The Morality of Advertisments

TITLE PAGE ISSUES OF MORALITY IN ADVERTISMENTS This report is basically about the issues of morality in advertisements; more specifically in sales and marketing. It states the effects advertising executes on its potential customers and also how it affects the businesses that are advertising. NIGEL. PAITO Business year 1 – Accounting & Computing Mrs. JUDY ELISHA HE 116. 1 Academic English Thursday 4th April 2013 Assessment Two – Report Writing Tutorial Group: School of Business CONTENTSTitle Page†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦.. [1] Contents†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦. [2] Introduction†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â ‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦ [3] Literature Review†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦ [4] Body†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦. 5] 5. 1. Methodology†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦. [5] 5. 1. 1 Survey Method†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦. [5] 5. 1. 2 Data Collection†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦. [5] 5. 1. 3 Participants†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚ ¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦. [5] 5. 1. 4 Secondary Sources†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦. [6] 5. 2 Data Analysis†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦. 6] 5. 2. 1 Part A: Demographic Information†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦.. [6] 5. 2. 2 Part B: Survey Questions†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦.. [7] 5. 2. 2 Part B: Survey Questions: Question 9†¦ [8] Conclusion†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦ [8] 8. 1. Recommendations†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦. [8] References†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦. 9] INTRODUCTION The reason for undertaking and writing this report on the morality of advertisement is to illustrate a survey which was carried out on what 20 random students thought about advertisements; its structures, types of advertisement to be advertised, etc†¦ The assumptions made in the study were; that the twenty students would give advantages or disadvantages of advertisements and how it made watching television, reading newspapers or hearing the radio enjoyable, entertaining or irritating for them.Relevant terms used in the report include: (A) Advertising; the paid, impersonal, one-way marketing of persuasive information from an identified sponsor disseminated through channels of mass communication to promote the adoption of goods, services or ideas (Curtis, 2011). (B) Sales; the act of selling a product or service in return for money or other compensati on. Sales involves most or many of the following activities; including cultivating prospective buyers (or leads) in a market segment; conveying the features, advantages and benefits of a product or service to the lead; and losing the sale (or coming to agreement on pricing and services). A sales plan for one product might be very different than that for another product (Barnes, 1993). And (C) Marketing; the systematic planning, implementation and control of a mix of business activities intended to bring together buyers and sellers for the mutually advantageous exchange or transfer of products (Pride, Hughes & Kapoor, 1999). Of all the major perspectives by which people construct the world, advertising is at once among the most influential and the least examined.Hence this report is basically going to cover the morality of advertising in sales and marketing but apart form that any other sub-topics outside this two main branches as stated above will not be directly included in this re port but I might state a bit of supporting information from the outside in-line with the two above. Information was gathered by way of interviews with the selected students; firstly a survey was carried out to investigate the perception about advertisements and then the results were stated in this report. LITERATURE REVIEW The purpose of advertising is to encourage people to buy something† (Garofalo, 1998). In any successful business, advertising play an essential and important role. Though advertising does not mean selling of products and services but it helps in increasing your sales. This statement advocates that advertising is used as a tool; through suggestion and pointing out the benefits by polishing the â€Å"apple†. Advertising can be used to produce product awareness in general public and to make business more popular within the circle of potential buyers.Advertising, in a straight line, increases profit of the companies by escalating its revenue. The expendit ure made on advertisement can turn as good boost in earnings (Quester, McGuiggan, McCarthy & Perreault 2001). Advertising saturated our social lives. We participate, daily, in deciphering advertising images and messages. Yet because advertisements are so persuasive and our reading of them so routine, we tend to take for granted the social assumptions embedded in advertisements.We do not ordinarily recognise advertising as a sphere of ideology (Gustafson, 2001). In most countries, the government takes legal and active roles in deciding what kinds of advertising are permitted, what is considered fair and what is inappropriate (Quester et al, 2001). While truth in advertisement is a key legal issue, it has moral dimensions as well. â€Å"Critics of U. S advertising has two main complaints – that it is wasteful and the most fundamental issue deception; making