Ethical Marketing and the new Consumer

Question: Critically analyse the ethics of at least three of the following marketing elements for your chosen organisation, drawing on relevant frameworks, tools, guidelines and regulations. Answer: Introduction The report identifies the ethical issues of apple by critically analyzing the marketing activities of it using range of tools and framework. Three marketing elements have been considered for the assignment: Target marketing, product or service and Price. Target marketing Teenagers are the target market of the Apple. The core reason behind focusing teenagers is that this age group socializes with friend more and adapts the change, innovation and technology easily. The decision of making teenagers as target market raises question on ethical target marketing of Apple. According to the Arnold (2009), if a company targets a specific group for advertising their product in target market than it is ethical. However, if vulnerable population such as children and teen agers (Low income but easy to manipulate) is one of the inclusion criteria in decision making then it would be considered as unethical target marketing. Businesses such as Apple are using innovation and technology to make money only by influencing the teenagers to stay updated in era of android phones and apps. The company has is targeting a specific group which has low income and the use of product or services in their life is not important. Apple has been releasing new versions and androids every year, and they are skilled enough to make up their consumers mind for buying the new product. According to the Ingram (2000), the vulnerable population or target market includes consumers with less maturity to make an informed purchase. Teenagers dont have maturity to understand what functions of products they are buying is useful for them and whether it is useful for them or not. They just buy it on the basis of trend and influencing such target market is unethical. Product or services According to the kotler, a product is more than a tangible thing. He identifies the abstract value of a product with its levels that can be developed and identified. These levels help to see product from the perception of consumer. These levels help to identify the level where actual value is more than the expected value which reflects in customer satisfaction. Apple provides so many products and services to its customers. The classification has been done on android phones of apple. Mentioned below are the five levels of Apple product in Kotler classification matrix. Core product: The level identifies the core purpose for which the product has been developed. The core benefit that smart phone provides to customers is mobile operating system where customers can perform tasks they have been doing on desktop. The main feature is small in size, performs as operating system as well as mobile phone. The ethical issue that has been brought in development of core product of Apple are associated with supplier management. According to the report published by BBC, the company has been found with poor working condition of workers at china. According to the report, one worker had to work 18 days continuously to develop the parts of product despite of continuous request to take off (BBC news, 2016). The Actual product After the core product is been built the actual product defines the benefits of core product which helps in competition because these features differentiates the product from the competitors. There are so many product attributes that needs to be considered under the actual product. Apple has been leader in identifying new features in the market which has been giving competitive advantage to it. The core attributes are : brand name, styling and safety. The brand name of apple is vital in gadget market. Everyone prefers to buy from inventor and so the apple has been. The styling of the product has been done to attract teenagers. The more focus has been given in identifying new features rather than its value to the customers. It is the brand name that is making more money for it. There are two types of customers one in internal and other is external. Apple has been taking care of external customers safety but not with internal products. There are so many ethical issues has been identifi ed regarding working conditions of apple that signifies that companys product development has unethical practices which directly impacts it brand value and will affect its position in the market if these practices are not handled well. The Augmented product Consumers are not satisfied with core benefit of actual product rather they are satisfied with total product which includes after sales activities such as service, installation, delivery and warranty. Product augmentation is the key of success in todays market. The marketing agendas of Apple are to identify the most attractive benefits of total product that can delight the consumer instead of just satisfaction. Apple provides warranty, after sales services, instruction and guidelines about how to use product along with 24 hours technical support. The main problem with apple is that each and every augmentation increases the cost of the product and so the customers have to face to purchase the product. There are so many augmentations in apple products that may not be required by its customers but they have to pay for it because they want apple brand. So apple is using its brand value to manipulate and force its customers to buy apple products which is unethical practice. Apple is makin g some kind of pressure in its marketing activities to use latest technology to stay up to date in business society and pressurizing customers is unethical in marketing (Carnegiecouncil.org, 2016). Price Apple has been manipulating its customers physiologically to spend money on its product. Social status is core benefit that has been used by the apple to market its new launches. The company has been launching its new models every year without modifying it significantly. Apple customers were continuously brainwashed to buy new latest model every year to stay updated. However, it was a marketing stunt by apple to make people fool to spend more money on apple products. Apple has also been criticized for price reduction which is also a marketing stunt. For example, the iphone cost was cut down after 2 months of release and the reduction was of 200 USD that lead to several complaints to Apple. As people who have purchased the model was feeling cheated. The incident defines genuine pricing has not been applied by the apple. Apple then rectified the issues by offering 100 USD off to next apple purchase to early Iphone customers. References Ingram, W. (2000). Consumers' evaluation of unethical marketing behaviors. Lexington, Ky.: [publisher not identified]. Arnold, C. (2009). Ethical marketing and the new consumer. Chichester, U.K.: Wiley. Apple 'failing to protect Chinese factory workers' - BBC News. (2016). BBC News. Retrieved 19 July 2016, from https://www.bbc.com/news/business-30532463 Two Faces of Apple. (2016). Carnegiecouncil.org. Retrieved 19 July 2016, from https://www.carnegiecouncil.org/publications/ethics_online/0068.html