IS TARGETING UNINFORMED CONSUMERS ETHICAL?
Industries scramble to attract new clients. Some businesses may use unethical tactics to attract their attention. Target marketing is one of the strategies. Here, businesses employ marketing and advertising to draw in customers and precisely target those customers in order to sell their products. However, not all sectors employ moral methods to attract customers. This calls into question whether it is moral for companies to target unaware customers.
IS TARGETING UNINFORMED CONSUMERS ETHICAL?
It is regrettable that some companies employ deceitful and misleading tactics to meet their sales targets. More regrettably, the majority of individuals believe that businesses take their interests into account. However, using marketing techniques and focusing on inexperienced customers is not immoral or deceptive. One of the reasons is that the majority of corporations and enterprises conduct customer research and analysis to identify the factors that may incline someone to purchase a product (Graeff 643-667). These include a range of elements, such as customs from other cultures, individual preferences, and regular schedules, among others.
The business expands into new markets by focusing on the uneducated consumer. This serves as both a method of gaining new clients and a platform for education by informing people about the new product (Buehler and Schuett). The business can draw in additional customers as the neighbourhood becomes more informed. Target marketing is also advantageous to a community. Consider offering a new product to the public. This would promote rivalry between the products and the established competitors, resulting in better products and reduced prices. Using targeted marketing, a business is likely to prosper. This is understood because the business has the upper hand in swaying the uneducated group through inquiry, information, and persuasion in addition to advertising (Fishman 23-25).
Essay 2
Any business’s goal is to increase the number of its customers. While some businesses do this through effective marketing strategies, others resort to a variety of dishonest tactics to attract clients. In this context, one of the popular strategies for reaching out to new customers and promoting items that frequently entail unethical practises is target marketing.
IS TARGETING UNINFORMED CONSUMERS ETHICAL?
But when we consider things more broadly, it would be extremely challenging for any business to launch its products to a new market without target marketing. But first, it’s important to distinguish target marketing from other deceptive or manipulative tactics that take advantage of people’s cultural norms and beliefs in order to persuade them to purchase the company’s products. Contrarily, with target marketing, businesses use a variety of strategies and techniques to identify community needs and then address them in their ad campaigns. By doing so, they can successfully enter a new market and inform their clients about new items that can meet their demands in an efficient manner (Buehler & Schuett, 2014).
The entire community benefits from focusing on misinformed consumers. As a result of increased competition among market participants brought on by enterprises introducing their goods into new markets, which will ultimately result in higher product quality and lower prices (Fishman, 1988).
Target marketing, however, can occasionally be seen as unethical as well, particularly when it involves goods that go against people’s cultural and societal norms. Similar to this, if the business sells food items, going after ignorant consumers might result in a number of health issues in the neighbourhood. Because of this, it is difficult to say whether a company’s target marketing strategy is morally right or wrong without first considering its business strategy and main products.
References
B. Buehler, F. Schuett (2014). When some consumers are misinformed, certification and minimum quality criteria are necessary. 70, 493-511 of the European Economic Review. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.euroecorev.2014.06.007
A. Fishman (1988). Dynamics sales in a competitive market discriminate against uninformed customers. 27(1):23–25 in Economics Letters. https://doi.org/10.1016/0165-1765(88)90213-3
Essay 3
Every business strategy must include marketing if it hopes to maintain growth in the 21st century’s fiercely competitive marketplace. As a result, many businesses employ a variety of techniques to successfully market to their clients in various parts of the world based on their regional needs and preferences. On the other hand, certain businesses that are providing unique services or goods focus on their potential consumers’ needs rather than just their preferences. They lack knowledge about these new items and are frequently prone to forming fictitious preferences that are influenced by the marketing materials of the companies, which can ultimately result in a variety of health problems.
Therefore, the question of whether or not it is ethical to target uneducated clients needs to be examined from a much broader perspective, taking into account both the profitability and expansion of the business as well as how this may affect consumers’ consumption and eating habits. From a business’s perspective, focusing on uneducated customers is not only a good way to expose their goods to a new market, but it is also a crucial tactic because it is the only way for businesses to interact with individuals from around the globe (Buehler). Therefore, if the companies’ objectives are good, target marketing becomes ethical in this situation because they can also educate the customers this way (Fishman).
IS TARGETING UNINFORMED CONSUMERS ETHICAL?
This isn’t always the case, though. Some businesses use particularly deceptive marketing techniques, which frequently entail manipulating customers’ psychological responses to create false expectations about the efficacy of their goods. And undoubtedly, this causes a lot of health problems in society. In light of this, target marketing is not only unethical but also should be avoided.
Work Cited
“Certification and minimum quality criteria while some consumers are ignorant,” by Benno Buehler and Florian Schuett. 2014: 493-511 (European Economic Review, Volume 70).
“Dynamics sales discriminate against ignorant consumers in a competitive market,” Arthur Fishman. 27.1 (1988): 23–25 in Economics Letters.
