Advertising Media in Iran

Advertising Media in Iran

Media is not an exciting word in Iran, but believe it or not the advertisement media like newspapers, television channels and print media are going great guns. Iran as a country is complex and multi layered, with a very intelligent society who has a very clear insight of their glorious past. The Iranian people are very forward looking and one meeting with the youth of Iran will be enough to tell what the youth need and how they get it.

All types of media in Iran is censored by the Islamic regime which has been in the control of this country since the Islamic revolution of 1979. Since then every form of media has come under the state, and all that is seen by the Iranians is under the directive of the state. In that context the advertisement media (Werbeartikel) have to stick to self policing in whatever they say or do, unless they want to be shut down permanently or be punished under the various state laws, usually unknown to the common man. Things took a turn for the better when a moderate government came into power, also bring in media reforms thou still the state have absolute control of all form of state owned media and adverting .With the advent of change came satellite television and the internet, thus for the first time the Iranian people were exposed to international content and advertisement media.

Advertising media normally is in a major way connected to commerce and commerce even in a closed state is needed, and so it is the same in Iran. Iran is a very literate and highly educated society and with education comes certain sophistication. The advertising media with their wares have always been able to attract their attention. The restrictions on certain goods considered un-Islamic didn’t have any space on the state owned media could easily be viewed on the overseas advertisement media. The internet and Satellite TV, which has been banned for more than a decade has brought all forms of ware to people of Iran. They being fashion conscious and even wanting simple things such as t-shirts (t-shirt druck) and starved for what happening on the world scene have found these media a health source of news and advertisement.

Also external channels like voice of America and scores of media channels with programming in the Persian language controlled by people of Iranian origin staying outside Iran have a very steady following with the youth of Iran. All media is dependent upon advertisements thus many business can be found promoting themselves on these channels. The people of Iran over the years have developed a healthy dose of skepticism and do not take any form of adverting media at its face value. They have learned to read behind every line, be they the advertising media from the state or broadcasted from outside Iran.  

It demonstrates how ads for beauty and hygiene products use foreign phrases, mainly English and French, to position them in reference to Iranian notions of quality, prestige or style.  It also notes how advertisers strategically select words from regional languages including Mazandarani, Azeri and Kurdish to alternately activate local or national associations.

This article was kindly contributed by: Werbemittel (www.werbeartikel.com)