The invention of printing, however, may be said to  have ushered in modern advertising. After the influence of salesmanship began to insert itself into public notice in the 18th cent., the present elaborate form of advertising began to evolve. The advertising agencies, working on a commission basis, has been chiefly responsible for this evolution. The largest group of  advertisers are the food marketers, followed by marketers of drugs and cosmetics, soaps, automobiles, tobacco, appliances, and oil  products. 

The major criticisms of advertising are that it creates false values and impels people to buy things they neither  need nor want and that, in fact, may be actually harmful (such as cigarettes). In reply, its defenders say that advertising is meant to sell products, not create values; that it can create a new market for products that fill a genuine, though latent, need; and that it furthers  product improvement through free competition. 

Advertising in India is a highly competitive business. Today with the increasing consumer awareness no business can survive for long without advertising .with growing business competition it has become necessary to ensure right media mix to each target audience . Today,advertising agencies  are precisely taking care of  consumer needs and provide creative designs with concept & ideas. 

Advertisers in India reach about 75 per cent of the population through television, and almost the  entire population through radio. Certain televised programs enjoy a viewership of more than 100  million. The Indian viewership exhibits a brand name recognition of both foreign and domestic  products and services. 

With value added information such as television rating points, audience profiles, and opinion polls  available to marketers, the sophistication of advertising in India is at par with world standards.  The world's leading advertising agencies - Ogilvy & Mather, J W Thompson, BBDO, Young &  Rubican, Lintas, McCann Ericsson, Leo Burnett and a host of others - all have a major presence in  the Indian market. 

The major Indian advertising media are newspapers, magazines, television and radio, business publications and billboards. 

Advertising on the internet is the most cost-efficient way of reaching customers all over the world including ones own country.Indian advertising agencies need to wake up to the challenges posed by global economic trends and emerging interactive technologies like the Internet, Indian companies need to pay attention to characteristics of the new economy  like open standards, digitalization, and volatility, as Internet-based communication offers  "tremendous new opportunities for Indian companies via media convergence and re-intermediation." This also requires Indian advertising agencies to pay attention to the importance of online  market research, since new media like the Net are bound to affect people's perceptions of  advertising. The challenge for Indian advertising agencies in the coming years is to be able to target the rural market as well as the sophisticated urban market who may have Internet access.