Is advertising manipulation

Advertising, a word with a large background that is similar to marketing plays an important role in the world of media and other parts. The first things that come into mind when we talk about advertising are money, customers, and adequate services. Advertising exists to help society by giving them information on products and services and make purchases according to people’s desires and needs. The global market place is seen as a giant negotiating table where everyone is a participant whether they realize it or not. Negotiating has become a way of life for many people and it is through this phenomenon that advertisements came in.

Advertisements have increased with more creativity versions that seek to promote a better or a cheaper service that will likely appeal to the ignorant as well as to the most intelligent consumer. Advertisements seem to negotiate on the likes and preference of the consumers buys offering what the consumer wants. Advertisements are not essentially negative in nature but they have turned to be a major manipulator of the consumer and buyers perceptions. However, with the growth of the media, people are on daily basis being bombarded by hundreds of messages that seems to appeal to their normal everyday lifestyle.

The advertisements will touch on major key areas such as transport services, health, clothes, vehicles, creams, soaps as well as drinks. The advertisements will be seen in various messages that crop up in a number of newspapers, magazines, televisions, radio and currently as pop ups in various web sites. The messages are so distinct that one cannot help to avoid them. For example, one may be driving to work listening to their favorite radio program and this is then followed by a series of advertisements (Brett, 2003, p. 249-273).

The use of manipulation in advertisement has become a major trend. Advertisement is seen as the act of passing of information that is meant to bring about the attention to a certain service, product or need. Advertisements involve use of paid announcements that are found in magazines, newspapers, billboards, television and radio (Erdogan, 2002, p. 257). However, advertisements have been associated with manipulation that involves the management and skillful act of influencing that is especially seen as influencing in an unfair manner.

Advertising objective is aimed at allowing the consumer to be aware of the various products that are on offer and who is offering them. The consumer is then left to make a conscious decision on the product that they prefer based on their needs and the ability to purchase the. That is hardly manipulation, however, for manipulation to occur the advertiser has to intentionally influence the buyer. A basic example of manipulation is where an advertiser for batteries runs an advert that says that their batteries lasts ten times more than the other normal batteries.

In this case they have manipulated the consumer into thinking that their batteries lasts more than the other batteries which might not even be the case. Manipulation in advertisements has also been seen in the Middle East where advertisements are run that speak of the bad traits of the products from the west and the people are encouraged only to buy certain products that are from their countries (Morris, 1978, 15). The hierarchical of effects model is a theory that aims at clarifying on the objectives found in an advertising campaign for a particular advertisement.

It is a model that suggests that there have to be around six steps that are involved when a consumer decides to makes a purchase. The steps include awareness, knowledge, the liking, preference, conviction and the final purchase. The first steps are seen to be mostly influenced by an advertisement that is manipulative in nature that seeks to appeal to their liking and preference that is perpetuated by the information given about the product that turns into a conviction to make the purchase (Erdogan, 2002, 4).

It is a theory that aims at highlighting the adverse effects of advertising into changing or influencing the perception and convictions of people towards the purchase of a certain product or service. (Philips, 1997, p 34). Advertisements are seen to bring about a sense of awareness and knowledge that is aimed at influencing and manipulating the self of the consumer into liking those adverts that will convince them to buy the product. However, the theory is not adequate in showing on the form of manipulation that is involved.

The theory mostly focuses on the stages and fails to point to a particular form of manipulation by example or with evidence. How manipulation occurs Advertisements have been found to inherently use manipulative tactics that influence on the peoples choices and their spending habits. What most people will not agree to is that adverts have an effect on the choices that they make before they can make a purchase (Clow et al, 2007, 165-171). David carter who is a financial analyst came up with the phrase that is known as referencing.

Referencing refers to the situation where one intentionally references lifestyles presented to us by the media to our real life. For example one will tend to reference to the lifestyle of those who visit McDonalds as those of those rich people as the people seen in the adverts are well dressed and driving expensive cars (Michelis. 2011, p. 1-31). Due to this reference one will be driven to spend what they may not have to fit to the lifestyles of the people referenced in the advert. No advert is more effective than the advert that touches on the people’s emotions and feelings.

A fine of such an advert is the advertisement of Google that was first screened during the super bowl. The advert that is entitled as impress a French girl shows how a man connected with a girl through Google and he goes all the way to meet her in Paris. They fall in love, marry and later get to start their own family. The sign that was received from the fans was prove enough that the message had been received. The bit that was not highlighted is the manipulation bit (Bruthiaux, 2000, p. 20-4). The advert shows two good looking people who meet over the internet get to fall in love and get married, as easy as that.

