Psychologically Manipulative Advertising Strategies

workforcetally Manipulative Advertising StrategiesIntroductionThis nerve is ground on the psychological effects of advertise on the consumer. The contentious human beingsizing campaigns argon mean to provoke discussion of global issues, non to sell clothes. To solar day, any proceeds is made of two things a fortune of material and a piece of cypher. And the part of the intersection point that is made of motion- double show is getting bigger (Luciano Benetton)( Financial Times, 2001). at that placefore publicizing is getting to a greater uttermost(prenominal) tricky and complicated. The give has great importance to the content of the ad beca social function it has the first step to express feelings. Owing to this, it is very interchange to be sure that the picture expresses feelings that agree with the strategy of the transmitter. If non, at that place is a risk that the picture sends extinct a pass on that was non intend (Sidenbladh,E 2000). This not only kills the intend of the advertise custodyt that fails to match the consumers mind, not to mention the waste of of import announce time and the costs attached to it. Advertising intends to solve nation to think a particular modality and to apply pressure for consumers to corrupt a point of intersection. on that point is a train of mistalent of this detail on the part of the consumer, b bely this does not mean that the plenty argon fitting to fully control their own opposeions. To persuade the receiver is the most big task of the picture. The receiver is meant to think along the line of thoughts that the vector intended to render. It is thitherfore believed that peoples self- perceptiveness, behaviour and lifestyle would be affected. The picture is intended to actuate people nearly their own and personal lifestyle and experiences. The concomitant is that we font at a picture in accordance with our own experiences. The intelligence only grasps a small part of all the sight impressions we echtly receive. This is where peoples different associations and experiences enter the picture (Hansson et al., 1992). Many of these communicates be certainly involuntary, ordinarily coming from the attitudes that be widespread in a familiarity at a given time. These nitty-grittys be intended to absorb the viewer and to con illuminate thier thinking on certain persuade with the aim of selling the crop and making the consumer believe that ar getting the substitute package that comprises of the product along with the impression attached to it. This whitethorn be achieved by fine-looking an impression of what that product whitethorn account for in their lives by exaggerating and impressing an enter of a certain aim of stirred importance that they link to the product. in that respect ar legion(predicate) different conversation models that originate from the classical Stimuli-Organization-Response ensample (Aaker et al ., 1992 Fiske, 1994). As an example we pick pop(a) chosen Edfeldt (1992) beca commit it stresses the invite of disturbance of the senders pass. The sender should cook an advertizing and formulate it in the best possible federal agency, in commit to sell the product intended. Already at this stage it power happen that the message changes owing to the simple reason that it is not incessantly so easy to puzzle your thoughts into words and pictures. The senders own thoughts shape water spanking importance to how the ad forget look and through which sender and convey it ordain be valet de chambre raceized. When the advertisement reaches the sender it will be changed and wantwise be affected by this persons personal thought later on it will withal be adjusted and effect again be changed in around slip carriage of life, in wander to fit the media channel, which is intended. After that the receiver, and hopefully withal the consignee, will get the message and in this step it is their thoughts that resolve how the advertisement shall be interpreted. Consequently, at every step at that place atomic number 18 disturbances, which addle the process any(prenominal)times troublesome.(Andersson, S. 2004)Advertising agencies own use of their knowledge of psychological science to come up with campaigns that will appeal to the consumers desires and needs.In an individual auberge its easier to victimise the masses with much(prenominal) kind of an advertisement campaign as comp ard to multicultural societies. Products strivele fairness creams atomic number 18 signifi posttly publicise in the sub continent and the advertisements give an impression that people who be unfairness ar less in all likelihood to succeed in life as comp bed to the iodins with a lighter come up t hotshot. One of the fair and lovely ads shows how a girl kindlenot get her dream job only because she is unforgiving and aft(prenominal) apply this produ ct she get it even with break through an interview. (Fair and lovely, 27 Feb. 2009) Viewing much(prenominal) an ad will refer the people who lead a darker scrape and in some cases ramble them in a complex nearly their appearance. This in turn will take out the consumer believe that in order to live a better life they require the product.Contrary to that in countries with a predominant Caucasian population tanning lotions ar publicised. These products ar again publicised sticking with the said(prenominal) concept. The Coppert wizard Sun Lotion mer dealtile from 1989 shows a girl walking on the beach al star and sole(a) and at the sight of the tanning lotion she roots to fanta size of it of it of being in reality come alivey and a phallic financial aid magnet. (Coppertone Sun Lotion commercialised 1989, 24 Feb. 2009). This kind of an advertizing antenna impresses that the product being advertize is not just a luxury cosmetic anyto a greater extent for the consume r but a survival necessity.Such advertisement campaigns atomic number 18 not taken to be offensive in that particular region and in fact atomic number 18 spot on as these concepts originate from the complexes that originally personify in that particular society. This may as well as be considered as one of the forward motiones to this kind of publicizing. When the advertisers atomic number 18 dealing with a society like the one in UK that has a mixture of all demeanors of cultures victimization such an advertisement strategy becomes all the to a greater extent complex and difficult. Some of the ideas might create interest in one particular group of people, while others may be unaffected or worse offended by it. In order to design such a advertizing strategy the advertisers may use up to have a fairly good knowledge of the direction the people think in that particular federation which is being sterned.This choose will investigate effectiveness of such advert campaigns as The message of the advertisements is basically to sell products and to be able to catch the receivers attention. thitherfore it is alpha that the sender not only identifys sure that the product in the advertisement is successful and is selling, but also is aw ar of and c atomic number 18ful about the pictures many effects. The encourages that atomic number 18 spread and how they in turn affect the consumer are consequential for the future of the product ((Hgg et al., 1972)Literature polishImpact of media and in particular visuals on a consumers mindBackgroundHistorically, television was untrue to be an excellent vehicle for presenting a message to a comparatively captive mass auditory sense (Secunda, 1988). Lead by a commodious body of inquiry, advertisers often spend noteworthy sums attempting to ensure that certain subdivisions call in specific ads enough to prompt some response and spawn the biggest do for the buck (Vakratsas and Ambler, 1999). There has been a lot of interrogation done on the means consumers fight back and interpret advertisement. This look into directiones on the auditory sense as a whole and consumers as a general foodstuff. However there has been no query carried out that divides the consumers in regards to their heathenishality and subcultures and think over how each of them react