Marketing Seminar: Week 4-Discussion Question-Responses

Business Finance

Discussion Answers Responses:

Please note in this assignment, your task is to post one response for each of the three answers from three different individuals. You need to refer to your answer and the files you read in the last assignment: “Marketing Seminar: Week 4-Discussion Question-“Consumer consumption and materialism: Blame it all on marketing!”” and try to respond to each of the three answers I paste blow.

#1: Answer from Angela Jones

I both agree and disagree with this complaint. I feel that the proliferation of marketing and advertising has made us much more aware of the things we could have, and in turn, has increased the number of items that we purchase. But I don’t think it is the marketing that is making us so materialistic, I think it is society. These days, so many people are worried about “keeping up with the Joneses”, so they spend more and save less. But I don’t think this is a new feeling, but instead is magnified by the ability for everyone to see everyone else all the time on television, in magazines, and through social media. So now we have more people to keep up with, more people to try to impress, so we buy more stuff to do this. Marketing just shows us all the stuff we can have.

Even without marketing, a baby knows that it wants to play with a fun toy that makes noise, or a teenager knows they want to fit in and will dress a certain way to do that. In both these cases, the consumer wants something, they may just not know what actual product will fill that need. This is where marketing comes in. A marketer’s main purpose is to sell a product. No matter what the product a company produces, they need to make a profit which means advertising. But advertising does not make us into people we are not. If someone is not interested in driving a $100,000 car, whether for the superior drive/ride of the vehicle or for the particular image it provides the driver, no amount of advertising will make someone purchase a car for this amount of money. Each person makes their own choices about who they are and who they want to be, or who their “ideal self” is and they use the products that marketers show us to become that person. But marketers do not determine for us what is the most important in our lives – we do.

#2: Answer from Jennifer Ward

I agree that we have become too materialistic as a society but I do not blame this on marketing.In the past people would save their money in order to purchase nice things that they would like to have such as name brand jeans, a great purse, expensive shoes, etc.Now people don’t wait and save up for their purchases.If they want something they go get it.If the money isn’t available at the time of purchase they just swipe a credit card.I blame this on technology because right now we can get any piece of information we need in a second.With smart phones and high speed internet we no longer have to wait or do extensive research to find what we are looking for, we just Google it!I feel like this has trickled over into materialistic purchases.When we want something, we want it now.The new generations don’t want to have to wait or work for it.It’s easily accessible and easy to use a credit card if you are all out of cash.Just like information is right at our fingertips, so are fabulous purses, great shoes, and designer sunglasses.This is my take on it!

#3: Answer from Barbara Morris

There’s no doubt that society, in general, has become too materialistic, but I don’t agree to blame the marketing for it. Yes, marketing is heavily exposing us to many different products and services, but it is not changing our personality traits. As Foxall believes, “marketing is not the highly powerful medium, as it is believed. It doesn’t contain such power to change individuals’ manners, and actions and certainly cannot influence personality traits as the three components of materialism are”. (1990) In fact, materialism three personality traits are Possessiveness, nongenerosity, and envy (Belk). Customers with these traits will be the most influenced by marketing, but only because they already have this tendency to materialism in their personality.

Thank you!