Back to Home Page
Simply put advertising is used to sell products. It forms the main revenue source for many media outlets so while it has met with controversy in regards to ethics, ultimately the practice will not be abandoned. In fact with new media technologies the presence of advertising is likely to increase as these technologies give advertisers the ability to reach a global audience and to integrate their promotions across many different mediums.
Since its introduction, advertising to young people has been regarded by many as unethical. This is because youths are seen to be highly impressionable to advertising influence. Furthermore they are at an age where they are forming their identity, attempting to make sense of cultural meanings and wanting to form social groupings. Academics have argued that these social groupings are strongly formed by what the media and advertising portray as the accepted norm. And this is where the problem lies. Advertising often portrays images that are unobtainable and puts value on characteristics, which are undesirable. Critics argue that advertising is responsible for a new breed of youth culture, characterised by materialism, money and the social status they bring. Consequently this places pressure on young people to conform to these ‘portrayed’ but not necessarily realistic norms (Stransburger and Wilson, 2002, pg. 58).
Advertising and Promotion professionals have openly admitted that young people are one of their most lucrative markets (Belch and Belch, 2004 pg 675). As their buying power has increased they have warmed to advertising more so than previous generations. Even as early as 1997 a study of 800 adolescents found that watching considerable amounts of television is directly linked to purchasing products that result in social acceptance (Stransburger and Wilson, 2002, pg. 58).
Research has found that advertising has also contributed to globalisation. Company mergers have seen organisations become transnational and consequently advertising now has an increased capacity to reach a global audience. Corporations such as McDonalds, Coca-Cola and Levi have all developed a global brand. In 1999 McDonalds spent $60-65 million on advertising alone, which was up on the previous year’s spending (Cunningham and Turner, 2002 pg 204-205). This shows just how much funds are put into advertising and the value corporations place on it. Furthermore all of these three companies actively target youth. For this reason many critics are sceptical of globalisation and global marketing.
A general criticism of globalisation is that it creates an oligopoly, which is an economic structure dominated by only a few very powerful and very large corporations (Bucy, 2005 pg 73). The main concern is that this structure limits diversity of content and ideology. This results in a number of implications for youth. Firstly, if the content is not diversified, youths are not getting a balanced media influence which affects the way they construct their identity. Secondly, if youth are exposed to only larger corporations advertising then smaller corporations will struggle to compete and diversity will be lost almost completely. In a sense these large corporations have the ability to construct youth culture to meet monetary and lucrative needs. Youth culture is simply another business transaction to the advertiser (Cunningham and Turner 2002, pg 204). On the other hand it has been argued that advertising is a part of the media age in which we live and should not be blamed for heavy consumerism among youth. Rather youth should be exposed to the medium so they can participate in a society based around commodities.
While convergence and new media technologies has given advertisers the ability to reach a global audience the traditional mass approach of one-to-many is been strayed away from as advertisers find new means to get their message across. Nonetheless this approach still allows a global audience to be reached (Cunningham and Turner 2002, pg 211). Advertisers can now make advertising seem personalised by using new media channels such as email, SMS on mobile phones and interactive advertisements online. Interactivity is becoming a very popular way to capture the audience, particularly youth who have grown up in an age of interactivity and who are no longer as excited about mediums that do not provide it. For youth this means even when accessing information they are going to be plagued with advertising. Their exposure to advertising will increase and products will be easier to purchase with companies providing the option to buy over the phone or online. This contributes to the development of a youth culture dominated by commodity.
It is also important to note that advertising professionals now have greater access to youth through new media technologies. Advertisers can now request personal details online, which can be used for future promotional endeavours. Many young people are quite prepared to give their details over the internet (Stransburger and Wilson, 2002, pg. 65). For advertisers this gives them a huge opportunity to utilise new media technologies and form a database. For example from this they may obtain mobile phone numbers and use it for a SMS campaign. Clearly marketers will continue to find new ways of promoting their products and converging technologies will continue to provide new channels for doing so.
Click here for full reference list
Adele Graves 09:08, 28 Oct 2004 (EST)