The major contempt with the advert being that Google is the better search engine than the others. However, what makes this advert to be a form of manipulation is that it actively plays on the emotional responses of a person that will lead people towards preferring that particular product. However, the use of emotion is usually not seen in most advertisements as all advertisements seek to touch even on the tiniest bit of emotion. This is because all advertisements are meant to touch on emotions whether positive or negative (Pergelova, 2010, p. 39-54).

Just like the manipulation of the emotions, advertisements also rely on the choices people make by manipulating on the choices they make using their logic. The logic choices people make are sometimes combined with their emotional responses which the advertisements will aim to exploit. Manipulation of the logic by the advertisement will lead the person to buy the product without logically looking at the value or significance it shall add to the life of the person (Bruthiaux, 2000, p. 297-310). The logical manipulation feeds more on the extrinsic motivation of the person rather than the intrinsic motivation of the person.

The intrinsic motivation is based on the affiliation, self acceptance of the product, use and the general need of the product to the person. On the other hand, the extrinsic motivation is represented by focus on the appearance, financial gain and the social popularity. This will lead people to be motivated to purchase a product they do not even need or require and is the main cause of people making impulse purchases. However it is up to the customer to see to it that they are not logically manipulated by seeking further information about the product or service (David, 1999, 288-294).

Most people own pets and would want to see them live healthy life just as they also value a healthy life. An advert was recently broadcasted that showed two skinny healthy dogs playing around, jumping, running and catching Frisbee thrown at them (Jeffrey, 1976). On the other side just sat a depressed fat dog that just watched the other two dogs having fun. The advert that was entitled ” life is hard when you are a fat dog,” tried to show how the life of a dog is hard and at the end showed the type of food that the dog should be fed to be healthy.

This is a form of advertisement manipulation that is meant to appeal on the choice of dog food that will be chosen as dog food indirectly affects the owner due to the fact that they own a dog and want to see it healthy. A human cannot tell which food is best for their pets unless with the information they get, which in this case is mostly from the adverts. The advertisers simply connect the dots of the wants of the owner with the need to see their pet healthy. However, this form of manipulation can clearly be noticed by critical analysis of the adverts (McChesney, 1999, 139).

For example, advert in this case fails to impress as it does not tell of the foods to avoid that get your dog fat or what was feed to this dog to get it fat. One cannot decide to avoid or skip advertisements completely for the fear of being manipulated as this will not solve the problem entirely. Avoiding adverts is entirely an impossible thing to do and this means taking other measures into account (David, 1999, 16-23). Firstly, if you love a particular series on TV and want to avoid the adverts that come during the break you can sacrifice and buy the full season months later when its complete from television screening.

Secondly, since you cannot be able to remove the advertisements on the newspapers and magazines, this will mean you turning to start reading things online. This will involve using the ads blocker which will block out all adverts in the material that you read online (Michael, 1997, 19). However, completely ignoring adverts will prove futile unless one opts to cut out the rest of the world completely. This will mean the person adopting other lifestyle measures that will see them better understand adverts than avoiding them.

This will include the person no letting themselves not to be pushed by the hype found in adverts (Nancy, 1999, 30). The persons so as to adequately avoid the various form of advertisements manipulation they are to critically learn more about the product they are to purchase or the service they intend to subscribe to. This will help to reduce on the ignorance that is associated with purchases of goods that one does not need or require at that time or in the making of impulse buying pushed forth by and advertisement one saw or heard. In addition, one is to learn to shop intrinsically and not extrinsically.

People are to be guided by the things that they need or require but not pushed by what the community or friends want (Sidney, 1986, 214-226). However not all forms of advertisements have manipulation imbedded in them. Advertising plays an integral role of informing people of the various products that are available for the consumers to enjoy. Adverts also form a key role in informing people on the available subsidizes and other alternative prod cuts that the customer will love apart from the normal products and services.

This will help the consumers and other buyers to have information on the products that they require (Abhilasha. 000, p 67-72). Advertisements also play an important role in creating awareness of the products that are available in the markets. This will help the wider publics to learn of the goods that are available to be purchased. This advertising manipulation helps in creating a demand for the new products that are not known by the public (Paulie, 2000, p 3-23). This enables the consumers to have the freedom of choice in choosing on a number of products that are available. In conclusion, the use of manipulation in advertisement has become a major trend.

Manipulation is seen to occur when an advertiser intentionally influence the buyer. Advertisements have been found to inherently use manipulative tactics that influence on the peoples choices and their spending habits. Manipulation is also seen in adverts that touch on the people’s emotions and feelings. Manipulation of advertisements is seen on the choices people make by manipulating on the choices they make using their logic. Manipulation of products is also seen on products that indirectly affect you. However not all forms of advertisements have manipulation imbedded in them.