They know exactly how you feel, how much money you have, and where you like to spend it. We’re not talking about your best friend. It’s the advertisers that know this about you. They spend millions of dollars each year researching your spending habits, your responses to advertising, and your purchasing decisions. That’s because they know that as a group, teens spend $141 billion each year, and they want a piece of those billions! So advertisers spend money to appear as your best friend who believes in you, and knows that you’ll be happy if you just buy their products. They often try to convince you that you need their products to make you confident, happy, stylish, or independent.  With their products, you will be smarter, happier, richer, and better looking instantly.

Have you ever been in a store and bought something that you saw on a special display near the checkout line? Congratulations to the advertisers! They convinced you to make an impulse purchase ― buying without thinking the purchase through or considering other options. You may have gone to the store because you needed a new pair of jeans, but you ended leaving with jeans AND two sweaters ― on sale, of course, on a “buy one, get one free” special. And you never even intended to buy the sweaters in the first place.