Mind games

How can we categorize something into tangible and intangible?
To be very vague, something that we can touch and feel is obviously tangible and the opposite intangible. But what about the future?
Take a little time out and pause everything else and just think about it. What are we? If not for the time we live in.
The other day I saw an insurance company advertisement on the television. Not to sound skeptic about the concept. But somewhere people nowadays are very easily convinced that they are definitely going to die(every human knows that but fails to realize) and after their death, their family needs the most important thing than the life of the loved one, “money”, and the person being insured can then die in peace when Mr “hooded guy with the scathe” comes knocking at their doorstep. People dedicate their lives to mundane jobs and work lives that they forget that they are an inevitable part of that same family, who somewhere wants them to b together and spend quality time. Instead people choose to work harder and harder to earn money and also pay premiums. I am overwhelmed at this fact as to how can one decide willfully to pay up because they want their families to have a better future after they’re gone leaving their families with easy money? And a Better future…did I say better future? Look back. Is the future tangible?
To make death an USP or a unique selling proposition is a very powerful asset. Like no other. Every product needs an USP without which it fails to create the need of the later.

A million thanks to mass media and marketing strategies. Man has discovered a way to burrow in a way into the human brain, to create a demand where it is not present in the first place.
I’m not here to plagiarize and stick a heel into the marketing sector. All I am trying to say is they have excelled at manipulative skills. And what do they manipulate? Everyone.
The age old marketing strategies have become so synonymous that we have assumed those concepts as common sense. For example why do you think the color blue and pink represent boys and girls respectively? It was only a marketing stunt pulled off very effectively in the 19th century in Europe. And it kind of stuck until modern times. Who says flowers are feminine? Ask yourself.
Anyways moving on.
To promote ones product or service its but obvious that the void of requirement has to be created. Many a time’s conspiracy theorists believe that the outbreaks of deadly epidemics are well orchestrated by the makers so that a particular brand of vaccines or antibiotics is sold in vast numbers and vast profits. (let us all assume that’s fiction and feel safe in the homes we all live in… momentarily)
so tangibility is under questioning when we say that almost all our voids ( or requirements ) are man-made.
The key point to note in this tricky sentence above is very simple. If one spends more on experience rather than that on products and services one can gain more value.
There is a reason for that statement. Everything we buy today is mainly consumables. And these consumables are rated on basis of quality (?). Let’s define quality. Something that proves that it meets or sets high standards than or for other products (in laymen terms) but in comparison to what? In order to prove one particular product someone else has to take a fall. For instance competition and that is exactly why marketing thrives on this competition.

Let us all take an imaginary stroll through a bustling market in a city of your choice. Let this market be filled of local vendors. The ones you can haggle over for the price of goods. Say clothes. Now you buy something you like at a fair price you bargained and return home happily.
Now let us go up an escalator of a shopping mall. Obviously the ambiance and the neatly ordered ironed clothes categorized and highlighted on 7 feet tall mannequins look enchanting. But the fabric is the so called “Quality” fabric and the maker is a big brand.
Both are clothes, same fashion, same material, different maker. You choose according to your spending power. An average Indian shopper will prefer the market and a brand conscious shopper will never look beyond the mall.
So now Tangibility is a choice. It suddenly becomes flexibility. A choice between necessity and luxury. Funniest part is I also saw something called a luxury soap advertisement the other day. How can that soap be any different from normal soaps? How can a deluxe version of something be better? I went on to compare the contents of the soap which were exactly the same. But still, to create that brand value you have to make that tangible product hard to get. It’s like setting high standards for a kid. Saying look son, anyone can buy a Maruti but for a Porsche you need to be bigger than you think.
Now it depends on the kid if he grows up into being a person who prioritizes necessities or someone who is lavishly fond of luxuries.
And as long as prominence is given to luxuries in a glorified brand manner the society will always have the rich and the poor.

The waterman