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Research Essay Cover Sheet Subject Name Marketing and Media in Global Context Subject Code MECM90034 Student Name Juan Wei Student Number 807199 Tutor Karin Zhu (Friday 3.15pm) Word Count 2699 Table of contents Introduction·············································································3 Young People as Consumer··························································5 Young People as Media User························································7 Key Communication Tactics-Message·············································9 Key Communication Tactics-Media···············································11 Key Concerns about the Tactics····················································13 Recommendation·····································································15 Bibliography···········································································17 Appendix···············································································19 2 Brief Research for Youth Marketing A Segment Which is Over-Commercialised by Marketing Introduction Since the buying power of children increased significantly, it continuously appeals the attention from marketing to reach this valuable segment with skilful communication techniques through various media platforms (Advertising Education Forum 2012, p. 12). In recent decades, the youth marketing reveals an over-commercialised situation. From traditional marketing to digital marketing, business is now concentrating on integrating the full-sides of media and message strategies to maximise the exposure time in front of young people (Marshall 2010; Advertising Education Forum 2012). Besides, due to the persuasive purpose always accompany with advertising, also, children still in the developing their capability to cope with that branded information. Thus, the ethical issues existing in youth marketing have become a central topic which was discussed by academics and researchers widely (Boyland & Halford 2013; Rideout 2014). However, because of the difficulty of measuring marketing activities’ influence on children’s behaviour, it brings the significant challenge for both policymaker and marketer to find an equilibrium of their job. In this essay, young people will first be introduced as consumer and media user, then, the critical communication tactics which are adopted by multinational corporations will be presented in the following paragraph. Next, ethical issues and major concerns brought by the above marketing 3 strategies will be discussed. Finally, several recommendations for policymakers and marketers are elaborated at the end of the article. 4 Young People As Consumer Children and young people as a lucrative demographic segment with significant purchasing power have appealed attention from marketers for a long-term (Advertising Education Forum 2012, p. 15). According to Marshall and Todd (2010, p. 22-25) and Strasburger et al. (2009, p. 44-46), young people could be clarified into three different types consumer based on their description, which are the primary consumer, the influential consumer and the future consumer. First, as primary consumer, children is to some extent the autonomous individual who can make decisions independently (Marshall et al. 2010, p. 24; Strasburger et al. 2009, p. 44). Besides, children could satisfy their own needs with its considerable disposable incomes (for example, pocket money or part-time job income) (Strasburger et al. 2009, p. 44). During 35 years (1968- 2007), American child purchasing power has steadily increased, in between, the buying power of children aged 12 grow dramatically from $2.2 billion in 1968 to $42 billion in 2007. In addition, accord with the data of children’s disposable income in some developed countries such as UK and Australia, kids aged under 16 obtained a weekly income around £10 and $10.17 respectively. Further, the total pocket economy in UK and Australia represented £8900 million in 2009 and $1.4 billion in 2013 (Marshall et al. 2010, p. 24; Gibbons 2013). Second, children as the influencer in the family could impact on parental purchase behaviour (Strasburger et al. 2009, p. 45; Marshall et al. 2010, p. 137). Recently, parents are likely to ask for children’s opinion before making the purchase decision (Shin 2018). Also, by utilising various negotiation techniques and pester power, a large proportion of parents shall submit to kids’ consumption 5 needs (Ambler 2007, p. 284). Third, as researchers claimed that exposure a brand in early childhood is crucial to cultivate a loyal relationship and emotional attachments with that brands, a $100,000 potentially worth to the retailer (Boyland & Halford 2013, p. 238). It encouraged marketers to pursue young people as the future consumer while building lifetime relations from childhood, which is also called cradle-to-grave consumer (Strasburger et al. 2009, p. 46). It has been estimated that $15 million was spent in one year to advertising and marketing children by American business (Shimp & Andrews 2013, p. 95). 6 Young People as Media User Young people are multitasker who are media savvy consumer actively on both traditional (television, broadcast, print, etc.) and emerging (social media, website and mobile) media platforms (Advertising Education Forum 2012, p. 26). Due to the convenient access to the internet and personal mobile devices and television owned by kids, business nowadays could target children with commercial messages on both online and offline channels (Marshall et al. 2010, p. 220). In 2017, Children aged under 8 and older than 8 currently cost an average of 2 and 7 hours on screen per day, meanwhile, children are avid user of emerging media, they prefer to spend more time on mobile screen with 48 minutes while nearly half of kids watching television before bedtime (Howard 2017; Marshall et al. 2010, p. 25; Rideout 2014, p. 5). However, the cognitive capability of the child will develop with age, which refers to children in different age stages will understand media messages in different levels. This process is named cognitive development, raised by Piaget (John 1999, p. 184). John (1999, p. 184) and Advertising Education Forum (2012, p. 24) both describe cognitive development in articles, in which four stages could be clarified: sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational and formal operational. The under below figure demonstrates detailed information of those four stages, in particular, kids in the sensorimotor stage are too little to be discussed. 7 Level of Media Age Characteristic Message Understanding Sensorimotor 0-2 l In developing symbolic consideration Preoperational l Deeply focusing on (perceptual 3-7 perceptual properties of Low stage) stimuli l Tend to concentrate on single dimension l Considering the stimuli around their environment in Concrete a more thoughtful way. Operational 8-11 l Being able to think several Medium (analytical stage) dimensions, while relating it in a comparatively abstract mode. l Entering into a more adultlike way of thinking. Formal l Being able to complicate Operational 12-Adulthood Mature analysing particular and (reflective stage) speculative conditions and objects. Figure 1: Four Stages of Cognitive Development 8 Key Communication Tactics-Message Along with the increasing awareness about commercialised information considered by parents and policymakers, business in recent years is more cautious in reaching young people with marketing contents. Additionally, as numerous children flowed into digital platforms, it brings marketers greater opportunities to appeal children in their everyday life. In general, business adjusted its communication tactics timely in targeting young consumers. In sum, there are two trends could be found, which occurred in marketing within the message and media strategies. Comprehensively integrating commercial messages with message carrier or medium is one trend when marketers organise advertised contents for the young target (Hudders et al. 2017, p. 333). Throughout the mainstream brand cases, Affective Strategy with Testimonial and Animation Story Execution Framework is commonly adopted as message strategy when brands communicate with children. Affective message strategy could arouse favourable emotions or feelings from readers while matching those feelings with the brand, product or company (Clow & Baack 2007, p. 202). Testimonial and Animation Story execution framework employ living person or cartoon character to voice the information, which aims at improving the conviction of the message (Ouwersloot & Duncan 2008, p. 179). Coco-Cola, LEGO and most mainstream brands are precisely choosing this strategy to invoke a good feeling and convince the young consumer to purchase related products. Also, there are two general tactics adopted by marketing: product placement (embedded advertising) and cross-promotions (Rideout 2014,p. 9). 9 Product placement, also named content marketing or branded content, has become a “hot trend” in advertising (Elliott 2013). Instead of characterising a brand in distinct or separate advertising, a large number of companies are now combining their brand logos or products into the programming which targets are watching (movies, television series) or playing (online or offline games) (Rideout 2014, p. 8). Notably, young people are exposed intensively on food and beverage associated placements among television and film categorised product placement (Speers, Harris & Schwartz 2011, p. 292). The company such as Coco-Cola accounted 15% of all