Family 20-02-09

What is family?
In the 1960s families were the individuals that you lived with and were closest to. Nowadays the idea of family has moved to not only those blood related but those extremely close friends. I find this easy to relate to as one of my closest friends is seen as my sister and my family see her as another daughter and sister.

Nuclear Family – father, mother and children who live together in the same house. Typically in the UK there are 2 adults and 2 children, where as in china it is 2 adults and 1 child.
Extended Family – nuclear family plus other relatives such as grandparents, aunts etc. in the 21st century these relative can live all around the globe.
Family of Orientation – the family you are born into.
Family of Procreation – the family founded through marriage.

Family structure has changed over the past decade with an increasing number of birth outside marriage, increase in divorce rate, increase in step families and increasing number of widowed living alone. All of these linking into one another and the way in which the birth rate used to and how it changes. There are increasing widowed women as men have a shorter life expencency and these are the over 50s. There are a large population of them making them a large group for marketers to aim for.

Nowadays in Britain there are two breadwinners within the household,1/4 of married women work at lease 30 hours, causing Britain to have the highest women employment rate in Europe. This then leads to their children becoming latch key (have their own key to house) allowing them to do what they want when they get in from school. This also allows marketers to target women as they have more disposable income to spend.
This advert uses the problems in society to market towards couple who are staying together but may have problems using these products as a way of keeping the couple together.

In the 1960s the model of the family life cycle (FLC) was put together, each individual regardless of age goes through each of these stages. Sometimes they can go through them more than once.

Stage Title Characteristics

1 Bachelor Young, Single, Not living at home
2 Newly married Young, No Children
3 Full nest I Youngest child under 6
4 Full nest II Youngest child 6 or over
5 Full nest III Older married with dependent children
6 Empty nest I Older married, no children living at home
7 Empty nest II Older married, Retired, No children living at home
8 Solitary survivor I In labour force
9 Solitary survivor II Retired

Nowadays this model is being questioned due to the divorce rate and those who do not get married or have children. This is the new version of the FLC showing different stages that have become increasingly popular in the 21st Century.

Within the family different individuals play different roles. Field (1969) identified three dimensions who each influence a decision.
Discernment – know about the product
Price – who pays
Satisfaction – who uses
In the 60s the father would be the one who worked and brought home the money. The man earns and the woman spends. In the 21st century the women also brings home money so when deciding on certain products an individual can be one or all of Fields dimensions.

Family Buying Organisation

When buying a product individually consumers go through the buyer decision process, when a family wants to buy something each person have a different piece of input to make an influence on the final outcome. This table shows the different roles when planning a family holiday.
Role What they do? Who?
Gatekeeper Has information Mother, Father, Children
User Who will be going Mother, Father, Children
Influencer Ideas of where to go Anyone
Buyer Who will pay Mother, Father
Decider Makes final choice Mother, Father (this can change depending on the family)

Below, this diagram shows the different husband and wife influences when buying a product.

The fridge is slightly towards the wife as she will want it to match with the rest of the appliances in the kitchen. The husbands clothing is towards the wife more than hers is towards him as she will buy him cloths as stereotypically men are less fussy about pants and socks than women are about their cloths. This diagram was created in 1974 when there was typically the traditional family of Father goes to work, mother does everything else and there are two children. Children having no influence on what is bought. A more recent study shows that children have larger influence on techniqueial products than the mother.

It is seen that the children know more about technology than the mother so would have a bigger influence. This shows how the development has changed from just the parents to the whole family.

This advert shows the different aspects of family life from growing up to playing in the adventure parks. This advert relates to anyone as pizza hut aims at a large audience – this adverts aims at family and somewhere they can go together.

Generational Marketing 13-02-09

Looking at age, rather than generation, does not enable the marketer to see what they have been through and the way they will react to particular products. Generation enables marketers to see where they have come from and when they grew up.

