Marketing Communications - Term Paper Example

How Fear Affects Consumer Behavior Patters I. Introduction Marketing communications is contributes much to the satisfaction of customer needs and wants. The way by which a company informs the customer regarding its products and to persuade customers to patronize such products would determine the number of potential clients the company will have in the future. As such, it is essential that we understand the important factors that are involved in the development of marketing strategies that enable companies to communicate better with their consumers (Ketler 2002). It is imperative that we also understand how different factors affect the behaviours of our customers and potential customers in order for us to anticipate their reactions (Perner 2006). Behaviours of consumers vary depending on the stimulus introduced. There are many powerful motivating factors that affect the behaviour patterns of the consuming public and one of these powerful motivators is fear. The appeal to fear is capable of igniting and heightening the public’s sensitivity to threats, which are present and put him/her either in an offensive or defensive mood. Whatever stances the person would take in a given instance of fear, his/her consumption behaviours are generally affected. To better understand how “fear is capable of sensitizing people to threats and of changing their behaviour” let us therefore discuss the different aspects of marketing communications and its effects on the target market. II. Fear Appeals Fear Appeal is a persuasive strategy commonly employed in the promotion of products and campaigns. This strategy works by sending persuasive messages to the target market or audience the terrible consequences that will befall on them if they will not follow what is recommended in the message. This strategy has dual effect. One is to prevent the customer from purchasing or using the product or services and the other is to persuade him/her to patronize such product. To illustrate my point, let us look into a simple a simple candy bar. For children are often scared away from this sweet treat by the threat of having rotten teeth and the prospect of doing to the dentist for a tooth extraction or worst, a root canal procedure. The fear of the impending pain brought about by eating too much candy would make children think twice of eating such sugary food. On the contrary, we can compel people to buy or use a product by fear. For example, the fear of aging often makes people buy cosmetic products, which will delay the aging process. Fear of looking old is so real for most people that they are willing to undergo painful surgeries just to retain their youthful looks. Commercials and promotion materials of most cosmetic products often hype on the customers fear of wrinkles, dry skin, ugly hair and the likes and how their looks could somehow diminish their appeal. Thus, more often than not, the consumers are forced to buy these beauty products. III. Fear Appeal Models There are three major models that evolved along the way with the fear appeal theories (Dillard 1992), (a) the drive models (McGuire1969), (b) the parallel response model (Leventhal, 1971), and (c) the expectancy value theories (Rogers 1985). These models give us different perspectives on fear appeal. The drive models give us a picture fear arousal was needed to elicit a motivational drive state (i.e., create tension), but too much fear would result in maladaptive outcomes (e.g., defensive avoidance.)1 The unpleasant tension brought about by fear would motivate a person to get rid of that fear. This means, whatever may reduce the fear instilled in the subject will either be become acceptable as manifested by behavioural change or non-acceptable as evidenced by the subject denial. The parallel response developed more focus on cognitive processes, as opposed to emotional processes. Protective adaptive behavior stemmed from attempts to control the danger or threat (cognitions), not from attempts to control the fear (emotions) (White 1992). In other words, where people receive a threatening message and come up with strategies to avert such threat or danger they are said to be engaged in danger control processes. By contrast, where people focused on their feelings of fear, and tried to control their fear (e.g., denial), they were experiencing fear control processes (White 1992). The expectancy Value theory on the other hand purports that fear appeals revolve around “three variables namely the perceived utility of the threat, the subjective probability that the threat will occur, given no changes in current behaviors, the subjective probability that the threat will occur if individuals make the recommended changes.”2 IV. Effectiveness of Fear Appeal Studies show that there are different reactions to marketing strategies that appeal on fear. There are those who believe that fear appeals are effective (Beck, 1984), other studies however negate the effectiveness thereof (Goodstadt, Cook, Sheppard, & Chan, 1982), while another group of experts documented mixed results (Hill & Gardner, 1980). If we take a look at all the studies to date, we find so many disappointing inconsistencies where some are even contradictory to each other. Why is this so? What are the factors that affect the effectiveness of fear appeal? There are a number of factors which I can think of that could affect the effectiveness of fear factor. However, for purposes of discussion, let us limit our scope to at least three of these perceived reasons why fear appeal may work or may not work in given situations. First, let us look into the concept of fear and threat. Sometimes in crafting a marketing strategy, we often equate fear with threat. For instance, a toothpaste company in trying to sell their products by showing how consuming a large volume of sugar will cause tooth decay. The company would capitalize on the fear of pain of a decayed tooth and the prospect of going to the dentist for a tooth extraction or a root canal. The fear therefore would motivate the person to brush his/her teeth and would probably head to the recommendations of the toothpaste company. However, we often do not consider that fear and threat don’t necessarily have the same effect on our subject. There are some instances when threat do not necessarily produce fears and nor does it follow that fear would entail the recognition of certain threats (White 1992). To illustrate our point, there are many campaigns against breast implants that