"Widely Advertised": Let's see how advanced the advertising industry was during the Sui and Tang dynasties.

Since 589 A.D., when King Yang Jian, the founder of the Sui Dynasty, destroyed Chen and established the Sui Dynasty, China ended the division it had experienced for more than three hundred years and gained great unity. From this point on, China entered a period of prosperity in feudal society. The Sui Dynasty and the subsequent Tang Dynasty were feudal times of great socio-economic development, social stability, commercial prosperity, frequent circulation of goods, a large increase in the population engaged in commerce, and increasingly fierce commercial competition. During the Sui and Tang dynasties, agriculture and handicrafts were highly developed, providing a large number of commodities for the market. Urban construction was also very prosperous, with the emergence of large commercial centers such as Chang'an and Luoyang. And there were significant changes in commercial organization and business techniques, and the commercial business model was also developing towards strong alliances, and the competition was very fierce. The big cities of Tang Dynasty In order to increase the popularity of their products and get more deals, merchants in Sui and Tang Dynasties paid special attention to the dissemination of information about their commodities. They use language, text and all means of communication, their products and services to the world, thus giving rise to a very distinctive ancient advertising industry. The word "city" originally had two meanings. The word "city" originally had two meanings. It not only represented the city where people lived, but also included the market in the city. The markets of the Sui and Tang dynasties were integrated with the neighborhoods where the residents lived. The markets were no longer open to the aristocracy, but also served the common people. These markets were located in every corner of the major cities during the Sui and Tang dynasties, greatly facilitating the lives of the citizens. Initially, the ""workshops"" and the ""markets"" were separate, with people living in the workshops and goods being sold in the markets. However, during the Shengtang period, this strict distinction was broken down, and stores were gradually opened in the workshops where the common people lived, and specialized merchandise circulation districts with distinctive features were created. For example, there was Chongrenfang, which concentrated on selling musical instruments, Yanshoufang, which specialized in selling gold and silver jewelry, and Deyifang, which specialized in selling cloth. It is this extension of "city" to "workshop" that made the commercial competition more heated while greatly facilitating the citizens. Commercial Street in Sui and Tang dynasties With the development of productivity, the division of labor in the society became more and more detailed, and more and more people were engaged in commerce. While the management of markets was strengthened, many trade associations emerged, and *** also set up specialized officials in these markets to manage them. Commercial practitioners had to abide by the market regulations set by the officials and trade associations, and the goods they sold had to be marked with the market's logo. Cities were also very large at that time, Jiankang was the first big city in Jiangnan with a population of more than one million; Chang'an and Luoyang also had populations of more than one million. All these residents had to spend money, and there were many business opportunities. But the number of merchants concentrated in these big cities was even bigger. Take Luoyang as an example, the three big markets of Luoyang Fengdu, Datong and Tongyuan concentrated more than 3,000 handicrafts ""wares"" and 5,600 selling ""stores"", forming a " The three markets were filled with more than 3,000 handicrafts shops and 5,600 shops selling goods, creating a bustling scene of "treasures and goods, and people in great splendor". Merchants from all over the country and even from the western regions came in droves, and the market was crowded with people, with fierce commercial competition. This is the basis for the formation of the advertising industry. Second, the form of advertising Chinese advertising originated very early, but has been *** emphasis on agriculture and business, making the development of the advertising industry is very slow. Initial advertising, is suing the customer word of mouth, the information is only familiar with each other in the exchange of people to pass on, although the dissemination of more affinity and trust, but the dissemination of a limited range, the speed is very slow, the flow of commodities play a role in the role of not much. Tang Dynasty Brewery A case of an advertisement promoting a product through word-of-mouth was recorded in Shui Yi Zhi. In the western city of Luoyang, there was a Yan Dealing Lane where the brewing industry was concentrated, in which there was a merchant surnamed Liu who was good at brewing wine. Every time he made wine, he would place it in the middle of the street and expose it to the sun, often for ten days and half a month, but the wine smelled as good as before. Whenever someone came to buy wine, he would give away a dime of wine in the sun-exposed wine altar for people to taste, at the cost of gratuitous drinking, to go back to publicize for them. Since Luoyang had a large floating population and many people came to buy wine, he gave away several jars of wine for people to taste every day. But after this publicity, the fame of his wine's rich aroma and sweet taste also spread all over the world along with travelers from all over the country, and the fame exceeded by thousands of miles, and it was known as "donkey-riding wine", named for the many people who came from far away on donkeys and came specially to buy it. Boss Liu's business was especially prosperous, and he became a famous and wealthy merchant because of the "donkey-riding wine". And this means of publicity for him was the original advertisement. Since the Sui and Tang dynasties, merchants have known that the branding of a commodity or product is of vital importance to the sale of goods. A brand is an intangible asset that generates value-added and premiums, and is a carrier of identification that is replaced by a specific symbol. A good brand represents excessive quality, perfect service and excellent use feeling to consumers. In a broad sense, during the Spring and Autumn and Warring States period, Shang Yang's "City Gate Standing Wood" and Lu Buwei's "One Word is worth a Thousand Pieces of Gold" are both a kind of branding effect, through which they both signaled the integrity of the ***, and laid the foundation of Qin's power. Store signs Merchants in the Sui and Tang dynasties often hung large area signboards and fronts outside their stores with the name of the store, mainly used to display the store's logo, the