Advertising is a form of selling. For thousands of years there have been in

Advertising is a form of selling, for thousands of years there have been individuals who have tried to persuade others to buy the food they have produced or the goods they have made or the services they can perform.
    But in the 19th century the mass production of goods resulting from the Industrial Revolution made person-to-person selling inefficient. The mass distribution of goods that followed the development of the highway made person-to-person selling too slow and expensive. At the same time, mass communication, first newspapers and magazines, then radio and television, made mass selling through advertising possible.
    The objective of any advertisement is to convince people that it is in their best gains to take the action the advertiser is recommending. The action may be to purchase a product, use a service, vote for a political candidate, or even to join the Army.
    Advertising as a business developed first and most rapidly in the United States, the country that uses it to the greatest extent. In 1980 advertising expenditure in the U.S. exceeded 55 billion dollars, or approximately 2 percent of the gross national product. Canada spent about 1.2 percent of its gross national product on advertising.
    While advertising brings the economies of mass selling to the manufacturer, it produces benefits for the consumer as well. Some of those economies are passed along to the purchaser so that the cost of a product sold primarily through advertising is usually far less than one sold through personal salespeople. Advertising brings people immediate news about products that have just come on the market. Finally, advertising pays for the programs on commercial television and radio and for about two thirds of the cost of publishing magazines and newspapers.