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Marketing and public opinion · The Galaxy of Marketing

• 0:00
  Let me ask you a tricky question. What is the
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  most lucrative product on the global market?
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  Companies never run out of it, it comes in different
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  varieties, and can be changed to the suit and
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  taste of the boardroom. Sometimes at least. And
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  while your brain turns on its marketing department,
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  I'll introduce myself. Welcome, marketing explorers!
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  I'm Olga K, final year marketing student and
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  responsible podcaster. In today's episode, we
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  will explore how marketing and culture shape
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  each other. It's no easy topic, so information
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  will be based a lot on the work Crystallization
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  of Public Opinion by Edward Bernays, often called
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  the father -founder of propaganda. A small disclaimer.
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  Some examples will include sensitive topics like
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  smoking, feminism, social inequality, and social
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  justice to explain how and why certain marketing
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  mechanisms play a vital role in society. So please,
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  don't take anything personally, and let's keep
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  it a professional discussion. Ready to move on?
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  Answering the question from the beginning of
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  the episode, you, me, basically any other person
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  who makes purchases, all of us are consumers,
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  and consumers are the most lucrative products
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  on any market. And to explain why it happened
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  this way, we'll start with the history of consumerism
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  in less than two minutes. No, it's not a joke,
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  you will be surprised just how simple and quick
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  that is. There are many theories and nuances,
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  but the most common one goes like this. In 16th
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  century, a middle -working class began appearing
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  in England, and they received salaries. Those
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  very salaries allowed them to buy small luxuries.
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  Tables, boats, cushions, some textile and tableware,
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  pretty much some small coffees, to make houses,
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  and sometimes themselves, look better. Gradually,
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  it converted into a very materialistic approach.
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  The more people earned, the more luxurious items
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  they wanted. For some, it was an opportunity
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  to demonstrate wealth. For the others... Pretty
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  much the same thing, but with added desire to
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  imitate high class. But higher classes absolutely
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  did not fancy that idea and they didn't want
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  to part with their sense of exclusiveness. So
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  they created new tendencies and new fashions
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  to keep their sense of being exceptional. The
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  cornerstone came in 1723, when Burnett Mandeville
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  completed his work The Fable of the Bees. It
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  had many ideas, but we will look at the most
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  important one. He claimed that materialism of
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  middle class is a good thing, and not only for
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  the middle class, but for the whole country,
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  because if the country produces lots of things,
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  businesses can grow, businesses can increase
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  wealth, wealth will produce more workplaces,
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  and with more workplaces, there is less poverty
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  and crime. In such conditions, at least he saw
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  that way, people are becoming more generous,
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  better in character, and behave better in the
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  social context. Thus, he came to the conclusion
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  that the government must encourage the production
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  and the consumption of the unnecessary luxuries.
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  Sounds too good to be true, right? Well, yes,
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  because eventually consumerism grew to the extent
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  where we had too many producers, we had to fight
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  for customer at a huge scale, and marketing starts
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  making its way to the top. And the worst thing
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  we are facing now with the depletion of natural
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  resources and ecological issues, along with modern
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  slavery. We'll talk about all of that later,
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  because now we're done with the history lesson.
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  Hope you still have some attention left, because
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  all of that led us to a very smart man who figured
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  out how to do marketing before humanity realized
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  that the marketing was needed. And that man was
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  Edward Bernays. You've probably heard of him
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  before. Well, not because I mentioned him at
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  the very beginning of the episode, but because
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  he was the father -founder of propaganda, public
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  relations, and marketing. A very productive man,
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  I must admit. About a hundred years ago, he published
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  a book called Crystallization of the Public Opinion
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  that I kindly read and transformed into a podcast
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  for you. So, in that book, Bernays is exploring
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  how public and marketing, along with government
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  and any other public institution, form each other.
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  For the context, at the time of Bernays, neither
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  marketing nor PR were considered separated disciplines.
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  So within a book, there is a kind of a mix between
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  PR and marketing specialist that is called public
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  relations consultant. The role of this consultant
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  comes down to changing the public opinion in
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  a way his client wishes. And the strategy he
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  describes is truly impressive. Because he didn't
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  just exploit consumer behavior and impulsive
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  desire, he understood how public forms its beliefs
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  and learned to change them to his needs. And
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  all of that without any AI tools or internet.
