Risks of Advertising Targeted on Kids - Essay Example

?Aisha Al-Busaidi Prof. Grimble Composition 099 12/3 Risks of Advertising Targeted on Kids In the modern age, where advertising has become omnipresent, marketers look out for new ways to instill their brand among all sections of the population. Far from the past decades’ trend of focusing mainly on the adults in advertising; most of the companies in today’s world have started focusing on the kids in a optimal manner. With the increasing media habituation among the kids, the advertising companies are more and more interested in establishing their brand prospects through the persuasion of these pip-squeak customers. Eric Schlosser’s article Kid Kustomers discusses how the children of today are targeted by the advertising companies with attractive ads for their intended materialistic gains. In this essay, I shall discuss briefly the impact of kids-focused advertising among the kids of today. It is obvious that kids-aimed marketing strategies carried out by the advertising companies is causing adverse behaviors among the children, raising concerns in various quarters. Schlosser, in his article, Kid Kustomers introduces the new trend of the advertising firms to target the children for promoting the brands or products or services of their client companies, through enticing and at the same time dubious ads. He briefly describes how this trend came to action, by scrutinizing the working class parents who want to compensate for spending less time with the children by spending more money on them. Actually, the advertising companies are well aware of the children’s mentality and know exactly how to get into their heads, for persuading them to nag their parents to buy the products. This makes the advertising marketers to turn the kids as the ‘surrogate salesmen’ for their businesses utilizing the ‘leverage’, ‘the nudge factor’ or the ‘pester power’ of the kids. By discussing the different marketing strategies and research works handled by the advertising companies, Schlosser shows how these ads have increased the sales of the businesses, by utilizing the children’s innocence. He also mentions a few kids-attracting ads by the cigarette and alcohol companies that have caused negative impacts on the children. For instance, The Joe Camel ad campaign by a cigarette company is one of the well-known examples that created adverse effects on the children’s behavior owing to the advertising. It was studied that one-third of the illegally sold cigarettes were of Camels brand, which proves the power of advertising among the young. Similarly, the way that advertising impacts the children is evident from a survey showing that though kids liked the Pepsi and Nike commercials, they are mostly driven by the ads of Taco Bell and Budweiser for its ad characters like talking Chihuahua and frogs. (Schlosser 223). Thus, advertising has a profound impact on the kids, particularly when they are targeted in an enticing way. However, the effects of these ads on the children are still controversial. Though legal measures were taken a few decades ago to protect and regulate the ads aimed at children, the restrictions and bans were later declared as impractical. In the modern days, TV advertisements are broadcast round-the-clock to target children of all ages, and are far from being banned. The advertising companies’ focus towards the children for their products’ marketing is mainly because of the great deal of ‘pester power’ and ‘leverage’ by the kids to get their parents’ approval. One marketer notes about this kids-aimed advertising as, “It’s not just getting the kids to whine, it’s giving them a specific reason to ask for the product.” (Schlosser 223). However, the intended response goes far from the expected reality, as children nag their parents in unhealthy ways. James U. McNeal analyses this nagging and has categorized it into seven kinds, which are used as the requesting styles and appeals by the children to get their parents’ attention. The marketing strategies of the advertising companies are manifold including surveys on children’s taste, dream research, developing children’s clubs, use of internet and many more. The advertisers tend to learn about the children’s behavior and tastes for applying them in their advertisements and product designs. For instance, the dream research has revealed that children dream often about animals and this has intended the companies to use new techniques for creating animated animal characters to get the obvious appeal among the kids. Similarly, the Character Appeal Quadrant Analysis “technique purports to create imaginary characters who perfectly fit the targeted age group's level of cognitive and neurological development.” (Schlosser 224). The tactics used by these companies like ‘cradle-to-grave’ marketing strategies, focus on creating prospective consumers by inducing the childhood memories. This is the reason for the cigarettes or alcohol companies to use iconic symbols and appealing characters, which the children are sure to recognize years down the road. The exposure of children to alcohol and cigarette advertising on televisions would tend to increase their craving for such products in the future. It probably increases the underage drinking and smoking habits, as the children are prone to create a ‘brand loyalty’ towards the particular product at an early age. Such habits might interfere with the children’s education, behavior and health as well. Similarly, junk food ads like Taco Bell seem to change the child’s food preferences, increasing the consumption of these products. The top food products marketed to the children are fast foods, candies, sugared cereals and drinks, which are sure to result in obesity and other health-related problems. Michael Pertschuk, the head of Federal Trade Commission, stresses that it is essential to shield the children from ads that preys on their immaturity, by exploiting their present-mindedness. (Schlosser 225). However, there are also possibilities for positive impacts to be created with these kids-aimed ads. As McNeal advocates, the traditional marketing approach might nurture positive beliefs among the children, if the company would promote it well. “If a company can ally itself with universal values such as patriotism, national defense, and good health, it is likely to nurture belief in it among children” (Schlosser 224). Though the advertising has a greater impact on the kids, it is still a question of fact whether this impact would bring positive changes to the society in general. Are children still motivated by all of the ads that are promoted? It is certainly a question to ponder as not all the advertisements are reached rightly into the minds of the children. It is noticeable that the attractiveness of the ads matter to the kids and not the products itself. What if marketers take interest in promoting positive attitudes towards their products instead of trying to gain benefit from the pester power of kids.? According to my personal view, the marketer’s exploitation of the media towards children for their advertising of products has been adversely affecting the kids. Marketers seem to utilize the children’s behavior, their fantasies as well as their likes and dislikes to their advantage of creating demand for their products. As the kids are defenseless and more susceptible to the ads, they are easily carried away by the captivating captions, animated characters and jingles. This certainly impacts their lifestyle, creating new behaviors and craving for the products. Another greatest concern in regulating the TV commercials is that children today are not only influenced by the ads about toys and foods but also tends to memorialize, celebrate and also imbibe the adult-focused ads. This is mainly because they are not able to differentiate the products’ purpose but are driven by the appealing characters in the ads. With the children’s brain in the developing stage, they may not able to view the ads in an in-depth manner and also in multiple perspectives particularly regarding the product information, features, etc. Instead, they will just focus on the moving images, and will form a good opinion about the product and will push their parents to make the buying decision in their favor. Thus, it is evident that the companies’ thorough marketers or advertisers have greatly impacted the minds of the children through piquant advertising that drives their attention to the suggested brand. As the kids of today are left to spend much of their time on commercial media, it is necessary to regulate the ads targeted towards them. The tactics and strategies used by the advertising companies are indeed unhealthy for the kids, creating adverse behaviors like persistent nagging, inappropriate habits and indulging in illegal adult practices. However, the increase in technology use will fuel or push the marketing agencies even further, and they could ‘hit’ them with more persuasive ads. It is the responsibility of the parents to comprehend the nature of advertising that targets their children, by creating awareness and providing better insights on the usage of media by their kids. However, the effects of advertisements on kids are not convincing in the present scenario, as it has created unhealthy behaviors, owing to the parents’ increasing difficulty in shielding the kids from the media exposure. Work Cited Schlosser, Eric. "Kid Kustomers." Signs of Life in the USA. Ed. Sonia Maasik and Jack Solomon. Boston: Bedford St. Martin's, 2009. 222-26. Read More