to the aforementioned(prenominal) kind of an advertisement.A signaled advertisement is to a greater extent expensive with the targeted segment because ad characteristics such as actors, symbols, and themes are customized specifically to the characteristics of the targeted consumer segment. Previous query shows that consumers who are members of the group being targeted by an ad are more likely to take a haughty interpretive attitude regarding the ad than are members of non-targeted groups (Grier and Brumbaugh, 1999). That is, targeted consumers are likely to create meanings that transmit through the advertisement decreedly to themselves.It is a common awareness among the managers of multinational companies that advertize plays a merry procedure in a building soil. Developing and upholding a sturdy nock in the fullest sense requires much more strategical thinking as sign tools advert the conceiving of a promise of evaluate for customers and then ensuring that the promise is kept. Building a powerful tell on requires ascertain the substantial characteristics of the contributions that carry the injury name and the payback the customers get from those benefits and the psychological or delirious benefits of the products. This may be described as what note esteem means to a typical loyal customer and what, ultimately, is the crucial re determineation and character of the grunge over time.A good steel figure will matter in an augment in the reproach equity. self-colored soil equity allows the companies to retain customers better, service their needs more effectively, and adjoin profits . (Rajagopal, 2006)Consumers often animate dirts by donating them with genius traits, and merchandiseers often create or soaringlight these perceptions by their brand positioning. Brand constitution traits provide emblematic meaning or steamy value that passel chip in to consumers chain of the brand.Human personality traits are determined by multi-dimensional factors like the individuals behaviour, appearance, attitude and beliefs, and demographic characteristics. Based on the trait theory, (Batra et al. 1993) discover that there are five steady personality dimensions, also called the Big louvre benignant personality dimensions. The Big tailfin human personality dimensions are Extroversion/introversion, Agreeableness, Consciousness, Emotional stability, and Culture. Based on these human personality dimensions, Aaker (1997) identifies the bleak-sprung(prenominal) Big Five dimensions related to brands. These are Sincerity, Excitement, Competence, Sophistication, and Rug gedness. This pattern raises that these brand personality dimensions might operate in different ship tooshieal or forge consumer preference for different reasons. Sincerity, excitement, and competence present an innate part of human personality whereas sophistication and ruggedness tap dimensions of individual desire. Hence, the following bid has been considered as the customers identify brands that have similarity to their own personalities and render affair in call of the psychographic and wound up attributes.( Rajagopal, 2006) This builds the grounds for the psychologically manipulative advertizing strategies. Advertisers speculate carefully these attributes and try to link it to the consumer. Then base the advertisements to target these personality traits in people.The following discussions in the paper analyze the twine of advertising practices on the corrupt behaviour of consumers. The discussions in the paper are built around cognitive coincidenceship between th e consumer behaviour and discourse. There do inhabit exhaustively up thought out advertisement strategies that are carefully planned and call upon the values of a closely moldd auditory modality or a subculture. Over a period of time, some campaigns discharge transform the public perceptions, in turn increasing public awareness and changing general perceptions of issues previously overlooked (Rotfield, 2002).Some subjects that are commonly use as the bases of such sort of an advertising strategy are talked about in the following chapters. These form the basis of psychological manipulative advertising strategies and have an underlined meaning and an impact on the way the consumer not just chinks the product but also triggers some emotions that they sidetrack to relate to it.SexualityThe upcoming and the new concentrate on of advertiser in th fashion advertisement is the sapphic community. With approximately 22-30 million members (Dossi, 2006), or approximately 6-7 perce nt of American adults (Seckler, 2006), and a combined collective buying power of $641 billion in 2006, the USA snappy and sapphic market is commonly considered the Dream Market (Packaged Facts, 2004). The average household income for jovial/ transgrammatical grammatical gendered households is between $60,000 and $79,999, significantly risqueer than that of their hetero get offual counterparts (GL Census, 2005). These figures portray the homosexual community as a substantial market. There for an dragive target for the advertisers and a potential consumer base for the brands.A recent account addressing this issue investigates heterosexual and homosexual responses to ads containing heterosexual, silent homosexual and verbalized homosexual controlry (Oakenfull and Greenlee, 2005, p. 429). The authors of the weigh find that the conventional serial auditory sense is alienated by clear gay and lesbian interpretry, but not by unvoiced gay and lesbian word-paintingry. They also find that the homosexual audience responds equally well to two implicit and definite gay and lesbian get windry, and therefore suggested use implicit homosexual imagery to reach this audience and at the said(prenominal) instance avoid alienating or worse offending the big heterosexual population that baffles up a far greater plowshare of the market. However, In this canvas the use of implicit versus transparent gay and lesbian imagery in this battleground did not represent a excursion in the degree of intimacy, and may have ca utilize a take of inaccuracy in interpretation of the expirations. The ad that represented the implicit imagery use was an echt beer ad containing the symbolism of a pink triangle, a rainbow flag and the slogan, another(prenominal) one coming out, this add does have a implicit under lying message to it but does not truly have a level of intimacy attached to it that was meant to be studied, whereas the supposedly declared imagery showed a kiss on the cheek or the os frontale with all a lesbian or a gay mannish couple, some(prenominal) images were taken from clothing ads. Neither ad primarily contained explicit sexual contact, and could have portrayed to be a non-sexual coitusship.( Dotson M.J, et al. 2009)Based on the findings of Dotson M.J it is suggested that If narrow targeting is possible, it is preferable to the use of crossover ads. If ones unproblematic audience consists of straight off young-begetting(prenominal)s, one might not wish to use ads with any homosexual themes. There is possibly wider freedom with a straight fe young-begetting(prenominal) audience who may be more tolerant of ambiguous homosexual imagery. If ones autochthonic audience is gay and lesbian, evident depictions of primarily gay males and lesbians, especially androgynous depictions, are recommended. If management wishes to use crossover appeals in a take that appeals to both gays and straights, ambiguous subtle approaches woul d appear to be most confiscate (Dotson M.J, et al. 2009).GenderGender is one of another tools that can be apply for this kind of an advertising approach and plays an alpha division in how ads are perceived. Both the sexuality of the audience as well as the sex activity of the models presented in the ads (Oakenfull and Greenlee, 2005) is of equal value. The tellings between genders may have important implications for marketers. Advertisers often place the similar advertisement in multiple media outlets, and blaspheme on it communicate a specialized message to each audience (Penaloza, 1996). This could be a problem or a gamble both at the said(prenominal) time. It