Negative advertising: effects and strategies

¶ … Social Ethics of Negative Advertising: A Series of Examples

Although most marketing professionals and consumers agree that people buy more when they feel better, a great deal of advertising has gone negative. Despite its recent popularity, the continuum of negative and positive advertising is not a new topic. In fact, Weinberger, Romeo, and Piracha's 1991 study of negative product safety news in the automotive industry found that "negative information about products in the marketplace is pervasive," and that "negativity tends to denigrate the object of communication" (pp.1). In 1993, Jain's study of negative advertising found that negative advertisements elicited a counter response in viewers, in addition to being accepted less by viewers than the positive ads. Despite this information, however, negative ads continue to run. Although negative advertisement concerning products is a problem in itself, the consequences of negative advertising are not simply material. In fact, a second type of negative advertising -- negative social advertising -- is having profound ethical and moral effects on the markets it targets. Whether they're considered negative because they tend to offend the target market with shock techniques, are less than tasteful, have an adverse effect on consumer values, or encourage customers to buy products they don't really need, a few examples of these socially negative advertisements prove that these ads have dire social consequences.

For example, one of the direst social consequences of these negative advertisements it the way with which they treat casual sex and sexually transmitted diseases. For instance, a recent advertisement on the back of Rolling Stone magazine promoted a drug for genital herpes by proclaiming that one partner had herpes, one didn't, and this drug allowed them to keep it that way. Although a drug for containing genital herpes is not a product in poor taste, but rather an important medical stride, this article's treatment of genital herpes as normal is in poor taste. Additionally, this advertisement suggests that those with the disease can have sex with healthy individuals without risk of passing the disease. Although the drug may make the transfer less likely, it is still possible. The product's marketing representative may have chosen to market the product in this way to give hope, but instead, it encourages unprotected sex with negative social consequences.

A second socially negative advertisement is not as socially dangerous as the first, but can still be construed has having ethically negative consequences. This advertisement, a commercial on cable television, advertised an insurance company. The advertisement featured a typical couple driving down the road chatting, when a car sideswiped them without any warning. The advertisement was intended to educate the public as to the importance of insurance because of life's unpredictability, but the shock tactic used in the commercial has negative effects on the watchers. Like news shows, the advertisement is meant to inspire fear, which creates a negative social environment.

But advertisements don't necessarily have to create a negative environment in order to be ethically and socially negative. Neither do they have to offend target markets with less than tasteful techniques or shock tactics. They can be deceptive, convincing consumers to purchase products they don't need. One type of advertising particularly guilty of this offense is paid programming, or television length commercials that appear on home shopping networks or traditional networks at certain times of the day. These advertisements, which attempt to sell recently patented products that are generally useless, specifically target those alone watching TV during certain periods of the day, vulnerable audiences like the elderly. Although some marketing executives may choose this type of advertising because it is less expensive and allows viewers to see product demonstrations, the ethical consequences of the advertisements is less than desirable.