Whenever advertisers want you to stop thinking about the product and to start thinking abo

ut something bigger, better, or more attractive than the product, they use that very popular word "like". The word "like" is the advertiser’s equivalent of the magician’s use of misdirection. "Like" gets you to ignore the product and concentrate on the claim the advertiser is making about it. "For skin like peaches and cream" claims the ad for a skin cream. What is this ad really claiming？ It doesn’t say this cream will give you peaches-and-cream skin. There is no verb in this claim, so it doesn’t even mention using the product. How is skin ever like "peaches and cream" ？ Remember, ads must be read exactly according to the dictionary definition of words. This ad is making absolutely no promise for this skin cream. If you think this cream will give you soft, smooth, and youthful-looking skin, you are the one who has read the meaning into the ad.

The wine that claims "It’s like taking a trip to France" wants you to think about a romantic evening in Paris as you walk along the street after a wonderful meal in an intimate cart. Of course, you don’t really believe that a wine can take you to France, but the goal of the ad is to get you to think pleasant, romantic thoughts about France and not about how the wine tastes or how expensive it may be. That little word "like" has taken you away from crushed grapes into a world of your own imaginative making. Who knows, maybe the next time you buy wine, you'll think those pleasant thoughts when you see this brand of wine, and you'll buy it.

How about the most famous "like" claim of all, "Winston tastes good like a cigarette should"？ Ignoring the grammatical error here, you might want to know what this claim is saying. Whether a cigarette tastes good or bad is a subjective judgment because what tastes good to one per son may well taste horrible to another. There are many people who say that all cigarettes taste terrible, other people who say only some cigarettes taste all right, and still others who say all cigarettes taste good.

The word "like" in an ad often focuses the consumer’s attention on ______.

A．what the advertiser says about the product

B．what magic the product really possesses

C．why the advertiser promotes the product

D．why the product is as good as promised