How mixing sex and fear into adverts helped Listerine sell gallons of mouthwash.

I can’t recall exactly where I heard that the best way to sell to women is to tell them that men don’t want them to have it.

Conniving, perhaps, though surely it works the other way around—people want what they can’t have.

I can see a bit of truth in this.

Would this strategy work today?

Maybe—it certainly was relevant, though, for a majority of adverts in the 20th century.

What is relevant today—and has been since the creation of man and will always be till his extinction—is the theme of sex.

Most adverts using this theme do so in a way that alludes to the end user becoming more desirable after using the offer.

“Add this into your life and watch women or men fall helplessly into your lap!”

While in some cases it’s obvious, like high-end luxury goods, scaring people into believing that without your offer they won’t find a lover can work just as well.

Decades ago, Listerine famously promoted their mouthwash using an elixir of fear and sex.

With what feels like an infinite number of Listerine ads to choose from to prove my point, the one I found most amusing was one that led with the headline:

“Go to bed stubborn… He’s not going to call!”

The first paragraph within this magazine advert:

“Last night at the Blakes’, he danced attendance on you. He didn’t have eyes for anyone else… for a while. But when you said good-night, you’d already lost him. You didn’t know, and you couldn’t know the reason why. People with halitosis (bad breath) never do.”

The last thing anyone wants is to spend an evening with someone, thinking, ‘wow, I really like this person,’ only to never hear from them again due to something so trivial like bad breath.

Without an absolute doubt this advert converted.

I love how mischievous this all feels; hell, the ad even absolves the reader of a pain that they’re just now seemingly becoming aware of: “You didn’t know, and you couldn’t know the reason why.”

I believe that everything we buy gets us one step closer to that feeling of finally being good enough for someone.

And this Listerine advert does exactly that.

The advert goes further into some more hoopla, but the main thing I’m getting at here is that sex sells, especially if you’re conjoining it with fear.

“Oh, but this is manipulating!”

Ah, yes, you’re right.

— George