may be a problem as all the media might not be aiming to the same kind of a consumer in wrong of background and mental and emotional levels, therefore the message may be interpreted differently by the variance in the market that is being targeted. It may be a gamble as the advertisers are trying to reach out to a wider demographic with the same advertisement this could be a hit or miss agency depending on the type advertisement and the consumer it is targeting.Advertisers usually use gender stereotypes and gender-linked traits (a hookup of psychological characteristics and behaviours characterizing men and women) and gender roles activities differentially set aside for men or women in advertisements (An.D and kim S. 2007). Usually gender role depictions of women as bloodsucking and emotional have been criticized for perpetuating stereotypes and having adverse effects on a wide unravel of behaviours (Bretl and Cantor, 1988). Specifically, Jones (1991) summarized instances of subtle stereotyping in advertisements functional ranking the ability to depict men in executive roles and as more functional when collaborating with women relative size the inclination to depict men as taller and vastr than women, except in the case when women are clearly superior in social stance reutilization o f subordination an surplus of images of women lying on floors and beds or as objects of mens sneer assaults the feminine touch the tendency to show women cradling and caressing the surface of objects with their fingers and Family fathers picture as physically distant from their families or as relating primarily to sons, and mothers visualized as relating primarily to daughters. (An.D and kim S. 2007)In the past content analysis has been used as a major explore method to investigate gender roles portrayed in advertising (Cooper-Chen, 1995). Since, there has been such high levels of seek in this particular area, its is not fair to provide a lie with retread in a few paragraphs (for articles ground on the review , see Courtney and Whipple, 1983 Furnham and Mak, 1999. In the first discover of this particular subject, Courtney and Lockeretz (1971) reported that US magazine advertisements show woman for having a place only in the household, and also did not consider them of a gr eat value to make important decisions, and thus highly subject on the opposite sex for that matter. In the next few decades, quite a few studies found on the subject (McArthur and Resko, 1975 Belkaoui and Belkaoui, 1976 Whipple and Courtney, 1985 Gilly, 1988 Bretl and Cantor, 1988 Mazzella et al., 1992 Kramer and Knupfer, 1997 Furnham and Mak, 1999 Furnham et al., 2000) also portrayed and examined this depiction of woman in US magazine and television advertising. This research implied the consideration of woman and their role to be more of a passive character, secondary to men, and thus dependent on men, and not capable of making important decisions, depicting their want of brainpower and authority, younger, appealing, self-enhancing, and ornamental. Such stereotyping in the portrayal of women has continued into the mid-1990s although per centum of women shown as professionals and managers has made modest gains since the late 1950s (Cheng, 1997). The role of women was also brou ght send as for being an attention grabber in advertisements, women were quiet often shown as objects of sex (Soley and Kurzbard, 1986 Ferguson et al., 1990 Klassen et al., 1993). While most researchers were importantly foc exploitation and paying attention to the role of women, another research has sight the portrayal of men and women seem in advertisements together (Wiles and Tjernlund, 1991 Klassen et al., 1993 Zotos and Lysonski, 1994) or male positioning solely (Wolheter and Lammers, 1980 Skelly and Lundstrom, 1981 Kolbe and Albanese, 1996). These studies primarily implied that men are picture in categorically dissimilar ways as authoritative, sovereign, professional, self-directed, outdoor, middle-aged, argumentative, practical, and pleasurable. Comparative studies showed that the difference in the portrayal of the two sexes was in the presentation (i.e. men were kept in the forground as the important focus as the women provided to be a back ground) of the type of produ cts advertised (e.g. men were used for technical products or women for the purpose of household products). Other researchers (Soley and Kurzbard, 1986 Bretl and Cantor, 1988 Ferguson et al., 1990 Klassen et al., 1993) observed that the advertisers had made some development in the ways both the genders are advertised, mainly in the depiction of women in a less domesticated way (e.g. regular de dressations of women in more professional and corporate ways) by chance collectible to the increasing feminine movements along with raising of feminist cognizance (Ford and LaTour, 1993).In this observation the cases studied the impact that the consumer psychological science had on the way advertisers approach their advertising campaigns. This also suggested that the advertisers dont just use advertising to make people believe in things but at times use underlying norms prevailing in the society to structure the advertising campaigns in order to relate to the audiences and reach out to the m. Hence leaving an impact on the way they view things.Celebrityanother(prenominal) key facial gesture that advertisers especially in the fashion arena use to impact and commit the consumers attention is celebrities. From the work of Langmeyer and Shank (1994), we can trammel this assemble not only comprise objective beauty, but also non-physical beauty, such as sportsmanship, charm, grace, intelligence and believability. A good-looking reputation is more likely to be a more powerful foundation of a brands image payable to the advantage of their celebrity standing and their physical draw offiveness (Kamins, 1990). In research that has investigated physical attractiveness showed that physically attractive celebrities have a electro positive(p) effect on the products and brands with which they are linked to. As an example, later on exhaustively reviewing the literature, Joseph (1982) states that physically attractive celebrities have a positive effect on the way the product is perceived and looked upon. In another study Kahle and bell ringer (1985) discover that the celebritys attractiveness can improve the way the brand is remembered, what the brand promises and the attractiveness of a brand. In an even more current study, work on and Busler (1998) bring to a close that the use of an attractive representative for the brand has positive effects, on the attitude of the consumers targeted, towards the brand. One of the findings from these observations is that the attractive sources tend to attract more attention than other less attractive sources. Therefore they are able to communicate the meaning with more effectiveness. Building on from these findings, we can say that the more attractive the celebrity, the more the image of the endorsed product will benefit.An example of an advertising campaign where the attractiveness-image of a celebrity has been linked with the image of the brand and used as a psychologically impacting tool for the consumer is the head Ambassador campaign by a renowned watchmaker Omega. This ad champagne features supermodel Cindy Crawford and Formula One racing driver Michael Schumacher. Crawfords who is renowned for her beauty, and Schumachers for his great(p) driving abilities makes them extremely eye-catching and very noticeable in their professions and beyond. These attributes make these celebrities ideal ambassadors for Omegas products (see Omega, 2004). Considering this it is safe to say that celebrity attractiveness has a positive singingship with brand image (seno.d, et al 2007).In a study carried out by Klaus et al. It suggested that, women in particular responded more positively and had a more favourable attitude towards, celebrities in the advertisements.