Like most people, you probably believe that advertising is a relatively modern phenomenon that was invented in the United States and that maybe a century or two has not passed!
If I want to be honest with you, I must say that this belief is completely wrong. Store billboards have been around since about 6,000 years ago in ancient Rome, although they did not invent the concept of advertising!
According to the historical documents obtained in Greece, the Athenians were probably the first people who used commercial advertising as one of the pillars of business. In Athens, the city heralds, who were chosen for having a clear and expressive voice, walked the streets and announced things to the public and received money in return. Sklipto, who was one of the sellers of cosmetics and cleaning solutions in ancient Greece, used exactly this method to introduce his products.
During the Middle Ages and after the fall of the Roman Empire, advertising seemed to have died out until it was used again in Britain and France in its ancient form in the 13th century.
But what we know today as print advertising owes to the invention of the printing press by Gutenberg and the introduction of the printing industry to England by William Caxton.
Just in 1759, two hundred years after the invention of printing, the great lexicographer, Dr. Samuel Johnson, wrote an article with the following theme: Advertisements are now so abundant that they no longer attract attention, and this is exactly what has been said for years. We hear from different people.
Advertising in the current sense was from the beginning based on the emphasis on high quality, exaggeration of product features, and mostly for sanitary items, but after the invention of poster printing, circuses, cabarets, drinks, tobacco and some consumer goods such as bicycles were also used.
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The entry of graphics into the field of advertising
In the 16th century, inspired by Japanese prints, European artists began to design and create artistic posters and advertising graphic design, and laid the foundations of today’s advertising graphics.
After that, American graphic artists such as Louis Riad, William Schumacher, Frank Hasenplug, and many other famous artists of that time began to publish their works in various publications, such as the Century magazine, Lowthorpe magazine, and so on. Colorful and attractive posters that represented different products and were designed based on the needs of customers.
Of course, it should be noted that one of the reasons for the development of visual advertising or so-called advertising graphics was the high competition of companies and their impressive investments to take over each other’s privileges.
Industrial revolution and advertising
Advertising, especially graphic advertising, entered its first stage in the 19th century at the same time as the industrial revolution.
Advances in “mass production” technology made consumer goods more accessible to people. This unprecedented availability of packaged food, diverse clothing, health products, etc., has encouraged manufacturers to seek out by creating a coherent chain of retail outlets as well as distributing their products through wholesalers and intermediary retailers. New markets to sell their products.
This competition forced manufacturers to advertise heavily and created concepts such as brand awareness and made it the first goal of businesses. With the development of consumer society and mass production, advertising exploded in the 20th century, especially in the United States!
In those years, the influence of advertising was so great and significant that in the 1920s, Albert Lasker, an advertising agency manager, claimed that “we are making a homogenous human being out of a nation of immigrants.”
Meanwhile, technological developments in printing created new possibilities for graphic designers and artists. As it is today, content organization along with attractive graphic design is one of the most important and influential aspects of any good magazine, poster and website.
A clean and efficient advertising plan will help to convey your advertising message more effectively and powerfully.
The importance of graphics in advertising
As mentioned, advertising is a set of techniques and methods that are used to draw people’s attention to products, services, opinions, etc. and respond to a specific need. In the meantime, the main elements that help us provide effective advertisements include graphics, messages, colors, and photos.
Among the above, graphics play an important role in the advertising industry, and that is why the word graphic design reminds us of advertising, or more precisely, graphic design is synonymous with the advertising industry.
But what is the reason for this affinity? This is because the nature of advertising is such that it promotes the visual representation of products, services, concepts and ideas. This is exactly the main approach to selling products and services that is applied by large companies around the world.
Advertisements related to products and services are effective when the graphics of the advertisement stand out while maintaining the relevance and clarity of the message. In addition to attracting the attention of the audience, attractive advertising graphics can significantly increase the conversion rate and the likelihood of the viewer buying the product.
Advertising graphics and the digital revolution
As mentioned, until the end of the 20th century, graphic design was limited to hand work, especially in advertising.
After knowing the needs of the client, the designers started to develop ideas and then drew their designs on paper with a pen. Design models were limited in those years, colors did not have a high variety, and Chinese characters for advertising messages also followed fixed styles. But in the 1980s and early 1990s, with the rapid development of computer hardware and software development, graphic design also underwent extensive changes.
In 1984, Apple’s Macintosh software, such as Bill Atkinson’s macpaint software, created a great revolution in the field of graphics.
Design tools were easily controlled by pointers, and designers were able to easily use computers to implement their ideas. In the mid-nineties, almost no designer used pen and paper (except for ideation) and all designs were summarized on the monitor screen, colors and tools.
Rapid progress in design software has enabled designers to implement their ideas more clearly than in the past. Design tools help them to create arcs and volumes, layer images and design unique montages according to their needs.
For example, in 1998, designers; Using the design software of the time, Ethel Kessler and Greg Berger assembled the image of John Singer Sargent with a photo of New York’s Central Park and the United States Botanical Center and presented it as a commemorative stamp to the then-Gov.
Dramatic growth of graphic design with the advent of the Internet
At the end of the 20th century, with the emergence of a phenomenon called the Internet and its entry into the hearts of businesses, advertisements took on a different form. With the growing demand of small and large businesses to introduce their brand and display their various products on websites, graphic designers also joined this trend and some of them specialized in digital advertising graphic design.
Banner design, poster design for emerging social networks, pop-up banner design, etc. were among the tasks that designers were engaged in during those years.
The market’s need for graphic design in those years sparked the establishment of companies such as Adobe, which we have all worked with many times with its video media editing software.
Powerful software such as adobe illustrator, adobe photoshop, etc., which are still the first words in the field of image design and especially advertising graphic design, are the result of the need of the designer community for better and smarter software.
How far will graphic design and advertising go?
According to research published in prestigious academic journals such as Harvard Business School, the future of the advertising industry is tied to content production, focusing on video ads, personalizing messages and strengthening visual elements, or in general graphic design of digital and non-digital banners. Is.
Since in today’s world things are quickly changing hands, what message we deliver in what form and to which people will be the first word in the coming years.
But how far the young seedling of digital advertising will continue to grow is a matter that is not easy to predict. They value it more.
In the end, everything depends on the designers’ always-on monitor, crumpled papers, and ideas that struggle to enter this world and sit next to an important message.