Do Diet Opinions Count?

The world is full of people who love nothing more than to give you their opinion on just about every topic under the sun and a few more besides.

It has been said that opinions are the cheapest commodities on the planet.

And being freely given with gusto on whatever subject you care to bring up, it is quite easy to see how this statement must be so very true.

Yet despite the cheap nature of opinions, the general public are easily swayed by them! This applies to the subject of dieting and diets as it does to most any other thing.

You only have to read the many opinions given in online forums and blog comments as well in the offline world in magazines and newspapers published both nationally and locally the length and breadth of the country to realize that everyone has an opinion on this or that diet program.

The fact that those opinions range from being "fully in favor of" right up to being "fully against", is a good indicator of just how valueless they really are as a measure of a diet's true effectiveness!

The Power of Opinions

Yet whether you view opinions as being valuable or useless, the simple fact remains that entire populations can be led to believe a thing is true when enough opinions are presented to them in that direction.

Remember how popular the Atkins diet became amid a wash of public opinion that gave it a huge vote of confidence? That popularity was of course artificially engineered by clever advertising and promotion to bring enough real people on board and to give their "honest opinions" of the diet they had tried for themselves over a period of a few weeks.

The cracks in the veneer only started to appear much later when long term dieters who stuck with Atkins started reporting other health issues that were directly linked to their diets. I think that quite enough on that subject was said way back then.

Using the Media to Garner Favorable Opinion

Now is now and the power of public opinion is still very much propagated to sell diets. Take Nutrisystem as a good example of using the power of advertising to get the public on their side.

The carefully orchestrated appointment of long time popular singer Janet Jackson several years ago as their spokesperson and her appearance in TV commercials did wonders for boosting the company's public image. That's simply because people identify with well loved personalities and celebrities.

When someone of Miss Jackson's caliber appears on TV with the message that Nutrisystem is a great diet, people believe her so completely that they also believe that the diet is amazing. The promotional move boosted sales figures quite dramatically as a result.

Negative and Positive Opinion Works

The same technique is employed in getting people to eat and drink a whole host of products that are not beneficial to their health, such as certain brands of soda and fast food which all contribute to the nations' obesity problem.

Even though people know deep down that certain products are harmful to their health, they can be coerced into buying and consuming them when public opinion conflicts with their own beliefs.

So if you ever wondered about how powerful such a valueless commodity as opinions can be, just take a look how they are used to get the public behind an advertising campaign and you'll see their true value.

If you want to get a closer look at how an article that covers diet opinions while reviewing the diet itself works, here is an excellent example: Nutrisystem reviews and opinions. This is a more factual based review of the diet itself with the author's own opinions mixed in with the facts to make it more readable and entertaining as a published paper.

Ultimately, it does come out on the side of the diet, as the presence of an advertising banner or two belies the fact that while providing negatives as well as positives, it is still geared up as being a favorable review.

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