Every afternoon, I ride the bus home from work. And every time I ride the bus home from work, we pass a billboard that catches my attention. It is made up of two juxtaposed pictures: a waist-down photo of a woman wearing tight fitting jeans, and another of the same woman wearing nothing but black hiphugger panties. Sexy. The slogan is, “Conoce su interior”, which, roughly translated means, “Get to know her on the inside”. It´s an advertisement for a new shopping mall in town.

If you´re anything like me, you are probably cocking your head to one side and thinking, “Really? An advertisement like that for a shopping mall?” Something doesn’t fit here. Its not an offensive billboard, its not badly executed, but, oh yes, wouldn’t the typical audience for a shopping mall advertisement be women?

The answer, according to recent statistics and, frankly, common sense is a resounding, “Yes”! Women are the segment of the population that spend the most money shopping. In fact, they are not only the biggest group to spend money for themselves, research shows they also influence spending for the rest of the family, husbands included. So, any mall barons in town hoping to attract new customers would logically seek to attract a female audience.

So how did the advertisers miss this important piece of information? It seems to me they are choosing to ignore their target audience and rely on a common fallacy instead. Immediately, the old motto, “Sex sells”, comes to mind. It can be easy to think that a sexy ad will get you the results you need, but you may end up missing your target.

Sure, every woman can appreciate the beauty of another woman, but it probably won´t make her go shopping at a different mall. She may even end up feeling jealousy and shame that she isn´t as shapely as the lady on the billboard, in which case the image could be appropriate for the opening of a new fitness center, but not a shopping mall.

This is just one case, but I see this disconnect between the target audience and the advertiser happening all the time. I belong to the millennial generation, and as part of this generation, I see the world in 0´s and 1’s. I go online to find information and use mobile apps for everything from banking to cooking. So when I come across a product that doesn´t allow me to set up an online user, or download an app for my smartphone, I usually ignore it and move on to something that can meet my needs better.

Maybe these companies are relying on other fallacies that say that change is hard, or that its best to do things according to tradition. In the meantime, they are losing my business. It is time to get to know our audiences so that they won’t pass us by while we’ve got our heads in the clouds.