Marketing Sex

--This article was written for a marketing magazine published by IMT.

Well! Before I start... I am not any sex guru; neither am I cajoled by that bug nor do such thoughts haunt me. I won’t pen my thoughts on sex therapy, sexual books, media, equipments and a gamut of all other necessities which you can think of. I am no hypocrite. And I am not on a high!

So what makes me choose the topic as ‘Marketing Sex’? Well again! It is the same cause which makes you read this article before any other article in this magazine. That is marketing for you!

But my title is not vicegerent in nature and neither does it stand to deceive you readers. This is a write up on how marketers use sublime yet fervently sexual strategies to reach their target audience. Let it stand-out as a perverted beginning to start with. We shall keep the ethos and ethics for some other day.

A latent theme behind many advertisements is to hit a cord with the audience. Such media advertisements become grape-vines and a person articulates more personally with them. Hence, we do not buy a bathing soap unless an actress scrubs the soap in a bath-tub; and never recognize a men’s shaving cream whose veracity for clean shave is not approved by a scantily clad glam model. Top-less models promoting jeans and Casanovas imbibing deodorants are the mantra of the day.

Without loitering around the subject any further, lets us recapitulate the advertisement campaign of virgin mobiles (candy foxxx). An obscene advertisement by any Indian Joint Family Standard! Yet the purpose of reaching the entire household is accomplished. Similarly, Amul Macho advertisement campaign speaks for itself while breaching the modesty of an orangutan.

Belligerence in marketing (hard selling) in a cut-throat competitive world is one of the reasons why sex is marketed. Page-3 of major newspapers, internet pop-ups on various sites, and ask-me columns on numerous magazines are all a pedagogy of innovative marketing; an effort to get that extra readership.

Another reason is the vulnerability of young population to off-beat promotions. The papa to pop wafting generation needs a familiar tranquil medium that appeases their fraternity.

Impulse Selling also contributes and facilitates the sale of most products that are marketed through the subtle usage of sex. A look at any retail outlet would suggest the exponential largesse at which such products are being marketed. Moreover impulse marketing eases the customers, customers across age and gender, from the age-over custom of asking for the products they intend to buy.

One more reason, before I become predictable, is the westernization of society and introduction of sex education as a part of academics. I shudder at the volume of information this generation possesses right in their text books, a commodity, which at our times was pertinent but considered as additional information.

Sex is not just pushed through clothes, shoes, books and magazines. Music videos play a receptive host. A whole industry promotes sex in music videos to increase the sales of their albums. Remixes of old songs have given a genteel meaning to the lyrics through its’ enamoured costumes and choreography. Some albums cash on mini-skirts and some others on strings- the same notorious strings where a prefixed ‘g’ would demeanour an article on marketing.

Today sex is perceived with a positive attitude. It is treated more of as a physical need, devoid of any extravagance of lust. As time progresses, the society becomes more cognitive, practical and responsible. Marketers are well aware of it. I do not profess growing infidelity in relationships and society at large as a new maturity is quite evident in the fore-coming dawn.

Well, I leave this here over to you... This topic has no boundaries, unlike the word-limit of this article, and is steered by millions of perverted agile marketers. If this article escapes the scissors of the editors and sees the light of the day, I would presume that the dawn of maturity has surpassed in IMT. For other reasons I do not intend to play the sexitized IMTian or portray Markezine as an in-house Playboy. Stay perverted and happy reading!