The UK Government Campaign to Affect Buyer Behavior in Smokers - Case Study Example

How and why the campaign by the government of the United Kingdom to affect buyer behavior in smokers has not been successful. By Insert Name Subject, Semester Institution Instructor Date Introduction Essentially, marketers want to establish the responses of customers’ to each and every marketing stimulus. Usually the buyer’s decision to buy is based on the four P’s of marketing i.e. price, products, people and price. Many advertisements can be done about the various products, but finally, at the buying centre, the buyer himself or herself makes the buying decision. The decision to buy is not only affected by such things as marketing strategies only but also by the anti-consumption campaigns. Such campaigns are usually carried out by the government in a bid to promote social welfare and for other reasons both express and implicit. The government may make use of various techniques in its effort to discourage the consumption of some particular commodities. The most common methods used by the government are: imposing higher taxes on some goods such as cigarettes and alcoholic drinks, making it obligatory for the processing companies to warn their potential and existing clients on the potential dangers associated with the consumption of their product (Cant et al, 2007). This essay focuses on why and how the UK government has made efforts to control the buyer behavior of smokers and the reasons for the failure of such efforts. The failure of the UK government campaign in affecting buyer behavior of smokers According to Jagdish N. Sheth, a guru in marketing and buyer behavior, the government is perhaps the biggest external influence on the purchasing behavior of the buyer. The factors affecting the buyer’s tendency to buy are categorized into three. The first category is the internal factors; the second is the external forces and finally the marketing factor. The internal forces include: habit, attitude, knowledge, personality and lifestyle. The habits of the buyer may lead to addiction. The goods consumed as a result of habit are referred to as habitual goods. Such commodities are addictive and their consumption is an integral part of the buyers’ lifestyle (Trehan, 2007). Such goods are usually associated with inelastic demand. This implies that a change in the price of the product results in a less proportionate change in demand for the products. Such goods include cigarette and beer. The third category is factors related to advertising. The UK government in a bid to promote social welfare has lain down and implemented campaigns aimed at stopping or reducing the consumption of cigarettes. The government appointed a committee to look into the effects of cigarette on the health of an individual. The findings of the committee that was appointed in the year 2002 came out with a list of the findings on the same. It however recommended that the government comes up with strategies of discouraging the purchasing and consumption of cigarettes. On this recommendation, the government appointed another committee to look into the ways and techniques of discouraging the consumption of cigarettes. The committee came up with suggestions which were not any different to what other governments practice everywhere across the globe. The proposals of the committee were the same methods that the government had used for over three decades and key among the strategies was the commonly used tool: Taxes. The imposition of higher taxes on the goods that the government deems not fit for consumption due to their effects on the health of the consumer and their negative impacts on the environment has not been successful for the simple reason that, habitual products have inelastic demand. A big change in price results in an insignificant change in price. A study in the UK indicated that a 10% increase in the price of cigarette, resulted in a 1.5% change in the demand for the same. The failure behind the imposition of higher taxes on cigarettes can be attributed to the reason that such goods are not subject to the law of diminishing marginal utility. The law is basically about the decrease in utility with the consumption of an extra unit of a commodity. Under normal circumstances, the more a consumer consumes of the same product, the lower the utility they reap. As such each extra unit comes with lesser utility. On the contrary, for cigarette, each extra stick seems to come with higher utility and hence the addiction (Cant et al, 2007). Seemingly, the government on the UK could not rely on the taxes tool. The government came up with campaigns discouraging the consumption of cigarette. The campaigns have not been successful either. There are many reasons behind the failure of the campaigns. One of the reasons why the campaign against the consumption of cigarette has not been successful is the power of advertising. Advertising, also known as product promotion has a great influence on the decisions made by buyers. Advertisement has been termed as the mirror of the society (Trehan, 2007). The designers of the adverts make them in such a way that they reflect what the society is like. According to Philip Kottler, the advertisements also reflect what and where the society wants to be or desires to look like. An advert that makes a product seem like the determinant of an individual’s social identity will greatly impact on the consumers’ decision to buy. In the 1990s adverts were done on various cigarettes. The adverts from the 90s were rather the most controversial in the history of advertising. Landmark advertisements were done on the Marlboro cigarette. The adverts featured men from such professions as soldiers, seamen and cowboys. The advertisements were aimed at making the consumer of the cigarette feel manlier. As such the consumers had the mentality that indeed the consumption of Marlboro made them belong to a stronger and more powerful social class. These advertisements caused a significant rise in the sales of Marlboro between the mid and late 1990s. The power of such adverts has made the government’s efforts to affect the behavior of buyers fail (Smith, & Taylor, 2007. Another reason behind the failure of government efforts in affecting buyer behavior of smokers is the habitual nature of