Money for nothing?

Ouch! – that’s the best description I can offer as I begin putting my money where my mouth is. See, of late, I’ve been mulling over paying for advertisement on the internet, well, facebook.com, to be precise to promote a portal that we’ve just launched called daypasses.com.

I guess this stems pretty much from my oriental upbringing where everything of value is only measurable by an equal part of material product. That is, we only place importance when we purchase something that’s tangible. Yes, we want every ounce and square inch for every cent.

So, when we bgin paying for stuff that we can’t touch like advertising and such, the very act send s a shock to our systems. But there’s where need seriously need to learn, especially from the like of the Americans.

For them, as formidable marketers, they are more thn willing to send perhaps a dollar or more to market something that’s sold for 20 or 30 cents. Now, I’m not just talking about the mega businesses that can afford to do so, but more in general terms even. See, they place equal amount of importance also to intrinsic value to material value wherelse in most parts of the east, we have a tendency to only pay for what we can touch and see.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not knocking our eastern roots and all that, but have a look around and what do you see? American brands and products transcend borders, both their own and internationally, making them the most prolific and recognizable brands while the east gets known quite literally by the labels of “cheap and unrecognizable” products. Very often, they, as the middlemen, make more money than manufacturers by placing brands on manufactured products and marketing them aggresively with money for branding.

In a manner, it is very much like a Ying & Yang thingy isn’t it? Nothing and something in equal parts of importance. Hmm... it really is harder to practice what we preach. And yes, it still feels, well, OUCH!