World War II 75/85 Year olds 1930s
MODS and Rockers 60/70 Year olds 1940s
Hippies Rebellion against state 1950s
Punks Rebellion against government 1960s
New Romantics Anti-punk – Feminine/Well off 1970s
Millennials good with technology Born before 1980s

Tweens
Falling birth rates in 1990s – 2000-2005 Tweens decreased
8-14 (differ between persons)
Kids of baby boomers
Nothing edgy and sarcastic – silly and stupid
Email is most likely to be used

Teens
15-18 – 7.5 million teens
Getting old quicker
Ignore ads
Social networking
9/11, Black president, War

Generation X
46 million worldwide
18-29
Practical
Edge
Friend rather than family
Independent
Latch key – Own key and do everything for themselves
Subcultures – yuppies

Young baby Boomers


Over 50s
Environment, ethical, travel
21 million 1/3 population
Saga M&S Debenhams
Sinatra

This video shows the way in which communities in the USA are getting all different generations to interact with each other. This enables the over 50s to see and hear about what the teens and younger are doing. The community centre holds another part of the influences that would persuade a young buyer as they may have learnt different thing from this older generation.


This week I found the Zafira and Mariva adverts from Vauxhall as I found that this appealed to young children as there are two young boys in it, it is humorous for the male audience and females would think that they boys are sweet with there deep voices.

Groups 30-01-09

Consumers belong to groups and these groups influence what they do, wear and act. During the beginning of the millennium, Burberry was the associated brand with Chavs. This was not the publicity that the real Burberry brand wanted as ‘fakes’ began to appear and the Burberry check was put on everything. The real Burberry would place the checked pattern on the inside of the clothing trying to disassociate themselves with the Chavs. The day the former soap star Daniella Westbrook and her daughter stepped out in head to toe in Burberry checked the company had to change and change fast (L.Jones, June 2008).
Groups can consist of 2 or more individuals who:
Have the same values
Have a role within the group, leader, follower etc.
Experience interdependent behaviours – they are dependant on the way other in the group act.
Groups can influence other groups and individuals in the way they act. Using the Burberry example individuals either wanted to be associated with the Chav image or not causing a decrease the in real Burberry’s merchandise. Group influences can be seen on the street, were a group of young teenagers will be crowded other passers by, may cross the road or go a different way to avoid them.

Below shows the different group types that we have influences from and those who we don’t want to be associated with. Individuals pasts shows these different group types making each individuals unique, therefore making it harder for the marketer to target anyone particular group.
Maslow looked at the way in which individuals need. His hierarchy of need showed the 5 different needs that the social animal, Man, needs.

Marketers and advertisers use ‘belonging’ as a pivotal message in ad campaigns. They know that the individuals wants to belong to a group so by using belonging it enables them to interact and comply with the audiences needs.

The need to belong comes from the social comparison theory that each individual sets their selves. Social comparison theory describes the way we look to the behaviour of others to provide a guide and to reassure our self evaluation. Consumers are selective about who they use as bench marks but will usually be a close peer or a person of equivalent standing. The main influence of groups is the acceptance of certain expectations of behaviour e.g. rules, norms. An individual can react to this pressure by compliance, internalisation, identification or counter conformity. This video shows the way in which group influences have on an individual, but there are always those who don’t follow the crowd.




During this week I found an advert which made me laugh as I am always being laughed at for my blonde moments so at least there is one person out there worse than me!!

Involvement, Values, Attitudes 23-01-09

The level of involvement which is used when buying a product varies dependant on what the product is. The more interested the consumer is in the product the more involved they will be. Laurent & Kapferer (1985) argue that there are four different components regarding the amount of involvement used.
1 – Importance and Risk
This looks at six different aspects that the consumer wants the product to undertake. Finance, Time, Performance, Ego, Physical and Social. An example of this would be a kettle, Finance – Is it worth the money, Time – how long will it last, Performance – does it work, Ego – is it branded, Physical – will it burn me and Social – does it look attractive/match.
2 – Probability of making a bad purchase
3 – Pleasure value of the product category
4 – Sign value of product category (Symbolism)

Our values differ from each individual, but individuals do not always act according to their values. these values come form past experiences and individuals backgrounds.

Key events happen all over the world, developing peoples value system. This timeline shows events that happened in my life and those that happened around the world. Some have affected me more than others as they are a lot clearer in my mind. September 11th and my brother being born are extremely clear, knowing exactly what happened and describe every detail.

By looking at the Harvard tests (WEB) different ways to see how different individuals react around people who they see as different and they relate to them. I chose to do the mental illness to see how it would say I reacted and what I think about them. I had to answer a few questions and then quickly put words in or out of a group named at the top of the screen. I found this very difficult as I was trying to go fast rather than concentrating. These were my results.

