[originaltext] Advertising as we know it today did not begin in the United S

Advertising as we know it today did not begin in the United States tmtil after the Civil War. Before that advertising had consisted mainly of small paragraphs in which a man simply stated what he wanted to sell. Later, Benjamin Franklin became known as the "Father of Advertising", partly because he used the modern copywriting technique of emphasizing the rewards derived from using a product, rather than simply talking about the product itself.
    The 19th century is also the period in which trademarks and slogans were born. Manufacturers often advertise a product by associating it with a symbol, often a person or an animal, known as a trademark; the trademark for a product may only be used by that particular company. For instance, the trademark of RCA Victor Company is a picture of an old, old record player with a dog listening to the record; it appears in most RCA ads and on most of their products.
    Slogans and trademarks are still widely used in modern advertising, but generally the approach has become more scientific. With hundreds of products that are nearly identical, an advertiser must somehow make his product look different, even if it really isn’t. It has been said that the two most important words in advertising are "free" and "new". The middle class American usually assumes that if a product is new, it is always better; and when people aren’t buying a product, calling it "new" often does wonders for its sales.