Friday 12 October 2018

Day 26: Guest speaker: Marketing & Culture

Guest speakers from a local university.

What is marketing?  Meeting the needs & wants of consumers
Process: Marketing mix.  Product.  Price.  Place.  Promotion.

Marketing is responding to wants what we think people need.  Role of psychology in determining what someone wants.
Culture: the sum total of learned beliefs, values, and customs that direct the behaviour of a society's members.  Includes: language, knowledge, laws (ex. difference in guns laws between Canada & USA), religions, food customs (differs in each country), artifacts, music, art, technology, work patterns (# of work days/hours), products.

Marketing influences Culture; Culture informs Marketing.

4P's designed to attract a target market.
Culture is a collection of beliefs, values, attitudes that results in customs, norms, rules.

Opportunity for you to make a difference in marketing.  Doing it well.  Addressing social justice topics along the way, instead of perpetuating stereotypes.
A look at where has marketing gone wrong.

What are traits of culture?

  • Culture has an ingrained influence on our behaviour
  • Culture offers order, direction, and guidance to people
  • Culture is dynamic
  • Culture is learned
  • Culture is SHARED
How is media created and shared: Family, School, Place of Worship, Media.

Under/Over representation problems in media: Gender, ethnicity & race, social class, age, weight, disability.
Look at things with a critical eye: do things need to depicted this way?  Is this hurtful/harmful?  Who benefits?

Under/over representation problems in marketing: advertising, product design, packaging design, commercials, movies & casting of actors, images, spokespeople, sports & team mascots, and more...

Gender in advertising:  How are young boys depicted?  Young girls?  Little boy is dressed scholarly.  Girl is the social butterfly.  How does this impact stereotypical norms?  Create a level playing field down the road?  
Ex. Walmart halloween costumes.  Why are skeleton costumes in the boys section?  Why is this a gendered item?  What do you find in the girls section - all princess outfits.

Gender in advertising.  Who is the ad's intended audience?  What is the sub-text of the ad?  How is masculinity defined?
Inspiring the Future.  View this website for how to make systemic change.  CLICK to view

Cindy Gallop (a leader in marketing advertisement).  "Women challenge the status quo because we are never IT."  "Don't be afraid to want to be VISIBLE."  "There's a huge amount of MONEY to be be made by taking WOMEN seriously."

Ethnicity/Race in Advertising:  How is ethnicity used to perpetuate a stereotype?  Ex. the "Frito Bandito" commercial.  How does this perpetuate stereotypes.  This was from the 1970's.  CLICK to watch

If we are always representing groups of people in certain negative ways then stereotypes will continue.    Ex. one brown corn pop is depicted as the janitor.
Hollywood (gate keepers of culture).  Underrepresentation of people of colour in speaking roles.  Ex. E.T. Mrs. Doubtfire.  JAWS.

Cultural appropriation.  Looking at team mascots (ex. Redskins, Indians).

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