Examples of Scott's Work With Advertising and Psychology

The most definitive of Scott's work - for what he is most likely to be remebered for in the field of advertising - is the 1913 book, The Psychology of Advertising. In this volume, Scott examined many specific topics, such as memory, feelings and emotions, human instincts, suggestion, will, and habit.

For instance:

• Three Universal Aspects of All Our Mental Activities
1. 1 Knowing
2. 2 Feeling
3. 3 Willing

• Four Principles of Improving One's Own Memory (p.9-10):
1. 1 Repetition
2. 2 Intensity
3. 3 Association (Scott feels this to be the most important)
4. 4 Ingenuity

• Conceptions Which Actually are Effective in Leading Persons to Answer Advertisements and to Purchase Advertised Goods (p.121-2, chapter on "The Will")
1. 1 Reliability of the goods or the firm
2. 2 The goods supply a present need
3. 3 Money considerations, e.g., cheapness, investment, chance to win
4. 4 Labor saving, convenient or useful
5. 5 Healthful
6. 6 Stylish
7. 7 An attractive and frequetly repeated advertisement

• Some general advertising tips and observations from Walter Dill Scott:
• "In advertising, suggestion should not be subordinated to persuasion but should be supplemented by it" (p.83)
• "It takes great and determined effort to overcome an old habit or to form a new one, but the advertiser should in many cases make the necessary effort; otherwise he is doomed to become an 'old fogy'" (p.130-1)
• "I might not remember ever having seen an advertisement, and yet my familiarity with the goods advertised might seem so great that I should believe that some of my acquaitances had recommended them to me or that I had used the goods years before" (p.144-5, section on "Unrecognized Value of Advertisements")
• "Quality is more important than quantity. Certain styles of advertisements (depending on the goods advertised as well as on other things) are effective in any space, and others are comparitively worthless, even if filling a full page" (p.176)
• "There are many classes of goods which are being presented as the preferred of the 'veritable swells.' When, on the contrary, an advertiser represents his goods as that preferred by a despised class of individuals, the effect produced is distinctly harmful" (p.73)

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Scott also performed several studies involving the collection, presentation, and analysis of empirical data to examine advertising problems. According to Donald L. Thompson, these included:

• Survey findings as to why several thousand respondents purchased various products
• Data from "all firms located west of Buffalo and advertsing in the Ladies' Home Journal for a period of 8 years" on the number of lines of advertising purchased annually (p.122)"
• Similar figures on space purchased by major advertisers in Century magazine for the period 1870-1907
• A survey of magazine publishers asking their opinions of whther ads pull better when concentrated in a special section or mixed in with editorial matter
• A study of the reasons several thousand men gave why they read newspapers
• Observational data on the manner in which persons are to and react to street railway cards

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Evidently, Scott helped to pave the way for the study and realization of effective advertising, and his work was ahead of his time in the soldifying era of advertising as a major part of business and everyday life.