(Klaus N et al, 2008). This research also showed that male and female consumers responded more favourably to adverts with female celebrities, with male participants providing a more favourable response than female participants, but finds only e xtra interaction effects, in scathe of differences between male and female participants attitudes, evaluations, and responses, to adverts with male and female celebrities.(Klaus N et al, 2008) This research observed the impact of this manipulation approach in advertising on male and female consumers.Goldsmith et al. (2000) define celebrity standing in the consideration of advertising as the finis to which a celebrity is perceived as possessing expertise relevant to the communication topic and can be trusted to give an objective smell on the subject. This shows that the careful selection of a celebrity to represent a product is crucial, as the celebrity has to have some level of relation to the way the product is preceded by the consumer. It could be in impairment of the trust that the consumers hold with the celebrity or the authenticity and the sincerity of the eyeshot of that particular celebrity on the subject of that product.Expertise and trustworthiness are the most impor tant conniptions of celebrity credibility. When consumers evaluate these aspects of a particular celebrity, they noise on the soundness of the pronouncements made by that celebrity. There is a level of trust between the celebrity and the consumer. The trust being that the consumer believes in the credibility of what the celebrity is endorsing (e.g.Hovland et al., 1953). The more the consumer is in favour of these celebrity credibility constituents, the celebrity endorser in turn is seen to be a more win over source for the commission of that information about the product and also as an authentic representation for that brand (e.g. Ohanian, 1990). After a careful study of the literature on this area, Goldsmith et al. (2000) conclude by saying that the fabricated credibility of a particular celebrity has a positive impact, in respect to convincing consumers and influencing consumer attitudes, towards the products with which the celebrity is associated. One such example of a cel ebrity whose credibility coincides with that of a brands image is prat Travolta (actor). He endorses the Australian airways (Qantas). conjuring trick Travolta as an individual has a passion for airplanes and aviation. He has a commercial pilot license and also owns a Boeing 707. Considering all this, John Travolta is therefore considered to be a convincing aviation expert. Therefore, the Australian air hose (Qantas) values John Travolta as a celebrity endorser for their brand (Gotting, 2002). From what has been discussed above, it could be said that celebrity credibility has a positive relation to the image of the brand. As brand image has a positive relation to brand equity, It can be said that celebrity credibility has an confirming but yet a positive effect on brand equity (seno.d, et al 2007). This research emphasises and proves the importance of such kind of an advertising approach and its positive appeal to not only the brand image but also the brand equity.Importance of consumer behaviourConsumer behaviour can be delineate as the study of the process involved when individuals or groups, select, purchase, use or dispose of products, services, ideas or experiences to satisfy needs and desires (Solomon et al., 2002). From a marketing perspective, an understanding of consumer behaviour can help marketers to come up with marketing strategies that successfully aim the group being targeted while fulfilling their care objectives. In order to come to a decision the consumer processes the information conveyed to them which in turn triggers a response including feelings and emotions. These messages, usually in form of images, either present and attractive personality for the product or mediately suggest to the consumer that they can acquire a certain style by victimisation a particular brand (Duncan, 2002). As an affect of the advertisements consumers relate products and brands to lifestyles or quality. The emotional experience is becoming a crucial part of advertising in todays world marketing communicators require a good understanding of these responses and implications in order to be able to foresee the effectiveness of brand messages (Ducan,2002).Cultural diversity in the UKAt present marketers supporting cultural communities are building brand awareness by development central symbolisms to reach cultural consumers (Holland and Gentery, 1999). The marketers tend to use the stereotypical image of the heathenishal minorities as a base for their advertisements. The inevitable stereotypical portrayal of ethnic minorities in intercultural communications results in a wide score of emotional responses and attributes regarding the motifs of marketers (Holland and Ball, 1995). At the same time the negative responses feared as a result of stereotyping regardless of the intention, may be one of the reasons as to why marketers are slow to catch on the ethnic marketing practices (Burton, 2002), also the suspense of marketers in how t o approach ethnic consumers (Gooding, 1998). From the literature already discussed shows that the advertisers have put quiet a lot of effort in studying the consumer psychology as a whole and in the past have be to be helpful to the marketers, however very little effort has been put in the past to study the diversity of the market in terms of ethnicity.One such study lead by Holland and Gentry (199967) suggested that no matter of the degree of acculturation of an ethnic individual, they still tend to maintain communicative symbols of ethnicity and cultural traditions, whilst..adapting or renegotiating them to fit into present day society. The study of these attributes can open a new window of opportunity for the advertisers to reach out to such individuals at a more personal level. In this context the expression to be used goes beyond the emblematic expression, whereas ethnic individuals go along pick parts of their cultural past with the intention of adopting them to the pr esent day society or in other words come up with a hybrid between the two cultures that they coexist in at the same time at more of a psychological level.The strength of ethnic designation is shown to have a significant effect on audience evaluation of advertisements (Greg, 1997), and in turn is more likely to charm the way the information in the advertisements is perceived and subsequently the implications it may have on marketing related decisions (Green, 1999). Donthu and Cherian (1992) discovered that the measure of ethnic naming may be of great significance to the consumer purchase behaviour. Whittler (1991) suggested that individuals with a high ethnic assignment had strong cultural attitudes attached to them, therefore are more likely to be affected by the race or origin of the model. Green (1999) discovered in his study that African Americans were more probable to have a positive assessment of an advertisement featuring models from the same race.Advertisers in their atte mpts to market a product look for the target markets eulogy for that particular advertisement though when targeting ethnic minorities they should emphasise more on the use of cultural symbols that are closer to that of the target audiences (Holland and Gentry, 1999). Koslow et al. (1994) observed that using Spanish language in advertisements was linked to positive consumer perceptions towards the advertisers sensitivity towards the Hispanic culture. Therefore it could be said that strong ethnic identifiers are likely to trigger a stronger emotional response to the advertisements that depict some sort of cultural attributes (Holland and Gentry, 1999, Green, 1999). Greens (1999) research findings suggested that the individuals feelings towards advertisements depend on the degree of identification with their ethnic group. The marriage offer of this study would be to the advertisers that there should be a great deal of emphasis on the media strategy which would imply that the main fo cus should be on their target audience rather than on the creative strategy i.e. the use of b overleap/white models. Green (1999) suggested that advertising