For a small company it's a waste to spend much money on ads, but for a company rated in Forbes it's for respect. You are right in some way, but they just can't stop paying for ads. Nowadays, the best marketing system is different from the old mass media one, and it's based on the web. But a big well known company as Coca Cola, they spend millions on adds in order to sustain their monopoly, to remind people about them, to show how powerful they are, more as an obligation to it's consumers.

Of course they could more important things with these money, to improve their products, but trust me, they already do that. McDonalds it number 6th in the world's most valuable brands, coca cola is number 3. McDonalds already have millions of customers. They keep their customers by showing them nice commercials (news and promotions) via mass media. They invade the world with their name on every poster or commercial break in order to constantly remind people about them.

In the today's world advertisement is very important for the development of any business because with the help of advertisement we can reach at the door step of our targeted customers. If we do not use the support of advertisement then we can not stay in the market, people forget our product. Advertisement is all about the marketing of our goods/products and services.

It works as a constant reminder, for instance: a normal man sits infront of the tv all day long and then this commercial comes which is inevitable to get away from (I'd blame laziness), they make annoying advertising songs that gets stuck in the brain and it annoys him so much, they want their beloved product to be the only thing he thinks about, so they keep on feeding him with all these commercials, so the next time he is out shopping the first thing he will pick will be the reheated product.

If you don't advertise, people forget you. Or worse don't know if you're still around. I think most of the coke/pepsi kind of thing is aimed at a younger audience. Trying to get them to be loyal to one or the other early on so they'd be loyal for life.

For example, everyone and their mom knows what pepsi is...instead of spending so much on the ads for the pop why not just lower the price...Or chrysler, their cars are trash...instead of spending millions on the ads during the superbowl...why not make a better quality car....or even mcdonalds...instead of spending on ads, spend the money to make the mcChicken taste more like chicken.

In other words, why choose the ad over the product when it comes to spending...Like I dont know about you but when was the last time you ever paid attention to an ad on youtube or the tv...its just a waste?