argument232 十二月高强组周一作业

waidswUID: 2256074

题目：ARGUMENT 232 - The following appeared in a memo from the sales manager of Eco-Power, a company that manufactures tools and home appliances.

"Many popular radio and television commercials use memorable tunes and song lyrics to call attention to the products being advertised. Indeed, a recent study of high school students showed that 85 percent could easily recognize the tunes used to advertise leading soft drinks and fast-food restaurants. Despite our company's extensive advertising in magazines during the past year, sales of our home appliances declined. Therefore, to boost company profits, we should now switch to advertisements featuring a distinctive song."
字数：442          用时：0:47:21          日期：2006-11-19

作者没有证据表明销售下降是因为广告的原因。
广告歌在餐馆有效不一定适用于该公司。
调查不能支持作者的论断：1高中生熟悉歌不一定会去消费快餐
                        2 该公司的顾客群不是高中生。

The arguer asserts that the Eco-Power(EP)should switch to the advertisements featuring a distinctive song to boost profits. To support this assertion, the arguer provides that the advertisement in magazines was of little effective which cause the sales decline. And also cite a study that 85 percent high school student can easily recognize the tunes of leading fast-food restaurants' advertisements.  This assertion is specious as it stands in several points.

First and foremost, the arguer fails to provide credible evidence that the sales decline was due to the deficiency of the advertisements rather than other possible reasons such as the disorder of management, the quality and popularity of the products, price, and myriads of others. Even assuming that the new strategy of advertisement is attractive to customers, without any other measures to improve other aspects of the EP Company such as the cost, the management, and the products, the advertisement is hardly of any use to improve the profits of EP. Absent ruling out such possible courses of the decline, arguer's assertion that change the form of advertisement could boost the profits is unconvincing.

Secondly, the arguer committed a false analogy fallacy that the effectiveness of advertising song of fast food restaurants is also proper for the tools and home appliance company. Based on my experience and common sense, those two kinds of enterprise are merely the same in their products and customers , and the ways of detailing. Hence this analogy lend little substantiating to the arguer's assertion.

Thirdly, the study which the arguer cites has nothing to do with the assertion. In one hand, the people surveyed were high student. Maybe they are the main customers of fast-food restaurant and sensitive to lyrics, however, it is very likely that the main client of EP is adults, more specifically, the housewives,  who have a great amount of features different form high school student in interests and purchasing habits. In the other hand, the reorganization of the song not necessarily leads to the consumption of the fast food. It is possible that there is a fast-food restaurant near the high school, so the students there are familiar with their advertising songs but rarely dine there. Lack the specific information about the study; I see no relevance of the advertisements with distinctive songs and the promotion of the sales.

To sum up, the arguers assertion that EP should alter their adverting strategy to advertisements with a distinctive song is unsubstantiated. To strengthen the assertion, the arguer has to convince us that the sales decline was due to the advertisements, and also offer more credible evidence about the effectiveness of a song.