This research has many different questionnaires including association with men and work rather than women and racism. These tests show individuals fit into specific categories because of their past experiences. Personal events develop on individuals way of thinking, developing to their personality.

VALS2 (Values,Attitudes,Lifestyle Survey) categorises individuals into groups depending on answer given. Below is the first few questions of the questionnaire.

This psychographic research combines detailed demographic data with AIO statements,(Attitudes, Interests and Opinions) which VALS completes by choosing mostly agree, slightly agree, mostly disagree, slightly disagree. Once I had taken the questionnaire, my results showed achievers and experiences. I found that they did describe me well as my past experiences have contributed to this.

This video shows how attitudes can change due to experiences. Lee Evans explains how children will try and see what they can and cannot get away with.

This week I found an Advert for Jeep which used the idea of animals well, giving the car character.

This character enables the viewer to begin a relationship with the car, like when you see a puppy for the first time there is as an automatic bond. Many people would have seen animals react like this after getting dirty or wet so it is a familiar idea. This idea of juxtaposition enables a humour contrast with the car and animal.

Gift Giving 19-12-08

Involvement when buying friends and relatives presents can change depending on the relationship and whether they are easy or hard to buy for. During the Christmas period presents are exchanged allowing marketers to dress their products in a new way to make consumer buy because it’s Christmas!! Toblerone chocolate change their packaging as the Christmas season arrives.

This is to persuade individuals to buy it, but why do they buy the product? By understanding the involvement needed to buy chocolate for someone else will give this understanding.

Different products have high or low involvement when purchasing them. Kotler’s decision process, shows how quickly the brain will buy some products but will take longer on others.
This table shows the involvement with some products. A low involvement purchase would be one that could be routine on the shopping list, milk, bread, no thought actually goes into what is being purchased. A high involvement purchase would be a house or car, this would take a lot of time to think about the purchase as other brands would be involved leading to undertaking the decision process slowly. Thinking about the product, feeling/using the product and buying the product happen in different orders depending on the level on involvement. Here shows the order individuals undertake these stages depending on the level of involvement.
High Involvement think-feel-do – cars, technology.
Low Involvement think-do-feel – beans, bread
Experiential/impulse feel-do-think – chocolates, crisps
Behavioural influence do-think-feel – clothes

Laurent & Kapferer (1985) argued that the involvement in which the consumer undertakes is affected by four components.
Importance & risk (Finance, Time, Performance, Ego, Physical, Social): These six attributes, collectively, build up how the consumer will by the product and problem that may come with it.
Probability of making a bad purchase: if the product does not work or problems occur with it, making it not a worthless buy.
Pleasure value of product category: The enjoyment from the product or buying the product for someone (seeing how happy it makes them)
Sign value of product category: what others will think about the product and does it stand for anything.

When gift giving it is about the emotionally connecting the giver and the recipient. This emotional shopping aims at the goal of finding something special for that individual, with the gift communicating a message. Problems arise with gift giving when the giver’s and recipient’s value drivers differ (Danziger,2004).

When shopping takes place it’s the experience that matters to the buyer, this is why shops will decorate and products will slightly change their packaging. Shops know that this experience is important wanting the buyer to enjoy themselves and remember the experience. La Senza put scented beads into their bags allowing the consumer to be able to remember them when they arrive home, maximising pleasure. In this clip of Love Actually, over exaggeration is used to humour the way shops try to maximise pleasure using different plants, beads and ribbons. (Sorry about the bad picture!)



As it’s Christmas I found four Christmas commercials which clearly integrate Christmas with their advertisement. These are enjoyable as they use the colours associated with Christmas and snow, something everyone wishes for. Coke is a famous Christmas advert as they changed Father Christmas from green to red, many millennial babies will easily relate to it as this is when they know it is Christmas.

Heusitics, Memory & Nostalgia - 12-12-08

Heuristics

Fast and frugal heuristics – making quick decisions when there is a lot of choice (Williams 2001).
The process can happen in a few seconds cutting out sections of Kotler’s Buyer Decision Process.
Search for information – can be cut down into criteria like cost,
Stop searching (heuristic rule)
Make a decision (heuristic rule)

When selecting the product, fast and frugal heuristics will choose the product due to four things.
Recognition – Branding – More like to buy a product known rather than a new one.
Minimalist – Advertising – used in conjunction to recognition once recognised plus one random criteria e.g. recognition plus nice label.
Take the last – Habit – way chosen last time used again.
Take the best – Branding/USP – assesses the options but still only uses one criteria.