types of goods handled or the services provided. These fronts are often vivid, intuitive form, bright colors and unique symbols, in order to give customers a strong auditorium impact at the same time, so that people understand and remember the name of the store and the project. These fronts are mainly made of green and white cloth, decorated with jagged or wavy around the perimeter, especially in the hotel industry. Even "Water Margin" has the story of Wu Song who saw an advertisement in Yanggu County which reads: "Three bowls are not enough for Gang" before he entered this hotel to drink and finally killed a tiger. In the story, it was only a small county-level hotel, but in the big cities of Sui and Tang dynasties, the signs of large restaurants had already developed into colorful wine flags in various colors, embroidered with special patterns and names of the stores, and written with words to induce customers to buy. Both show the characteristics of the store, but also brand promotion, the effect is very obvious. During the Sui and Tang dynasties, the night life of the city was well developed. Many business districts operated all night long, so using lanterns to advertise was a very effective way to promote advertising. This kind of light advertising is generally in the lantern or light box with text indicating the identity of the store, the production of lanterns is also extremely gorgeous, hanging at night in front of the store is very eye-catching, is a particularly attractive mooring banner advertising. High-hanging store sign Some special industry stores, will also be hanging outside the store can represent the content of the industry some of the items, as a front advertising supplement, can also receive strange results. For example, the drugstore will hang gourds outside the door, selling agricultural tools will be hung outside the store on the plow and rake and so on. This kind of advertisement has a physical, moral, simple, vivid image, but also to find the right audience, improve product awareness and sales. Third, other types of advertising Sui and Tang dynasties, people began to produce the concept of brand, some old stores will seize the customer's psychology, the use of people's trust in the old, to take the art of attack. These old stores would indicate their store name on the products they produced and sold, and take a catchy name for the goods, which had both an auspicious meaning and a proof of origin. In the Tang Dynasty, the Lei family of Sichuan was the most famous in the production of guqin, with the reputation of "the first number of Tang qin, Lei Gong", and the Lei family indicated the word "Lei Gong qin" on the qin produced by their own family, to differentiate it from other people's products. This is one of the earliest trademarks in China, and a vivid example of the development of ancient commodity advertising into the trademark industry. Some shrewd merchants would make use of celebrities of the time to publicize their goods for themselves, which was the earliest celebrity advertising. In the Tang Dynasty, there was a restaurant that sold good quality wine with a strong fragrance, which was loved by the poet Lu Guimeng. The owner of the hotel was in a Lu Guimeng wine, put forward the request to ask Mr. Lu to do a poem for their own wine, the payment is to be free of its 100 days of wine accounts. Mr. Lu Guimeng was very happy, and wrote down the poem of "low shop front still covers, the wine drops of fragrant ash like last year", and let the owner of the store hang in the store after framing, which attracted a large number of fans of Mr. Lu Guimeng's patronage, and this place gradually became a fixed place for the exchange of literature enthusiasts, and needless to say, the business has doubled several times. Fourth, the special advertising terms Ancient advertising industry in the Sui and Tang dynasties got a big leap, in the process of advertising, and gradually formed a specific advertising terms. These advertising terms are the crystallization of the wisdom of ancient merchants, containing a variety of commodity information and folk culture. Among the rich advertising-conscious merchants, most of those who opened tea estates would not directly write so-and-so tea estate, but replace it with "Lu Yu Chuanjing". This allusion comes from an old poem: "Shennong planted tea all over China, Lu Yu passed down the scripture to explain tea. Longjing is clear and pure, Biluo is green and spits out spring buds." Lu Yu, the Sage of Tea As we all know, Lu Yu is the Sage of Tea in China, who loved tea all his life, and authored three volumes of "The Classic of Tea", which is the earliest monograph on tea in the world. Tea store in the hanging "Lu Yu passes the scripture", is since Yiyi got the tea saint's true biography, the quality of tea is unparalleled in the world, but also in line with the psychology of the tea-loving scholars, to obtain their cultural identity. Hotels are often associated with Li Bai, "Tai Bai Legacy" is the most common industry advertising term. Li Bai was an immortal of poetry and wine, who loved wine all his life and drank it all the time. "Li Bai's 100 poems on wine drinking" has long been a familiar saying. The hotel takes advantage of the fame of the Poetry Fairy and the Wine Fairy and replaces the wine in the store with ""Taibai's Legacy"", which is both elegant and subtle, and is more likely to attract those literati to stop by. Other similar shoe stores' ""圯桥进踵" is termed by the story of Zhang Liang's shoes, and the sauce shop's "调和鼎鼐" is termed by the story of the Duke of Zhou, just to name a few. These are ancient merchants attach importance to product promotion, combining goods and culture, an exploration in advertising. V. Sui and Tang Dynasty Advertising Industry Overview The prosperity of the advertising industry is inseparable from the prosperity of commerce, only in the Sui and Tang Dynasty, the country is stable, economic prosperity, commercial development of the heyday of the great development, will make the people's consumption level is improved, driven by the development of commerce. When the commercial development reaches a certain stage, in order to expand the scale of commerce, the phenomenon of relying on the dissemination of information to publicize products and services is bound to appear. Street-side advertising Advertising is a kind of culture from folklore, and its road of development in feudal society was full of ruggedness due to the influence of politics, economy and culture. However, it pushed open a magical door for the development of commodity economy, leading the ancient brand awareness and competition consciousness, while skillfully integrating the traditional Chinese culture into it, even including the Confucian spirit of ""benevolence"" and ""faith"", which is the a pioneering move in the history of China's commodity economy and cultural development, and is also worthy of reference for today's advertisers.