false or misleading statement in an advertisement†.Other than that, when producing or advertising a particular prod uct and in the course using absolute superlatives such as â€Å"Number One† or â€Å"Best in the World† when referring to the particular product, it is sometimes called puffery and is considered completely legal (O’Guinn, Allen & Semenik, 2000). Critics also argue that advertising does not provide good product information at all. The basic criticism of advertising here is that it frequently carries little, if any, actual product information. What it does carry is hollow ad-speak.Advertisements are rhetorical; there is no pure â€Å"information†. All information in an advertisement is biased, limited and inherently deceptive (O’Guinn et al, 2000). BODY METHODOLOGY Survey Methods: The survey method used to collect data in this report was through the use of questionnaires. The questionnaire had two sections (A and B): Section A contained the Demographic Information in which students were told to provide their personal information by ticking the approp riate box relevant to them.And section B contained the Level of Agreement, in which they were told to put a tick beside each statement where they strongly disagreed, disagreed, agreed or strongly agreed. Data Collection: There were numerous steps that were followed in order to collect this data. The first step was the construction of the questionnaire, which the lecturer did. Once that was done the questionnaire where then given to SoB representatives on behalf of all the students. The representatives were ell-versed and given directions by the lecture to distribute the questionnaires to the students to be surveyed. There were 20 questionnaires given and upon completion were tabularized and uploaded on PAU intranet. Participants There were 20 participants of this survey, all of whom are students at Pacific Adventist University. Their demographic information is explained in detail below. Secondary Sources There were not any secondary sources that were followed when carrying out the r esearch apart from the use of published advertising books and the internet.Besides that everything came firsthand: Students were informed as to the purpose of the research. This was done through face to face verbally. To uphold privacy, students were instructed not to write down their names, as only their positive and honest responses were required. Besides, the survey questionnaire was short enough for the students to fill out, so that not much of their time was taken up. DATA ANALYSIS Part A: Demographic Information.According to the data collected, a total of 20 students participated in the research: | |Male |Female | |Gender | | | | |14 |6 | | |Single |Married | |Marital Status | | | | |14 |6 | | |Day Indoor | |Residence | | | | |13 |7 | | |1st |2nd |3rd |4th | |Year | | | | | | |4 |4 |6 |6 | | |SOHS |SOT |SOE |SOB |SOAH |SOST | |School | | | | | | | Part B: Survey Questions Section B of the questionnaire contained the actual questions on the morality of advertising. This section contained 8 questions with responses ranging from strongly disagreeing to strongly agreeing. While the 9th question was more of a general attempt to view the students’ perspective of their understanding in regards to advertisements. According to the student’s understanding on the ethics of advertising, when asked: Answers shown in percentages) Question 9 Responses: †¢ Some are persuasive, others are boring †¢ Only healthy products should be advertised †¢ Good to introduce products, for awareness purposes †¢ Advertisements should abide by certain rules and regulations †¢ Influences people to buy †¢ Should promote products and not compete with or criticize other companies †¢ Can be manipulative †¢ Should be moral and ethical †¢ Good for maximising profits †¢ Enable people to cultivate the power of choice CONCLUSION From the resulted stated above, generally it can be concluded that; in any successful business, advertising plays an essential and important role.Advertising makes the general public becomes conscious about products, services and goods under the brands, they persuade people towards these brands and make them buy better brands. APin See all 5 photAAAadvertising has been used to create awareness in the general public and to make businesses more popular within the circle of potential buyers. Advertising, in a straight line, increases profit of the companies by escalating its revenue. The expenditure made on advertisement can turn as good boost in earnings. And that’s where the famous saying comes in; â€Å"You reap what you sow†. RECOMMENDATIONS From these results it has been proven that it advertising really influences people’s choice when it comes to economic decision making and so it has the power of persuasion.Also my research has found out that advertisement cannot be avoided in life therefore advertisement has developed from simple words, pictures and action into this unavoidable pastime but consequently will evolve into a culture in the long run. Therefore I recommend people to be not easily deceived by the persuasive advertisement but rather focus on the informative advertisements because these types of advertising give ethical details on these particular products. And also we should not take for granted the mere social assumptions entrenched in advertisements, but rather see them as a field of ideology and influence. REFERENCES Dr. Curtis, A. (2011). Mass Communication. Pembroke: North Carolina. University of North Carolina. Barnes, S. (1993). Essential Business Studies: The Collins guide to success. Hammersmith: London. Collins