cigarettes. Cigarettes are most common habit forming commodities in the market. The tobacco in the product is addictive and once a user has become addicted, the chances of them quitting are very minimal even in the midst of the most spirited of campaigns. Therefore, the best the campaigns by the UK government can achieve is to discourage potential smokers from taking up the habit. The efforts are not likely to affect the buying behavior of those already addicted to the habit of smoking. Psychologists have identified peer group influence as a key influence on the habit of smoking. This factor has also been identified as one of the chief hindrances to the success of government efforts to affect the buying behavior of smokers. The campaigns and the peer group influence have been described as two equal forces acting in opposite direction. These forces leave the consumer in a dilemma. In such a situation however, chances are, the potential or actual smoker will continue with the habit because the peer pressure and influence comes with some degree of personal touch (Smith, & Taylor, 2007). This is so because peer group influence is associated with friends, Peers and family. The campaigns by the government of the United Kingdom would have been a bit more successful if they were well planned and more detailed. The failure of the campaigns can be associated with poor planning and the fact that they do not contain enough detail. They are usually general and in most cases do not explain why they discourage smoking. They do not point out the exact impacts of cigarette on the health of the consumers. As such, the consumers do not take the anti-smoking campaigns into much consideration. Proper planning and understanding of the target group is very essential to the success of the government campaigns against smoking. Failure of the anti-smoking campaign by the government of the United Kingdom can also be linked to the fact that the messages in embodied in the campaigns are poorly constructed and put forward. Psychologists have argued that it takes proper and timely planning to get a message understood and implemented by the one to whom it is being conveyed (Doole & Lowe, 2008). Messages that sound as stern warnings can be counter-productive. According to gurus in psychology and effective communication, the most effective way to deliver a message that is bound to work is through well planned and organized guidance and counseling sessions. The fact that the government of the United Kingdom has not tried the idea of counseling on the smokers is a gap in the process of affecting the consumer behavior of smokers. Guidance and counseling is arguably the most effective and efficient way of getting to change the internal perceptions of an individual. The reflective nature of counseling sessions cannot be compared to the harshness in the stern warnings like smoking kills! The counseling sessions makes the smokers change their views on smoking and as such they may think about changing the smoking habit (Smith & Zook, 2011). Chances of success of the campaign aimed at affecting the buyer behavior of smokers are put on the balance by the fact that the messages of the campaign are usually conveyed through print media such as news papers, government journals and weekly magazines. The effectiveness of a printed or rather a written message is not one hundred percent guaranteed because among the targeted recipients, are illiterate people who may not be in a position to get the message. The campaign to affect the buying behavior of smokers has not been successful owing to the dynamics of a group. In a group, the decision to buy takes various phases. Within the group, before a person makes a buying decision he or she must have taken keen interest in the thought of the initiator. The initiator is the person who suggests a product such as cigarette. This is the origin of the idea to purchase. After the initiator, comes the influencer who plays the role of influencing the individual’s decision to buy the suggested product. Then there is the buyer who is the final consumer of the product (Smith & Zook, 2011). Looking at these group dynamics, chances of finding a party that is ready, willing and able influence negatively is not easy. The efforts of the government are not taken into consideration when making a buying decision. The government is a silent campaigner in the sense that the energies invested in discouraging smoking cannot possibly be compared to the efforts and resources invested in advertising the cigarette (Doole & Lowe, 2008). There is an overwhelming imbalance between the two sets of effort and it is rather apparent that the consumers will go for the more spirited effort. The influence of the company’s effort to trigger desire to buy overshadows and renders irrelevant the government’s anti-smoking campaigns. Conclusion In conclusion, the major causes for the failure of efforts by the government of the United Kingdom to affect the buying behavior of smokers, has not been a success because of various factors. Key among these factors is such issues as the power of advertising, the habitual nature of cigarettes, peer group dynamics, poor planning of the anti-smoking campaigns and the imbalance between product promotion and public awareness. For the government of the United Kingdom to succeed in its efforts to affect the purchasing decisions or consumer behavior of its citizens, it has to complement the campaigns with such regulatory measures as price control, banning of public smoking and severe penalties for non-compliance. Many governments across the world have failed in influencing the purchasing decisions of smokers because the price-demand relationship of cigarettes is inelastic (Trehan, 2007). References Cant et al, 2007.Marketing Management (5th Edition).Juta &Co. Cape Town Doole, I. & Lowe, R.2008.International Marketing Strategy:Analysis, Development and Implementation(5th Edition)Cengage Learning.London Smith, P.R & Taylor, J.2007.Marketing Communications: An Intergrated Approach (4th Edition).Kogan Page Limited. London Smith, P.R & Zook.Ze .2011.Marketing Communications:Intergrating Offline And Online With Social Media(5th Edition) Kogan Page Limited. London Trehan, M.2007. .Advertising and Sales Management. V.K, India Enterprises. New Delhi Read More