I. Advertising and Public Relations:
In this section on Advertising and Public Relations, you will learn to
- Explain the purpose of an advertising or public relations message
- Describe the tactics advertisers use in order to motivate consumers to buy a product or think favorably about a brand
- List the channels - new and traditional - that promotional communicators use in order to reach a target audience
- Discuss the impact of persuasive messages on America's economy and its citizens
II. The Purpose of Advertising and Public Relations:
Different from journalists who attempt to remain neutral when crafting a message, promotional communicators have an agenda. They want to motivate us to act in some way as a result of receiving their message. They may want us to purchase a product (eg., toothpaste), sign up for a service (eg., Cingular cell phone service), or ascribe positive feelings to a brand (eg., Timex). Ultimately, when advertisers and PR professionals develop messages, they seek to inform, persuade or remind us.
If the product, service or brand is new to the market, advertisers craft a promotional message to explain its features and benefits. If the product, service or brand exists in a marketplace filled with competitors, then advertisers develop a promotional message to persuade us that their particular one is different and better. If the product, service or brand has been on a market for a long time (eg., Ivory soap), then advertisers produce a promotional message to remind us that it still exists and can still meet our needs. Thus, the purpose of an advertising or public relations campaign has a lot to do with the lifecycle of the product, service or brand. Is it just being introduced to consumers? Does it have competitors? Has it been a trusted brand for decades?
III. The Motivation is in the Message
Some people criticize promotional messages and call them manipulative; however, it's a fact that these messages are very necessary. Look at it this way: businesses produce products and deliver services. How would we know about them if they weren't promoted? We may have unmet needs and these companies have the products or services to satisfy them. Without the promotional messages telling us about them, our needs would remain unsatisfied.
Okay, that's true. Ad messages connect businesses with consumers. Ad messages grease the economic wheel of our stock market. Ad messages are beneficial and necesssary. True, but trite. Why? Because we can't ignore that ad messages are potentially detrimental to society. Your textbook cites a few examples of the negative effects of promotional messages: eating disorders; addiction to alcohol and tobacco; self-diagnosing and demanding prescription drugs from medical professionals. While advertising and PR campaigns can serve the public in positive ways, we cannot overlook the obvious negative outcomes of these messages.
In order to understand the outcomes of promotional messages, you have to first understand the psychology behind the message itself. Psychologist Abraham Maslow in his Hierarchy of Needs (Click here for a graphic depiction of the hierarchy.) posits that as humans, we have physiological needs, such as the need to sate our hunger and quench our thirst. Next, we have the need for safety and security. We also have social needs, such as the need to belong to a group and the need to be loved. Beyond that, we have esteem needs where we desire recognition and status. Finally, our ultimate need is to reach self-actualization, which is a certain Zen state where we are living at our highest potenial.
Promotional communicators reference Maslow's hierarchy when they develop their ad messages and appeals. They try to align their products, services or brand with the highest possible need on the ladder. For example, Herbal Essences shampoo. It's just a shampoo, right? It meets the lowest possible need on the hierarchy - a physiological one, basically. Cleanliness: a basic human need. So, let's say I put together an ad message that appealed to this need. It would simply read: "Herbal Essences. It cleans your hair." Boy, how bland! Would that make you buy the product? No, probably not. Let's move up the hierarchy and say, instead, that if you use Herbal Essences shampoo, you will find that people want to be with you because you are beautiful. This ad would convey the following sentiment: "Herbal Essences: For beautiful hair that makes others want to be with you." Hey, what could be better than this claim? Well, if you've ever seen the famous TV ads that are part of Herbal Essences promotional campaign, the makers of the product go straight to the top of Maslow's hierarchy. Their claim: "Use Herbal Essences and be transformed in to a new and complete person."
It's a shampoo, isn't it? Why do we expect it to transform us? Many times, we suspend our disbelief and purchase products based on these exaggerated claims. For those of us with a sizable income, perhaps that's okay. However, critics of promotional messages lament these subversive ad tactics claiming that they spur people to buy products when they cannot afford to do so. Reckless spending based upon advertising promises has driven many individuals into personal bankrupcy.
So, yes, promotional messages serve a vital function in our society. They create a demand for products and services. They enable companies to compete and differentiate themselves. They provide a return on the investment that businesses put out to develop the product or services. They off-set the operating expenditures of businesses. Yes, ad messages are necessary, no doubt. However, they have the potential to destroy people and social structures. Because some of you may elect to be promotional communicators some day, you need to understand the power that your messages wield over those who receive them. And because all of us are consumers of promotional messages, we need to understand the agendas of advertisers and PR professionals.
IV. The Channel is the Motivation
Studies have shown that we consume more than 1,500 advertising messages a day. This is commonly referred to as "clutter." Promotional communicators seek to cut through the clutter by selecting ingenious channels by which to distribute their messages. For example, they may elect to paint an entire transit bus or fly a blimp promoting a brand over a sports stadium. As an advertiser, the first thing you need to do is grab the attention of your audience. Second, you need to get them to react to the ad message. Grabbing attention is much harder than you would think in our highly cluttered landscape.