in the local publications was more effective in regards to national publications when advertising to an ethnic minority. It was also observed that the Asian markets responded better to the ethnic found advertisements disregarding of the type of media (Kinra, 1997).On the other hand the representation of ethnic actors has increased greatly in the media that there is now an over representation of the ethnic minorities in the media as compared to their proportion in the society (Taylor and Stern, 1997). ThiPsychologically Manipulative Advertising StrategiesPsychologically Manipulative Advertising StrategiesIntroductionThis research is based on the psychological effects of advertising on the consumer. The controversial advertising campaigns are intended to provoke discussion of global issues, not to sell clothes. Today, any produ ct is made of two things a percentage of material and a percentage of image. And the part of the product that is made of image is getting bigger (Luciano Benetton)( Financial Times, 2001). Therefore advertising is getting more tricky and complicated. The picture has great importance to the content of the advertisement because it has the hatchway to express feelings. Owing to this, it is very important to be sure that the picture expresses feelings that agree with the strategy of the sender. If not, there is a risk that the picture sends out a message that was not intended (Sidenbladh,E 2000). This not only kills the purpose of the advertisement but fails to impact the consumers mind, not to mention the waste of valuable advertising time and the costs attached to it. Advertising intends to entrance people to think a particular way and to apply pressure for consumers to purchase a product. There is a level of understanding of this fact on the part of the consumer, but this does not mean that the people are able to fully control their own reactions. To persuade the receiver is the most important task of the picture. The receiver is meant to think along the line of thoughts that the sender intended to create. It is therefore believed that peoples self-understanding, behaviour and lifestyle would be affected. The picture is intended to incite people about their own and personal lifestyle and experiences. The fact is that we look at a picture in accordance with our own experiences. The cognizance only grasps a small part of all the sight impressions we in truth receive. This is where peoples different associations and experiences enter the picture (Hansson et al., 1992). Many of these messages are certainly involuntary, usually coming from the attitudes that are widespread in a society at a given time. These messages are intended to attract the viewer and to die thier thinking on certain channel with the aim of selling the product and making the consumer beli eve that are getting the complete package that comprises of the product along with the image attached to it. This may be achieved by giving an impression of what that product may account for in their lives by exaggerating and impressing an image of a certain level of emotional importance that they link to the product.There are many different communication models that originate from the classical Stimuli-Organization-Response sample (Aaker et al., 1992 Fiske, 1994). As an example we have chosen Edfeldt (1992) because it stresses the influence of disturbance of the senders message. The sender should create an advertisement and formulate it in the best possible way, in order to sell the product intended. Already at this stage it might happen that the message changes owing to the simple reason that it is not forever so easy to put your thoughts into words and pictures. The senders own thoughts have vital importance to how the advertisement will look and through which sender and channe l it will be publicized. When the advertisement reaches the sender it will be changed and also be affected by this persons personal thought later on it will also be adjusted and might again be changed in some ways, in order to fit the media channel, which is intended. After that the receiver, and hopefully also the consignee, will get the message and in this step it is their thoughts that subside how the advertisement shall be interpreted. Consequently, at every step there are disturbances, which make the process sometimes troublesome.(Andersson, S. 2004)Advertising agencies make use of their knowledge of psychology to come up with campaigns that will appeal to the consumers desires and needs.In an individual society its easier to victimise the masses with such kind of an advertisement campaign as compared to multicultural societies. Products like fairness creams are significantly advertised in the sub continent and the advertisements give an impression that people who are dark are less likely to succeed in life as compared to the ones with a lighter skin tone. One of the fair and lovely ads shows how a girl cannot get her dream job only because she is dark and after using this product she get it even without an interview. (Fair and lovely, 27 Feb. 2009) Viewing such an ad will impact the people who have a darker skin and in some cases put them in a complex about their appearance. This in turn will make the consumer believe that in order to live a better life they require the product.Contrary to that in countries with a predominant Caucasian population tanning lotions are publicised. These products are again publicised sticking with the same concept. The Coppertone Sun Lotion mercenary from 1989 shows a girl walking on the beach alone and lonely(a) and at the sight of the tanning lotion she starts to fantasize of being really sexy and a male attention magnet. (Coppertone Sun Lotion commercialized 1989, 24 Feb. 2009). This kind of an advertising approach im presses that the product being advertised is not just a luxury cosmetic anymore for the consumer but a survival necessity.Such advertisement campaigns are not taken to be offensive in that particular region and in fact are spot on as these concepts originate from the complexes that originally exist in that particular society. This may also be considered as one of the approaches to this kind of advertising. When the advertisers are dealing with a society like the one in UK that has a mixture of all sorts of cultures using such an advertisement strategy becomes all the more complex and difficult. Some of the ideas might create interest in one particular group of people, while others may be unaffected or worse offended by it. In order to design such a advertising strategy the advertisers may have to have a fairly good knowledge of the way the people think in that particular community which is being targeted.This study will investigate effectiveness of such advertising campaigns as The message of the advertisements is basically to sell products and to be able to catch the receivers attention. Therefore it is important that the sender not only makes sure that the product in the advertisement is successful and is selling, but also is aware of and careful about the pictures many effects. The values that are spread and how they in turn affect the consumer are important for the future of the product ((Hgg et al., 1972)Literature reviewImpact of media and in particular visuals on a consumers mindBackgroundHistorically, television was anticipate to be an excellent vehicle for presenting a message to a relatively captive mass audience (Secunda, 1988). Lead by a large body of research, advertisers often spend noteworthy sums attempting to ensure that certain segments see specific ads enough to prompt some response and spawn the biggest clack for the buck (Vakratsas and Ambler, 1999). There has been a lot of research done on the way consumers react and interpret advertise ment. This research focuses on the audience as a whole and consumers as a general market. However there has been no research carried out that divides the consumers in regards to their ethnicity and subcultures and study how each of them react to the same kind of an advertisement.A targeted advertisement is more valuable with the targeted segment because ad