use the threat of cancer as a deterrent factor. However, there are still many women who would want to have such implants, ignoring the treat of future bodily harm. This is a classic case where fear does not necessarily follows the threat, and threat does not necessarily instill fear. Second point why Fear appeals sometimes do not work is the fact that we sometimes neglect the processes often associated with message rejection. Not all messages are well accepted by its target audience and trying to capture their attention by instilling fear may not work where the behaviour of the target audience is already closed towards any suggestions. Remember that along the way, people develop some kind of loyalty to certain brands and products. Established loyalties are difficult to shake and individual reactions to fear should always be taken into considerations. The question should be ask as to whether the kind of target audience would be receptive to a fear stimulant. Certain groups of people are more receptive to specific suggestions at a given stage as the fear is seen as real treat. For instance, if the target audience is children, fear appeal may work to prevent them from eating too many sweets, in adolescence, demonstrating the terrifying effects of drugs as “frying your brains” might work and a message of wrinkles and old age would really scare a lot of people who are already beyond the age of 40. On the reverse, threatening children with old age will definitely not work. The treat is neither real nor imminent for them. The third point I want to raise is the varying levels of fear and threat. Let us remember that different strokes work for different folks. The higher the level of threat, the higher the levels of fear it will generate. Note that in a society where the threat of AIDS is no real, the fear of getting sick is also imminent. Thus, anti-AIDS campaigns, which promote the use of condoms, are gaining very good acceptance level. The message these campaigns are that “everyone is susceptible to AIDS.” The line that says “Prevent AIDS. Use condoms” therefore would be very effective way of promoting condoms. They key is sustaining the fear and presenting a solution that will remove the threat that produces the fear. Remember that what we are trying to understand is how to use fear and threat in an effectively manner. By contrast to the AIDS campaign, let us look into the threat of lung cancer for smokers. The threat is that “smoking is dangerous to your health” and fear it will generate is that of lung illness, probably cancer. If your campaign would simply say, “smoking would cause cancer” the message may be rejected as you are simply prohibiting and not removing the fear by presenting an alternative. What does this tell us? The message is clear. Fear appeal can be very effective if you present the fear and give alternatives or solutions to eliminate the fear. V. Conclusion Although there are many factors that contribute to the failure of fear appeal in some areas, it remains to be a potent stimulus that shape consumer behaviours. Fear appeal remains a factor affecting the behaviour of the market. By harnessing fear and turning it into a motivational factor to bring your message across, one is able to command some behavioural changes. Take the for instance the fear of aging. Most cosmetic companies rely on this factor to boost their product sales. By presenting an alternative and a solution to the otherwise scary and depressing situation, products like anti-aging creams, hair care and the like are selling like hot cake. Marketing positioning through advertisements and slogans that hyped on the fear of the target consumers are gaining grounds everywhere. Take the advertisement of L’anza’s anti-aging silk serum for hair for instance, where it claims that your, “Hair feels like silk and glows with youthful radiance. Very effective moisturizing and anti-aging ingredients.”3 This clearly relay the message to men and women who wished to retain their crowning glory’s youthful glow and ally their fear of growing old. In other words, like all other strong emotions, fear has the power to compel the individual to perform something that will address such fear. Bibliography 1. Aiken, K., Swasy, J., Braman, A. (2004) Patient and Physician Attitudes and Behaviors Associated with DTC Promotion of Prescription Drugs – Summary of FDA Survey Research Results online available at http://biotech.law.lsu.edu/cases/FDA/FRfinal111904.pdf#search='how%20fear%20change%20consumer%20behaviors' last accessed April 15, 2006 2. Beck, K.H. (1984). The effects of risk probability, outcome severity, efficacy of protection and access to protection on decision-making: A further test of Protection Motivation Theory. Social Behavior and Personality, 12,121-125. 3. Dillard, J.P. (1992). Rethinking the study of fear appeals. 4. Hill, D., & Gardner, G. (1980). Repression-sensitization and yielding to threatening health communications. Australian Journal of Psychology, 32, 183-193. 5. Kettler H. 2002. Integrated Marketing Communications at Dow Chemical Company online available at http://www.hipermarketing.com/nuevo%204/columnas/efrain/integrated.pdf#search='marketing%20communications%20theory' last accessed April 15, 2006 6. Kohn, P.M., Goodstadt, M.S., Cook, G.M., Sheppard, M., & Chan, G. (1982). Ineffectiveness of threat appeals about drinking and driving. Accident Analysis and Prevention, 14, 457-464. 7. Leventhal, H. (1971). Fear appeals and persuasion: The differentiation of a motivational construct. American Journal of Public Health, 61, 1208-1224 8. Perner, L. (2006) Consumer Behavior and Marketing Strategy available online at http://consumerpsychologist.com/ last accessed April 16, 2006 9. Stainback, & Rogers, R.W. (1983). Identifying effective components of alcohol abuse prevention programs: Effects of fear appeals, message style, and source expertise. International Journal of the Addictions, 18, 399-105. 10. White K. (1992) Putting the Fear Back Into Fear Appeals: The Extended Parallel Process Model. Communication Monographs, Volume 59, 329-349 online available at http://www.msu.edu/~wittek/fearback.htm last accessed April 16, 2006 11. McGuire, W.J. (1969). The nature of attitudes and attitude change. In G. Lindzey & E. Aronson (Eds.), The handbook of social psychology (Vol. 3, pp. 136-314). Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley. 12. Rogers, R.W. (1985). Attitude change and information integration in fear appeals. Psychological Reports, 56, 179-182. Read More