Chapter 1284 Ad Spots for Suffering Travels

After arranging matters at the animation studio, Pei Qian returned to the company headquarters.

Just as he entered the elevator lobby, he saw that the newly purchased advertisements had already been launched.

The Suffering Travels documentary was playing on the display screen.

Many office buildings had small display screens as advertising spaces, usually placed in the lobby elevator area, inside the elevators, or other high-traffic areas, targeting ordinary office workers.

Buses and subways also had small display screens to play advertisements for various products.

The advertisements played on these screens were generally the brainwashing type, such as recruitment, used car sales, wedding photography, apartment rentals, moving services, and the like. There were also advertisements for travel agencies.

However, although these advertisements varied in type, they were all equally boring, even a bit low-end.

Of course, there was a reason for this.

On the one hand, these small screens targeted commuters, and the most valuable target customer group for these businesses happened to be office workers.

On the other hand, because the screens were small, and sometimes even the sound was unclear, a high-end, sophisticated ad wouldn't be very effective. The only way to leave a lasting impression was through visual imagery and repetitive, brainwashing slogans.

Over time, the advertisements in such places had all become similar: dull, boring, brainwashing, and even a bit low-end.

Pei Qian inevitably had to take the elevator to and from work, and thus had to endure this mental pollution.

Although the small screens in the Shenhua Haohua Jing elevator lobby were muted, there was a state of advertising that could be achieved called: silence is golden.

Some brainwashing ads, you only had to hear them once, and next time, even if you didn't hear the sound, just seeing the image would make those sounds automatically echo in your ears.

It was simply mental pollution.

But now, this mental pollution had been swept away.

Because all the advertising spaces in the Shenhua Haohua Jing building had been replaced with the Suffering Travels documentary!

Not only Shenhua Haohua Jing, but this time Meng Chang had spent a large sum of promotional funds to put this documentary on buses, subways, and advertising display screens in other office buildings.

This was part of Meng Chang's promotional strategy. After all, to get a high commission, he had to spend more money, and spending money had to be done with skill.

Pei Qian was very satisfied with this and felt that Meng Chang was getting the hang of things.

This was simply a textbook example of "spending money with no effect"!

First of all, the display effect on these small screens was not good to begin with. There might even be no sound or unclear audio on buses and subways, so most manufacturers would choose relatively brainwashing, monotonous slogans in order to deepen the advertising effect and cope with this complex environment.

However, the promotional video for Suffering Travels was obviously very different from these advertisements. You had to listen to the sound and read the subtitles to know what was going on, but the small screens often had low sound and the subtitles were not easy to see clearly.

Secondly, this advertising space was mainly aimed at office workers, who tended to be more pragmatic.

Looking at the other types of advertisements, such as recruitment, used cars, apartment rentals, moving services, wedding photography...each of them was a relatively essential need in life.

Even the advertisements for travel agencies would basically focus on a petty-bourgeois sentiment, suggesting that you work so hard that you should travel to see the beautiful scenery and rest.

As a result, the Suffering Travels documentary directly made office workers feel that it seemed better to go to work!

In short, the Suffering Travels documentary was absolutely perfect as an advertisement on these small screens!

The key was that this operation cost a lot of money.

After all, these advertising spaces had to compete with recruitment, used car, apartment rental, and moving companies, and which of these companies lacked money?

The advertisement was not cost-effective, but taking it down could purify the environment, allowing everyone to suffer less from brainwashing advertisements, which could be said to be an act of great merit.

More importantly, it could not only discourage outside customers but also serve as a warning to the employees within Tengda Group!

Suffering Travels would be fully open to the public in the future, and anyone could sign up by paying a fee.

The reason for this had been explained before, because turning Suffering Travels into a commercial endeavor would burn money and lose money far more effectively than simply using it as an employee benefit.

Therefore, discouraging potential customers in advance became crucial.

But it was a different matter for Tengda employees. After all, people outside only needed to avoid signing up, while Tengda employees couldn't even avoid it by paying.

Suffering Travels was a company benefit for them, and an "benefit" that could not be refused.

When the employees saw how much the people in charge suffered, and realized that the benefits and treatment of ordinary employees were not much different from those of the people in charge, why bother working hard and trying to perform well in order to become a person in charge?

Then everyone would slack off together, and even the original people in charge would begin to bide their time. Wouldn't that be great?

Therefore, Pei Qian thought it was more and more appropriate, and was quite satisfied with Meng Chang's arrangement this time.

Back in the office, Pei Qian clicked on the documentary again, preparing to relive it.

Such a delightful video should be filmed for eighty or a hundred seasons, with twenty or thirty episodes per season!