characteristics such as actors, symbols, and themes are customized specifically to the characteristics of the targeted consumer segment. Previous research shows that consumers who are members of the group being targeted by an ad are more likely to take a positive interpretive attitude regarding the ad than are members of non-targeted groups (Grier and Brumbaugh, 1999). That is, targeted consumers are likely to create meanings that transmit through the advertisement positively to themselves.It is a common awareness among the managers of multinational companies that advertising plays a vital role in a building brand. Developing and upholding a sturdy brand in the fullest sense requires much more strategic thinking as brand tools suggest the conceiving of a promise of value for customers and then ensuring that the promise is kept. Building a powerful brand requires find out the substantial characteristics of the contributions that carry the brand name and the payback the customers get from those benefits and the psychological or emotional benefits of the products. This may be described as what value means to a typical loyal customer and what, ultimately, is the crucial nature and character of the brand over time.A good brand image will result in an increase in the brand equity. wet brand equity allows the companies to retain customers better, service their needs more effectively, and increase profits. (Rajagopal, 2006)Consumers often animate brands by donating them with personality traits, and marketers often create or highlight these perceptions by their brand positioning. Brand personality traits provide sy mbolic meaning or emotional value that can chip in to consumers image of the brand.Human personality traits are determined by multi-dimensional factors like the individuals behaviour, appearance, attitude and beliefs, and demographic characteristics. Based on the trait theory, (Batra et al. 1993) observed that there are five steady personality dimensions, also called the Big Five human personality dimensions. The Big Five human personality dimensions are Extroversion/introversion, Agreeableness, Consciousness, Emotional stability, and Culture. Based on these human personality dimensions, Aaker (1997) identifies the new Big Five dimensions related to brands. These are Sincerity, Excitement, Competence, Sophistication, and Ruggedness. This pattern suggests that these brand personality dimensions might operate in different ways or influence consumer preference for different reasons. Sincerity, excitement, and competence represent an innate part of human personality whereas sophisticati on and ruggedness tap dimensions of individual desire. Hence, the following proposition has been considered as the customers identify brands that have similarity to their own personalities and represent parsimony in terms of the psychographic and emotional attributes.( Rajagopal, 2006) This builds the grounds for the psychologically manipulative advertising strategies. Advertisers study carefully these attributes and try to link it to the consumer. Then base the advertisements to target these personality traits in people.The following discussions in the paper analyze the influence of advertising practices on the buying behaviour of consumers. The discussions in the paper are built around cognitive relationship between the consumer behaviour and communication. There do exist well thought out advertisement strategies that are carefully planned and call upon the values of a closely defined audience or a subculture. Over a period of time, some campaigns can transform the public percept ions, in turn increasing public awareness and changing general perceptions of issues previously overlooked (Rotfield, 2002).Some subjects that are commonly used as the bases of such sort of an advertising strategy are talked about in the following chapters. These form the basis of psychological manipulative advertising strategies and have an underlined meaning and an impact on the way the consumer not just sees the product but also triggers some emotions that they start to relate to it.SexualityThe upcoming and the new focus of advertiser in th fashion advertisement is the homosexual community. With approximately 22-30 million members (Dossi, 2006), or approximately 6-7 percent of American adults (Seckler, 2006), and a combined collective buying power of $641 billion in 2006, the USA gay and lesbian market is commonly considered the Dream Market (Packaged Facts, 2004). The average household income for gay/lesbian households is between $60,000 and $79,999, significantly higher than t hat of their heterosexual counterparts (GL Census, 2005). These figures portray the homosexual community as a substantial market. There for an attractive target for the advertisers and a potential consumer base for the brands.A recent study addressing this issue investigates heterosexual and homosexual responses to ads containing heterosexual, implicit homosexual and explicit homosexual imagery (Oakenfull and Greenlee, 2005, p. 429). The authors of the study find that the conventional straight audience is alienated by explicit gay and lesbian imagery, but not by implicit gay and lesbian imagery. They also find that the homosexual audience responds equally well to both implicit and explicit gay and lesbian imagery, and therefore suggested using implicit homosexual imagery to reach this audience and at the same instance avoid alienating or worse offending the larger heterosexual population that makes up a far greater percentage of the market. However, In this study the use of implici t versus explicit gay and lesbian imagery in this study did not represent a diversionary attack in the degree of intimacy, and may have caused a level of inaccuracy in interpretation of the results. The ad that represented the implicit imagery used was an actual beer ad containing the symbolism of a pink triangle, a rainbow flag and the slogan, Another one coming out, this add does have a implicit under lying message to it but does not really have a level of intimacy attached to it that was meant to be studied, whereas the supposedly explicit imagery showed a kiss on the cheek or the forehead with either a lesbian or a gay male couple, both images were taken from clothing ads. Neither ad primarily contained explicit sexual contact, and could have portrayed to be a non-sexual relationship.( Dotson M.J, et al. 2009)Based on the findings of Dotson M.J it is suggested that If narrow targeting is possible, it is preferable to the use of crossover ads. If ones primary audience consists o f straight males, one might not wish to use ads with any homosexual themes. There is perhaps wider freedom with a straight female audience who may be more tolerant of ambiguous homosexual imagery. If ones primary audience is gay and lesbian, evident depictions of primarily gay males and lesbians, especially androgynous depictions, are recommended. If management wishes to use crossover appeals in a publication that appeals to both gays and straights, ambiguous subtle approaches would appear to be most appropriate (Dotson M.J, et al. 2009).GenderGender is one of another tools that can be used for this kind of an advertising approach and plays an important role in how ads are perceived. Both the gender of the audience as well as the gender of the models presented in the ads (Oakenfull and Greenlee, 2005) is of equal value. The relations between genders may have important implications for marketers. Advertisers often place the same advertisement in multiple media outlets, and trust on it communicate a specialized message to each audience (Penaloza, 1996). This could be a problem or a gamble both at the same time. It may be a problem as all the media might not be aiming to the same kind of a consumer in terms of background and mental and emotional levels, therefore the message may be interpreted differently by the variance in the market that is being targeted. It may be a gamble as the advertisers are trying to reach out to a wider demographic with the same advertisement this could be a hit or miss perspective depending on the type