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  We should learn from that guy. Now, I would suggest
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  you take some notes before Instagram comes in
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  the way. Step 1. Know how your target audience
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  lives. Basic rule of the marketing that is also
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  the most powerful one because it gives the access
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  to the step 2. Incorporate the message into the
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  daily life. And to do so, PR or marketing person
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  must determine information channels, understand
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  how the information is consumed, adapt it to
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  the format and wait for the reaction. That is
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  very important for any marketing because whenever
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  you're talking the message that is being very
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  direct and quite apparently being an ad, people
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  don't perceive it that well. Let's take an example
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  to make it all make sense. In the book, Bernays
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  says about a Lithuania campaign. Lithuania was
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  gaining independence at the time and needed international
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  support from somebody very powerful, the United
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  States. But the problem was that US citizens
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  had no idea that such a country existed at all.
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  And if the small group of organizers walked down
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  on the streets with banners screaming Save Lithuania,
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  they wouldn't achieve the necessary result. But
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  they did something completely different. They
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  decided to do marketing for everyone, but instead
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  of using one -size -fits -all, they carefully
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  adapted the messaging. Fashion lovers read journals
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  about Lithuanian clothing. Academics read articles
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  about their language and history. Pop culture
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  staged Lithuanian concerts and eventually, with
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  all the interest and love to the culture, public
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  felt a sudden urge to help Lithuania gain independence,
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  because now they cared about the country they
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  recently knew nothing about. Another thing Bernays
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  mastered was giving products a symbolism. It
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  works especially well when it becomes associated
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  with core emotions and beliefs of a target group,
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  like feminism and cigarettes. If we sing logically,
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  the act of smoking has no power or beauty in
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  it whatsoever. Moreover, at his time, smoking
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  for females was so highly stigmatized that a
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  woman could go to jail for smoking in public,
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  not to mention the social judgment. But companies
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  needed new customers, and our mastermind came
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  up with an idea. He knew about the rise of feminism
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  and upcoming suffragist march, so he asked his
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  friends, working in newspapers, to stand at the
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  finish line with cameras. Then he went to suffragettes,
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  gave them cigarettes and asked to light them
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  up at the finish, declaring it was the light
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  of freedom. And now a stigmatized act became
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  a symbol of social protest and belonging to the
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  group. That is how marketing can shape public
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  opinion. But what about the public opinion shaping
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  marketing? Let's first look at how public opinion
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  is shaped in the first place. Mainly, our beliefs
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  are influenced by family, society and personal
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  experience. The narratives we hear from each
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  of these types of groups is shaping us profoundly.
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  Bernays closely looks at a social aspect and
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  calls it a group behavior. Or kind of a herd
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  behavior, but I'm trying to be nice. According
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  to him, we're inclined to follow public opinion
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  because we want to belong to the group. Consequently,
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  we are more perceptive to the information that
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  comes from within our group and oppose the messages
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  that come from the outside. Like if we love the
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  color blue, We think that everybody who loves
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  the color blue says the right information, and
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  everybody who loves color red says something
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  wrong. But it doesn't go as simple as that, because
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  we can belong to many groups. Let's imagine Anne.
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  She can be an entrepreneur, a cosplayer, a member
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  of some business union, a vegetarian, etc, etc.
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  In those conditions, predicting how she will
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  respond to an ad is practically impossible. And
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  that is a huge challenge for companies, especially
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  brands. They're highly motivated to be liked
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  and sought after. And we, as consumers, can exploit
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  that feature to make companies change their behavior.
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  Let me show another example. Unity, a game software
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  provider, once wanted to introduce new fee structure.
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  A giant company with billions in income that
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  is connected to thousands of games. A powerful
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  behemoth to move. Yet the opposition grew strong,
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  and many game developers publicly announced considering
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  competing software providers. Eventually, company
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  rejected the new structure and apologized. Another
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  very scandalous types of examples include failed
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  influencer collaborations. That is where a whole
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  tsunami of criticism and hate tears down brands
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  and people alone. It happens mainly for three
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  reasons. Reason number one. A person makes a
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  mistake, gets cancelled, and brand has to save
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  reputation. Like in case with Kanye West and
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  Adidas. Variant number two. A brand makes a mistake
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  and gets cancelled. like in case with Balenciaga
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  and Kim Kardashian. Number three. Both make mistake
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  with ad messaging. That is the more complicated
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  one. The brightest example was the Pepsi and
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  Kendall Jenner collaboration, because the whole
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  video was a mess. The audience did not necessarily
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  hate Kendall Jenner or Pepsi brand for launching
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  an ad, but they did hate the message, and that
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  hatred to the message deeply influenced the reputation
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  of both of them. Now, when you know all of that,
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  you're perfectly equipped to play around with
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  the marketing strategies and find creative approaches
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  to business promotion. We'll have a separate
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  talk on creativity later on in this season. And
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  for now, I hope the marketing department of your
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  brain did not explode from all of the data you
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  just received. Thank you for listening to this
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  episode. Don't forget to develop your curiosity
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  and see you later in the galaxy of marketing.