In fact, this documentary was not very long, and the challenges were not very stimulating.

Rock climbing and wilderness survival were both quite professional projects, and there were even many television programs dedicated to this topic. Compared to those professional masters, the Suffering Travels group was obviously far behind, at most only considered beginners.

But it could give people a very down-to-earth feeling.

After all, those masters of outdoor survival and rock climbing were obviously not ordinary people. When doing these difficult and challenging projects, they would naturally give people a sense of alienation.

For office workers who lacked exercise all year round, survival masters like Bei Ye were already different species from themselves. Watching such television programs was more of a novelty, and they would not put themselves in that situation at all.

But Suffering Travels was different. These were all ordinary people. Not to mention anything else, simply eating compressed biscuits and dried meat was a very severe challenge for some of them.

So it looked particularly relatable. After relating to it, they felt that they would never go no matter what.

The challenges in the documentary were still relatively simple, mainly involving rock climbing of low difficulty, rappelling, swimming, setting up tents, making fire, and cooking food.

The food was farmed poultry bought in the nearby farmers' market, placed in a specific area for these people to catch. They could use archery or make traps. If they couldn't catch anything, they could only eat compressed biscuits.

It sounded interesting, but the result was often that they were covered in dirt and out of breath, but gained nothing. They could only watch others eat roasted chicken while they gnawed on compressed biscuits.

The harm was not great, but the insult was extremely strong.

These all seemed not difficult, but in reality, for ordinary people, simply setting up a tent and sleeping in the wild was already a form of suffering.

Pei Qian paid special attention to the performance of these people in charge.

Relatively speaking, Hu Xianbin performed the best, probably because he was relatively young, had good physical fitness, and adapted quickly.

Although Huang Sibao's physical fitness was not great, he was generally in a state of resignation, and did not complain too much. He seemed to know that nothing he said would be useful, and was completely in an "Uncle Bao, use all your tricks, I'm lying down" expression.

Xiao Peng was still trying to get close to Bao Xu, seemingly hoping to use human tactics to dismantle Bao Xu's psychological defenses, at least to make himself a little easier. After all, among these people in charge, he was relatively less hated by Bao Xu.

He Desheng talked the most, deliberately acting very miserable in front of the camera, and constantly saying how hard he was in the interview, seemingly wanting to evoke sympathy and escape from the sea of suffering as soon as possible.

As for Guo Licheng, his physical fitness was the best, but obviously the fun of wilderness survival was far less than weightlifting for him, so he just perfunctorily completed Bao Xu's requirements, waiting for the end of this activity with a lifeless expression.

A documentary very completely expressed the various aspects of these people in charge's lives.

But overall, there was a basic tone and premise, that was, except for Bao Xu, no one was enjoying it at all. Everyone was suffering and wanted to immediately end the activity and return to Jingzhou.

The documentary did not mention the names and identities of these people. After all, who they were was not important, the suffering they were undergoing was what mattered.

As long as everyone saw that Suffering Travels was living up to its name and produced a natural deterrent effect, then the purpose of this documentary would be achieved.

So far, this documentary had already gained a good amount of buzz on the Aili Island website, and the comments were gradually increasing.

When the promotional video was first released, some people expressed their longing, but now it was quite rare.

"When I first watched the promotional video, I was wondering why it was called Suffering Travels. Now I understand, it really is suffering!"

"These few people who were invited are a little unprofessional. Shouldn't they try to show a sense of enjoyment? Why do they all have a bitter face?"

"Maybe this is Tengda's consistent aim? Must be real enough?"

"What I mean is, the first batch of beta users should be people who are more interested in wilderness survival, right? Why do these people give the impression that they were forced to participate in the activity with a gun pointed at them?"

"In short, one thing can be made clear, this Suffering Travels really is suffering. That promotional video was a deception!"

"Very good, I hope there will be more seasons in the future! Although I won't go, it's still quite interesting to watch others suffer!"

Many viewers were puzzled by the existence of this documentary.

According to common sense, since this documentary was also officially produced, shouldn't it at least show a more positive side?

Moreover, it didn't need to be deliberately filmed. Since it was a beta test, they must have carefully selected people who had a strong interest in wilderness survival to participate, right?

The resulting documentary would naturally be very optimistic and enjoyable.

As a result, no one knew where the officials found these people, each of them with a face pulled longer than a bitter gourd, really bringing the word "suffering" to the extreme.

The audience didn't have any opinion, after all, it was quite enjoyable to watch others suffer.

The key was, did they still expect to make money from this in the future? Wasn't this deterring all the target customers?