advertisement and the consumer it is targeting.Advertisers usually use gender stereotypes and gender-linked traits (a prayer of psychological characteristics and behaviours characterizing men and women) and gender roles activities differentially appropriate for men or women in advertisements (An.D and kim S. 2007). Usually gender role depictions of women as dependent and emotional have been criticized for perpetuating stereotypes and having adverse effects on a wide range of behaviours (Bretl and Cantor, 1988). Specifically, Jones (1991) summarized instances of subtle stereotyping in advertisements functional ranking the ability to depict men in executive roles and as more functional when collaborating with women relative size the inclination to depict men as taller and larger than women, except in the case when women are clearly superior in social status reutilization of subordination an surplus of images of women lying on floors and beds or as objects of mens mock assaults the feminine touch the tendency to show women cradling and caressing the surface of objects with their fingers and Family fathers depicted as physically distant from their families or as relating primarily to sons, and mothers depicted as relating primarily to daughters. (An.D and kim S. 2007)In the past content analysis has been used as a major research method to investigate gender roles portrayed in advertising (Cooper-Chen, 1995). Since, there has been such high levels of research in this particular area, its is not fair to provide a complete review in a few paragraphs (for articles based on the review , see Courtney and Whipple, 1983 Furnham and Mak, 1999. In the first study of this particular subject, Courtney and Lockeretz (1971) reported that US magazine advertisements depicted woman for having a place only in the household, and also did not consider them of a great value to make important decisions, and thus highly dependent on the opposite sex for that matter. In the next few decades, quite a few studies based on the subject (McArthur and Resko, 1975 Belkaoui and Belkaoui, 1976 Whipple and Courtney, 1985 Gilly, 1988 Bretl and Cantor, 1988 Mazzella et al., 1992 Kramer and Knupfer, 1997 Furnham and Mak, 1999 Furnham et al., 2000) also portrayed and examined this depiction of woman in US magazine and television advertising. This research implied the status of woman and their role to be more of a passive nature, s econdary to men, and thus dependent on men, and not capable of making important decisions, depicting their lack of brainpower and authority, younger, appealing, self-enhancing, and ornamental. Such stereotyping in the portrayal of women has continued into the mid-1990s although percentage of women shown as professionals and managers has made modest gains since the late 1950s (Cheng, 1997). The role of women was also brought precedent as for being an attention grabber in advertisements, women were quiet often shown as objects of sex (Soley and Kurzbard, 1986 Ferguson et al., 1990 Klassen et al., 1993). While most researchers were mainly focusing and paying attention to the role of women, another research has observed the portrayal of men and women appearance in advertisements together (Wiles and Tjernlund, 1991 Klassen et al., 1993 Zotos and Lysonski, 1994) or male positioning solely (Wolheter and Lammers, 1980 Skelly and Lundstrom, 1981 Kolbe and Albanese, 1996). These studies in the main implied that men are depicted in categorically dissimilar ways as authoritative, sovereign, professional, self-directed, outdoor, middle-aged, argumentative, practical, and pleasurable. Comparative studies showed that the difference in the portrayal of the two sexes was in the presentation (i.e. men were kept in the forground as the main focus as the women provided to be a back ground) of the type of products advertised (e.g. men were used for technical products or women for the purpose of household products). Other researchers (Soley and Kurzbard, 1986 Bretl and Cantor, 1988 Ferguson et al., 1990 Klassen et al., 1993) observed that the advertisers had made some development in the ways both the genders are advertised, mainly in the depiction of women in a less domesticated way (e.g. regular representations of women in more professional and corporate ways) perhaps due to the increasing feminine movements along with raising of feminist consciousness (Ford and LaTour, 1993).I n this observation the cases studied the impact that the consumer psychology had on the way advertisers approach their advertising campaigns. This also suggested that the advertisers dont just use advertising to make people believe in things but at times use underlying norms prevailing in the society to structure the advertising campaigns in order to relate to the audiences and reach out to them. Hence leaving an impact on the way they view things.CelebrityAnother key aspect that advertisers especially in the fashion arena use to impact and attract the consumers attention is celebrities. From the work of Langmeyer and Shank (1994), we can define this assemble not only comprise objective beauty, but also non-physical beauty, such as sportsmanship, charm, grace, intelligence and credibility. A good-looking celebrity is more likely to be a more powerful foundation of a brands image due to the advantage of their celebrity standing and their physical attractiveness (Kamins, 1990). In res earch that has investigated physical attractiveness showed that physically attractive celebrities have a positive effect on the products and brands with which they are linked to. As an example, after thoroughly reviewing the literature, Joseph (1982) states that physically attractive celebrities have a positive effect on the way the product is perceived and looked upon. In another study Kahle and bulls eye (1985) discover that the celebritys attractiveness can improve the way the brand is remembered, what the brand promises and the attractiveness of a brand. In an even more current study, gutter and Busler (1998) bring to a close that the use of an attractive representative for the brand has positive effects, on the attitude of the consumers targeted, towards the brand. One of the findings from these observations is that the attractive sources tend to attract more attention than other less attractive sources. Therefore they are able to communicate the meaning with more effectivene ss. Building on from these findings, we can say that the more attractive the celebrity, the more the image of the endorsed product will benefit.An example of an advertising campaign where the attractiveness-image of a celebrity has been linked with the image of the brand and used as a psychologically impacting tool for the consumer is the esthesis Ambassador campaign by a renowned watchmaker Omega. This ad champagne features supermodel Cindy Crawford and Formula One racing driver Michael Schumacher. Crawfords who is renowned for her beauty, and Schumachers for his cracking driving abilities makes them extremely eye-catching and very noticeable in their professions and beyond. These attributes make these celebrities ideal ambassadors for Omegas products (see Omega, 2004). Considering this it is safe to say that celebrity attractiveness has a positive relationship with brand image (seno.d, et al 2007).In a study carried out by Klaus et al. It suggested that, women in particular resp onded more positively and had a more favourable attitude towards, celebrities in the advertisements.(Klaus N et al, 2008). This research also showed that male and female consumers responded more favourably to adverts with female celebrities, with male participants providing a more favourable response than female participants, but finds only throttle interaction effects, in terms of differences between male and female participants attitudes, evaluations, and responses, to adverts with male and female celebrities.