By adding and adapting heuristics to products, they enable consumers to think what they want to look like to others, e.g. birds eye chicken or Tescos own chicken.
- Pricing – lowest/best deal – Tesco Value
- Promotion – free gift/offer – Tea bags
- Novelty – newest item – fashion clothing
- Variety – break the mould/something new – cereals
- Herd – most popular – Nike
These heuristics enable consumers to buy products to their own personal need, financially would look for promotions and pricing.

Learning

‘Every time an advisement or commercial appears, the objective is to have the reader or viewer learns something … and remember what he learned.’ (Britt 1955)

Learning theory looks at two sections about the brain. When the brain is in gear the individual undertakes Cognitive Learning where they have to complete complex problems. When the brain is not in gear, it undertakes Behaviourist Approach where the stimulus response to the connections.

Memory

‘Learning is the acquisition of knowledge and memoir is the storage of internal representations of that knowledge.’(Blackmore 1988)

This diagram shows the memory process, from the initial input to storage in the brain.

Small pieces of information are stored in our brain, this information is placed in nodes linked to a knowledge structure. Links are formed across structures and can be lead triggering, this is what marketers use to remind consumer of a brand or event. This diagram shows the relationships that occur in the memory process.

Nostalgia

‘Nostalgia has been described as a bitter-sweet emotion, where the past is viewed with both sadness and longing.’ (Soloman,2000)

Advertisers use nostalgic themes so that consumers can link the happiness/good feelings that they felt to the product. The 5 senses enable this to work well, especially when more than one is used.
Sound – Music – ‘Never had a dream come true’ reminds me of my Grandad.
Sight – Images –Iconic fashions
Smell – Smells – perfumes, ice cream
Touch – Feel – silk
Taste – cider
The Christmas Marks and Spencer adverts enabled the older generations to connect with the films being re-mastered and the actors within them. The font of the writing also makes the audience think about old films and the credits on them.

The advert I choose for this week was Heineken, this advert shows of the male humour and them trying to look clever. It works well as both the man and the dark haired lady thinks they have one over the other person.

Gender reactions to charity ads & Direct mail - 28-11-08

Different genders respond to different parts of adverts because of the way each brain works. In research, a group of people were brought into a room and later asked to name various items in the room. The men remembered the big picture of an office, like chair, placing of desk. Where as the women remembered more intimate details vase of flowers, photo of children on desk. This shows that when advertising to each sex understanding what the main things they will notice and remember is vital.

Schiebe and Condry (1984) examined advertisements according to product type and found major gender differences in the values promoted in advertisements. Advertisements aimed at women look at stressed beauty and youth where as with men these adverts look at ambition and physical strength.

Advertisers have huge problems when advertising for men and women having to have complete different adverts for them both to notice it. For women adverts will be:
More detailed
Finely distinctions – women appreciate the different types of each individual.
The adverts for men will be:
Less complicated
Easy to see some sort of free-bee
Shown the whole picture
These simple differences show the way in which men remember adverts and women remember.

When advertising for charities they will normal aim at women as they are stereotypically more sensitive than men. When looking at a group of adverts, conclusions were gathered that women will look at them in more detailed e.g. the way the child looks and says something making the viewer think how lucky they are. Where as the men will just look at it at face value.

Male and females have different responds to direct mail. Females will respond to an emotional style and charities used this in their fund-raising mail-shots. Males respond to a factual style of direct mail. Females like conversational language where as men would prefer chatty language and factual statements. Women prefer strong colours where as men prefer neutral colours. So when advertising it is best to choose what gender you are target rather than trying to aim at both.

Young boys and girls have different advertising needs as when advertising for a boy, they are normally fast paced with action where as girls adverts are more feminine. This can be reflected on the way in which the adverts are portrayed as adults.

This week I found an advert which shows the way men and women can miscommunicated. McDonalds, to me, is a children’s place to eat but this advert aims at the teenage/young adult generation.