As reported in the April 2006 edition of Business 2.0 magazine, companies are seeking to capitalize on the popularity of Google Maps by renting out space on the rooftops of buildings. Target, in fact, is already doing so. It has placed its familiar red bull's-eye logo on roofs of buildings that appear on satellite-based cameras. If you think this is over the top, consider advertisers who have paid people like you and me to turn their foreheads into advertising space. If you think I'm kidding, click here to find out about ForeheADs by Cunning Stunts Communications.
V. Wal-mart on the Run: An Uphill Public Relations Battle
The ForeheAD ads may be comical; however, there's nothing funny about losing money because your business has a negative brand image. your promotional messages just aren't working to turn consumers' negative attitudes about your business into positive ones. Such is the case for Wal-mart. You will learn about Wal-mart's ambitious public relations campaign to protect its small town, Americana image. In the face of mounting criticism due to a sex discrimination law suit, allegations of unethical labor practices, and offering inferior healthcare benefits to employees, Wal-mart's steady growth is leveling off. Recognizing that the public's perception of its brand is having detrimental effects on its profits, Wal-mart hired a New York-based public relations organization to manage its media messages.
Edelman, Wal-mart's PR firm, has mounted an aggressive promotional campaign to counter the retail giant's negative publicity. As part of this campaign, Wal-mart's corporate officials are making themselves readily available for comment on matters concerning the company. Wal-mart has also created a website - www.walmartfacts.com - that provides an accounting of its stance on company-related issues. Moreover, according to a feature article in the April 1, 2006, edition of Marketing News, the company runs "full-page ads in newspapers across the country stating its position on such hot-button topics as healthcare and employee hiring practices" (Enright, 2006, p. 14).
Will Wal-mart be able to quell the negativity now surrounding its brand? The content of its promotional messages and the channels by which these messages are delivered to consumers will help to make the difference. Has Wal-mart reached a tipping point where it stands no chance of re-entering the good graces of the American public? To say "yes" is to discount the power of promotional messages to inform the public of Wal-mart's everyday low pricing, persuade the public that Wal-mart values its employees, and remind the public that Wal-mart is just a mega-company with a small town value system. After all, that's the purpose of promotional communication.
VI. Advertising: Regulate vs. Leave it Alone?
Walk down any city street and you are guaranteed to be bombarded – not by people, but by advertisements. Hundreds of brand messages fill city streets and seek to capture your attention. You see them on buses, in windows, on t-shirts, in subways, and on billboards. They are everywhere you look, all competing for your attention. Resistance is futile. You will fall victim to these advertising messages. They will affect you. If not consciously, then sub-consciously, these advertisements will cause you to question your self-worth and perhaps even convince you to empty your wallet in pursuit of the promises extolled by these ads.
With advertisements deeply affecting our values, attitudes and behaviors, many believe the federal and state governments should be given more power to examine and regulate commercial speech. Others point to the economic need for commercial speech and argue it deserves to be protected from government intervention under the First Amendment right to freedom of speech. Besides, they say, today's advertisers and ad agencies engage in self-regulation; therefore, they don't need the government to get involved.
As a daily consumer - and perhaps, future creator - of advertising messages, you need to consider this powerful and persuasive form of communication. The question is: Should advertising be regulated in order to safeguard society, or should advertising remain unregulated because of the value it provides to our economy - linking buyers with sellers?
Pro-regulation individuals argue that advertisements have a negative impact on society, and therefore, should be subject to stronger government regulation. Pro-regulators might say:
* Advertising messages perpetuate gender stereotypes (ie, women as homemakers, men as breadwinners, etc.).
* Advertising messages encourage reckless spending, which sometimes leads to personal bankruptcy. This phenomenon is especially troublesome among lower income populations.
* Advertisers use models or celebrity endorsers to promote their product. Consumers cannot help but compare themselves to these individuals and feel inadequate, thinking they don't measure up. The result: advertisements erode the self-confidence of adolescents and adults alike.
* Advertising messages have been linked to such social crises as eating disorders and sexual harassment.
Anti-regulation individuals argue that advertising serves a vital role in our economy by influencing consumers to buy products produced by manufacturers. They believe self-regulation by advertisers is enough and the federal government should not impose regulation on the advertising industry. Anti-regulators might say:
* Today's marketplace is crowded by so many similar products and services. Advertisers simply have to utilize emotional appeals and other such persuasive tactics in order to compete with rival businesses.
* Advertising raises consumer awareness of goods and services, which in turn, increases sales, drives up production, and keeps the economy humming. Without advertising, there would be no demand for products and services. The result: higher unemployment rates.
* Adults have control over advertising messages they consume, or allow their children to consume. If they don't want to subject themselves to the influence of advertising messages, they should simply turn off the television, radio and other media channels used by advertisers.
* Advertising brings money back into a company, allowing it to invest in new product development and create better, more innovative products for the public to purchase. Without advertising, there would be no money for new innovations that can benefit the consumer.
Question: in light of these arguments for and against advertising, should advertising be more tightly regulated, requiring, for example, that all claims in ads be substantiated by factual proof, that advertising for prescription drugs be removed from media, that children's advertising be eliminated from children's programs, etc.
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