The Market at the Bottom of the Pyramid

Imagine a time when you were reading a magazine and stumbled upon an advertisement that influenced you to go out and purchase that particular product. This proves as the typical goal of marketing companies since persuasion of consumers inevitably leads to a higher profit. Likewise, advertising agencies use various different approaches in marketing their products. This approach can be exemplified by drawing comparisons from two different advertisements, Schick and Wrangler. Schick’s advertisement contains qualities that are effective and promote their product in a manner that persuades consumers, where the Wrangler ad lacks many of these qualities.

Advertisements are brought up to express emotional, subrational appeals and to attract our attentions, only a few of which actually attract our attention. According to Fowles, he believes that “unfulfilled urges and motives swirling in the bottom half of [our] minds.” Fowles suggest consumers to pay attention to the fifteen appeals in order to evade thinking differently.

In today’s society, advertisements saturate our lives. In our day to day lives we find ourselves sorting through many advertising images and messages. However we overlook the moral impact that advertisements have on individuals in society, effecting the desires and inclinations of individuals. Through major markets such as tobacco and alcohol, their marketing impacts both moral ideas and moral behavior in society. The changes in society would showcase the powerful force that advertising has on society, which radically affects the very way we think, the concepts we have and the association we make.

In “The Indictments Against Advertising” by Courtland L. Bovee and William F. Arens, both authors of business and contemporary advertising textbooks, briefly discuss advertising’s effect on the consumer and shows the implications of businesses, in this case the fast-food industry, persuading people to “want what they don’t need” (Bovee 358). The advertising technique of persuasion leads to false impressions of a product, much like the advertisement claims of selling healthy fast food. With fast food ...

In order to get insights into the consumer perception about the role of advertising we have reviewed a number of articles and conducted four in-depth interviews. A number of research papers reach opposed conclusions. These vary from the ones stating that "the ethicality of a firm's behavior is an important consideration during the purchase decision" and that consumers "will reward ethical behavior by a willingness to pay higher prices for that firm's product" (Creyer and Ross Jr.

In order to generate sales, marketers often promote aggressively and uniquely, unfortunately, not all marketing advertisements are done ethically. Companies around the globe spend billions of dollars to promote new products and services and advertising is one of the key tools to communicate with consumers. Conversely, some methods that marketers use to produce advertisements and to generate sales is deceptive and unethical. Ethical issues concern in marketing has always been noted in marketing practice. According to Prothero (2008), ethics itself has a profound, varied and rich past. It emphasizes on questions of right and wrong or good and bad.

Material and ideological conditions are integral components of a market society, which interacted and changed the ways we view market society today. I will discuss the shift from traditional societies to a market society to explain what Polanyi refers to as “the great transformation”. I will then talk about the changes that have occurred in the workplace, the impact on these workers, and the worldview of those in a market society.

Businesses are in game in order to earn money and advertising is the strongest weapon that helps to sell a particular product . An advertisement can be harmful and misleading as well as helpful and beneficial . Advertising in ethics is an unclear concept , but truly the main goals of corporations should be avoid misleading their customers by setting up wrong expectations and to keep their current clients .The major problem with advertising is that most of them are misleading . Advertisements create an unrealistic and sometimes irrelevant impression of an any particular product. Unfortunately, often , consumers become the victims of their tricks .

This book has opened a whole new perspective on advertising and the reasons we buy things and regret them later. Thinking that I have the urge for a McDonalds hamburger may feel real, or it might just be an elaborate, expensive advertising technique used to manipulate my buying behavior.

Advertising generally tries to sell the things that consumers want even if they should not wish for them. Adverting things that consumers do not yearn for is not effective use of the advertiser’s money. A majority of what advertisers sell consists of customer items like food, clothing, cars and services-- things that people desire to have. On the other hand it is believed by some advertising experts that the greatest influence in advertising happens in choosing a brand at the point of sale.

By being a consumer in a world of diverse products and services, it has given us a wide range of choices. A product may be produced by different companies and has the same function, but it is presented to the consumers in different forms. In order to differ from each other, companies use the help of advertising to present its product in a better way than their competitors’. However, advertising the product is becoming more crucial than the product itself. Companies are focusing more on making the brand more popular, rather than actually improving the product that they offer. By turning the advertisement competition into a war between companies, they mislead buyers by hyperbolizing their products positive features, thus hiding the negative ones. Companies forget about the effect they have on the consumers. Consumers should be aware of the manipulative tricks that advertising uses like subliminal messages and brain seduction in order to not be misled into buying something that they do not really require. By knowing how to manipulate the audience and consumers’ brain, companies use tactical methods in order to persuade specific customers to buy specific products or services. Other examples of techniques they use are techniques like puffery which are suggestive claims about a product, using subliminal messages and transferring information indirectly, as well as by targeting a specific group of people, creating a slogan or a mascot and by using sexy models with perfect bodies, advertising tries to manipulate and persuade consumers into buying the product they are offering.

Advertisers and corporations are liable for using modern and sophisticated forms of mind control to the extent level of brainwashing consumers, in order to manipulate their choices and their spending habits. Our society is being negatively impacted, by becoming a consumer driven society constantly distracted by overwhelming persuasive advertisements, as opposed to ideal informative advertisements. The most vulnerable and negatively impacted targets of persuasive advertising are the younger, less mature, and/or less knowledgeable and self-directed consumers. Ironically, it was once said “An advertising agency is 85 percent confusion and 15% commission” (Allen). It is quite clear that social benefits are not part of this equation. The harm and severe social related costs far outweigh any economic growth and benefits deemed necessary for advertising and marketing companies.

A reader will clearly understand whether the advertising influences people or not, also will recognize how advertising forces people to buy things they do not need. It is also important to distinguish between manipulation and influence. During the whole work, we will show exact examples and evidence of how actually advertising manipulates people and why we do not see it. On the other hand, we will also describe non-manipulative advertising and how people can avoid senseless purchase.

Advertisements are pieces of art or literary work that are meant to make the viewer or reader associate to the activity or product represented on the advertisement. According to Kurtz and Dave (2010), in so doing, they aim at either increasing the demand of the product, to inform the consumer of the existence, or to differentiate that product from other existing one in the market. Therefore, the advertiser’s aim should at all times try as much as possible to stay relevant and to the point.

In today’s difficult economy who can afford to spend their hard-earned money carelessly? Americans want good quality and low prices, and businesses that advertise their product make saving money possible. Advertising was created for one reason, so businesses could make known their product (Black, Hashimzade, and Myles). Some consumers may argue that advertising is not informative, but that it is manipulative because some advertisements make false claims. Fortunately, there are regulations and consumer rights that promote truth in advertising. Consumers must embrace their rights to keep advertising the way it is meant to be. Advertising is meant to be informative and not manipulative, and consumers play a great role in promoting truth in advertising.