Advertising is the business of making the public want to buy things. Posters, adverts, sponsored posts, and the whole industry behind them.
It is a mass noun covering the trade and the output together. The vocabulary is well established: an advertising agency makes the work, an advertising campaign is a run of it, and advertising revenue is what pays for most media. Regulation is real, since advertising must not mislead and cannot target children for some products. False advertising is a legal complaint rather than a figure of speech.
1nounadvertisingThe activity of promoting products publicly to encourage sales.
“Half the budget went on advertising.”
Middle French
advertir
Anglo-Norman
advertir — to inform
Middle English
advertisen
English
advertise
English, today
advertising
Built from
From advertise + -ing. advertise comes from Middle English advertisen, from Anglo-Norman advertir (“to inform”), avertir, Middle French advertir, avertir (“to warn, give notice to”), with the French -iss- infix assimilated to -ise, -ize and probably influenced by the noun advertisement. Compare also advert.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA