Notice how commercials for insurance- be it for cars, homes or health care- never fail to treat the audience like we're all toddlers with bricks for brains, and tell us nothing or next to nothing about the benefits of the product being sold? Instead we get CGI lizards and emus and Jake from State Farm stalking Pat Mahomes and if we have any brain cells at all (commenters on this YouTube post are obviously exempted) we are left wondering what on Earth any of this has to do with insuring our cars or homes or health.
Until now. Because I've got the answer for you, free of charge, no stupid mascot or overexposed sports figures necessary.
Let's start with car insurance. In every state in the country except New Hampshire (the weird state,) car insurance is an absolute requirement for legal use of the public roadways. Want to operate a motor vehicle beyond your driveway? You MUST purchase a minimum level of insurance from a licensed insurance broker.
Now let's talk about home insurance. Oddly, this is not technically required anywhere in the United States as long as you own your home outright. However, if you are like the vast majority of home "owners" under the age of 60, a financial institution holds the mortgage on that house and every single one WILL require that you carry some form of insurance coverage on the home you jointly own. And if you rent? Landlords pretty much universally require that you carry some level of renter's insurance.
Finally, let's look at health insurance. From 2010 to 2019 there was an absolute legal requirement for all American citizens to carry a minimal level of health insurance from a licensed provider. The federal requirement went away in 2019, but realistically the massive expense connected to health care represents a de facto requirement. Sure, you can opt out of the health care insurance system- but you'll be one bad slip away from opting in to bankruptcy if you do. Health insurance doesn't NEED to be a legal requirement any more than breathing does.
See my point? Insurance Companies don't create ads to convince you that you need to purchase their product. They don't need to. You have to purchase their product. All these stupid commercials are doing is trying to convince you to buy THEIR version (because they've got a CGI Emu) instead of the OTHER GUY'S version (even though they've got a CGI Lizard) or that OTHER version (because they've got that old character actor you remember from the Spider-Man films) or still ANOTHER version (because they've got Jake and Pat Mahomes.) They are appealing to a captive audience, so they aren't interested in selling us on the virtues of that product. They are interested in planting their mascots into our brains so that when we buy what we HAVE to buy, we remember the cartoon character or that football player who used to win Super Bowls.
Don't believe me? Check out the comments. I dare you.
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