and one truthful television commercial for each of six fictitious products. A panel of 100 largely middle-income consumers watched the truthful commercials and another group of the same size, income and educational level saw the dishonest versions. Both sets of commercials used the same actors, and except for the misleading bits, the same language. Yet in four of the six tests, the cheating commercial placed well ahead of the honest promotion in coaxing the audience into a buying mood.

More people were persuaded to buy the mythical Pro Gro plant fertilizer when the commercial stressed that it contained protein--though protein is of absolutely no help to plants. A bunion remedy, D-Corn, drew more buyer interest when it was touted as having four times as much methylglyoxal as its competition; yet no evidence was offered to support the notion that increasing the amount of methylglyoxal might be in the least beneficial. When Lite Bite Peaches were outweighed on a scale by a rival brand, the consumer panel got the deliberately misleading--but overwhelmingly persuasive--impression that Lite Bite contained fewer calories. Lieberman hopes that the ad agencies will use his findings to help guide them in avoiding misleading advertisements, but says that so far he sees few signs of interest.

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