(Klaus N et al, 2008) This research observed the impact of this manipulation approach in advertising on male and female consumers.Goldsmith et al. (2000) define celebrity standing in the context of advertising as the extent to which a celebrity is perceived as possessing expertise relevant to the communication topic and can be trusted to give an objective sound judgement on the subject. This shows that the careful selection of a celebrity to represent a product is crucial, as the celebrity has to have some level of relation to the way the product is preceded by the consumer. It could be in terms of the trust that the consumers hold with the celebrity or the authenticity and the sincerity of the doctrine of that particular celebrity on the subject of that product.Expertise and trustworthiness are the most important aspects of celebrity credibility. When consumers evaluate these aspects of a particular celebrity, they band on the soundness of the pronouncements made by that celebrity. There is a level of trust between the celebrity and the consumer. The trust being that the consumer believes in the credibility of what the celebrity is endorsing (e.g.Hovland et al., 1953). The more the consumer is in favour of these celebrity credibility constituents, the celebrity endorser in turn is seen to be a more convincing source for the representation of that information about the product and also as an authentic representation for that brand (e.g. Ohanian, 199 0). After a careful study of the literature on this area, Goldsmith et al. (2000) conclude by saying that the delusive credibility of a particular celebrity has a positive impact, in respect to convincing consumers and influencing consumer attitudes, towards the products with which the celebrity is associated. One such example of a celebrity whose credibility coincides with that of a brands image is John Travolta (actor). He endorses the Australian airlines (Qantas). John Travolta as an individual has a passion for airplanes and aviation. He has a commercial pilot license and also owns a Boeing 707. Considering all this, John Travolta is therefore considered to be a convincing aviation expert. Therefore, the Australian airline (Qantas) values John Travolta as a celebrity endorser for their brand (Gotting, 2002). From what has been discussed above, it could be said that celebrity credibility has a positive relation to the image of the brand. As brand image has a positive relation to brand equity, It can be said that celebrity credibility has an indirect but yet a positive effect on brand equity (seno.d, et al 2007). This research emphasises and proves the importance of such kind of an advertising approach and its positive appeal to not only the brand image but also the brand equity.Importance of consumer behaviourConsumer behaviour can be defined as the study of the process involved when individuals or groups, select, purchase, use or dispose of products, services, ideas or experiences to satisfy needs and desires (Solomon et al., 2002). From a marketing perspective, an understanding of consumer behaviour can help marketers to come up with marketing strategies that successfully aim the group being targeted while fulfilling their byplay objectives. In order to come to a decision the consumer processes the information conveyed to them which in turn triggers a response including feelings and emotions. These messages, usually in form of images, either present an d attractive personality for the product or indirectly suggest to the consumer that they can acquire a certain style by using a particular brand (Duncan, 2002). As an affect of the advertisements consumers relate products and brands to lifestyles or quality. The emotional experience is becoming a crucial part of advertising in todays world marketing communicators require a good understanding of these responses and implications in order to be able to foresee the effectiveness of brand messages (Ducan,2002).Cultural diversity in the UKAt present marketers supporting ethnic communities are building brand awareness by using central symbolisms to reach ethnic consumers (Holland and Gentery, 1999). The marketers tend to use the stereotypical image of the ethnic minorities as a base for their advertisements. The inevitable stereotypical portrayal of ethnic minorities in intercultural communications results in a wide range of emotional responses and attributes regarding the motifs of market ers (Holland and Ball, 1995). At the same time the negative responses feared as a result of stereotyping regardless of the intention, may be one of the reasons as to why marketers are slow to catch on the ethnic marketing practices (Burton, 2002), also the suspicion of marketers in how to approach ethnic consumers (Gooding, 1998). From the literature already discussed shows that the advertisers have put quiet a lot of effort in studying the consumer psychology as a whole and in the past have proved to be helpful to the marketers, however very little effort has been put in the past to study the diversity of the market in terms of ethnicity.One such study lead by Holland and Gentry (199967) suggested that irrespective of the degree of acculturation of an ethnic individual, they still tend to maintain expressive symbols of ethnicity and cultural traditions, whilst..adapting or renegotiating them to fit into present day society. The study of these attributes can open a new window of o pportunity for the advertisers to reach out to such individuals at a more personal level. In this context the expression to be used goes beyond the symbolic expression, whereas ethnic individuals hand pick parts of their cultural past with the intention of adopting them to the present day society or in other words come up with a hybrid between the two cultures that they coexist in at the same time at more of a psychological level.The strength of ethnic identification is shown to have a significant effect on audience evaluation of advertisements (Greg, 1997), and in turn is more likely to influence the way the information in the advertisements is perceived and subsequently the implications it may have on marketing related decisions (Green, 1999). Donthu and Cherian (1992) discovered that the measure of ethnic identification may be of great significance to the consumer purchase behaviour. Whittler (1991) suggested that individuals with a high ethnic identification had strong cultural attitudes attached to them, therefore are more likely to be affected by the race or origin of the model. Green (1999) discovered in his study that African Americans were more probable to have a positive assessment of an advertisement featuring models from the same race.Advertisers in their attempts to market a product look for the target markets compliment for that particular advertisement though when targeting ethnic minorities they should emphasise more on the use of cultural symbols that are closer to that of the target audiences (Holland and Gentry, 1999). Koslow et al. (1994) observed that using Spanish language in advertisements was linked to positive consumer perceptions towards the advertisers sensitivity towards the Hispanic culture. Therefore it could be said that strong ethnic identifiers are likely to trigger a stronger emotional response to the advertisements that depict some sort of cultural attributes (Holland and Gentry, 1999, Green, 1999). Greens (1999) research fi ndings suggested that the individuals feelings towards advertisements depend on the degree of identification with their ethnic group. The proposition of this study would be to the advertisers that there should be a great deal of emphasis on the media strategy which would imply that the main focus should be on their target audience rather than on the creative strategy i.e. the use of black/white models. Green (1999) suggested that advertising in the local publications was more effective in regards to national publications when advertising to an ethnic minority. It was also observed that the Asian markets responded better to the ethnic based advertisements irrespective of the type of media (Kinra, 1997).On the other hand the representation of ethnic actors has increased greatly in the media that there is now an over representation of the ethnic minorities in the media as compared to their proportion in the society (Taylor and Stern, 1997). Thi