Critical Reflection of the Brands Hp and Glassons

The film includes many exclusive interviews with representatives of some of the world’s most popular brands and brands which have revolutionized marketing. It also features opinions of many well-known advertising

Pepsi or Coke? Apple or Android? Starbucks or Tim Hortons? These are seemingly insignificant choices between products; however, taken together they structure the lives of individuals. To reduce brands to anything less would be to negate the significance they hold in the fabric of individual’s lives. What is important, then, is to uncover the ways in which certain brands weave their way into this fabric through their advertising practices and promotional culture. This paper begins with a brief historical outline of consumer culture and it’s ties to neoliberalism, and then moves to an in depth exploration of the way in which companies work to create and maintain a positive brand image among consumers. Through a focus on branding, versus product-specific advertising, companies work to create attachments and emotional bonds, effectively creating a loyal and invested customer base. Corporations draw upon established systems of meaning, selling consumer’s values and beliefs back to them in the form of a brand. This process is not unidirectional, operating simultaneously through individual consent and participation. In our modern, neoliberal market place, notions of individuality have positioned “the choosing self at the center of consumer culture”, and individuals seek self-fulfillment and satisfaction from “active lifestyle choices” (Arvidsson, 2001, p. 48). The self has come to be defined by the brands one identifies with.

Sampson stated, “Advertising makes us remember and recognize brands better while also affecting our preferences and perceived needs. It changes our attitudes towards products.” He is explaining that companies have implanted brands into our heads, thus making their products very recognizable. Companies feel the need to materialize our lives. By doing this, they cause us to buy expensive engagement rings and other products that people do not necessarily need. Sampson also stated, “Store managers may also manipulate environmental cues to change our buying behavior. For example, research in a wine store found that people bought more expensive wines when classical music was played in the background than when they heard Top 40 music.” This shows how companies go to the extent of changing the environments that we shop in to further prompt us to buy more expensive items.

According to the text, it is important for marketers to recognize and unravel the consumer's self-image because individual's possessions reflect their identifies "we are what we consume" (Kotler and Armstrong

In this article, “Jesus is brand of Jeans,” by Jean Kilbourne, explores the world of advertisements and their effect on modern day consumers. She states that advertisements have a tendency to play on the emotions of people; attempting to convince the consumer to buy their products. As well as encouraging the thought of that objects will make us look better and make us whole. This is deceiving and a destructive way to look at life, as objects being just as important as people. Kilbourne explains this throughout her article with many examples and describes how ads affects us daily.

For years brands have marketed their products in alignment with our values such as family, money and

To live the American Dream means to be incorporated into American society. Corporate companies capitalize on this ideology, claiming that they will discover the consumer's identity through marketing. In their advertising schemes, companies often express how their products can improve and reshape an individual’s identity. Often times, marketing advertisements include phrases such as “we can help you,” “this product will change your life forever,” or “it’s good for you.” According to Laura Oswald in The Place and Space of Consumption in a Material World, she declares, “Consumption enables individuals to change “hats” [identity] as the occasion demands. As a result, the meaning of products, their “brand image,” is central to the formation of personal and social identity in consumer culture” (5). When individuals purchase and consume products, they buy into that brand’s image (Miller). Companies inform consumers that their products will allow them to discover their ‘empty identity.’ In turn, companies convince individuals into believing that once their identity is found, they will be accepted by the masses. Large corporations exploit Americans’ thirst for belonging, insisting they will provide the remedy of social entry. They express that their ads will help to discover self if they consume their brand, thus creating a ‘consumerist alliance.’ Furthermore, as the customer continues to purchase more and more of their

As variety and option tend to lead to the peaking of consumer interest since human nature inevitably values choice and the allure of something being new or revolutionary, it is easy to see how interest can be closely linked with consumption. Singer stated that, “In its first 24 hours, the app was downloaded more than one million times” (2015: 1). This points to the universal nature of the product stemming largely from the ease at which the product can be accessed. Also, Boush and Loken pointed out that a sense of familiarity with the product regarding the brand largely contributed to the consumption adding to the fact that the product is already highly convenient to purchase (1991: 16). Boush and Loken stated, “Capitalizing on an established brand name is a growth strategy that seems destined to increase in popularity,” which accentuated the idea that convenience in the use of a product strongly linked with a brand not only involved the product itself yet involved the brand as well (1991: 16). Thus, it is seemingly clarified that convenience in use helped to make products, brands, and trends beyond culture, for the appeal to innate human tendencies in clinging to what is comfortable, known, or familiar is beyond cultural norms. Allison further clarifies that convenience in use is a key component for making a product, brand, or

Going into a store to buy either a new shirt or some cough medicine, the decision on what is bought is affected by the brands or even the advertisements customers have been subjected to. Branding and the marketing of those brands affect people as they make decisions on what they want to spend their money on. In “A Brand by Any Other Name,” by Douglas Rushkoff and in “With These Words I Can Sell You Anything” by William Lutz, the authors write about how consumers are influenced by different marketing practices. Rushkoff and Lutz explain the ways that shoppers can be manipulated just by what they read or hear and buy things just because they think they are getting the best or the coolest.

First, Baudrillard’ (1993, 1994, 1998) theory, symbolic consumption, as a focal notion of the study, is found to be a good foundation to understand consumers’ purchasing decisions for fashion brands. The findings show that consumers choose brands which have relevance or desired ‘symbolic value’ for them. Not only Baudrillard, the findings are also in line with the studies of Dittmar (1992, 1994, 2004, 2008), Elliott & Wattanasuwan (1998a) and Wattanasuwan (2003, 2005) regarding how consumers use fashion products; symbolic consumption is used to represent actual self-identity, and also to create ideal self-identity.

Many people in today's society are distressed greatly with ones rank in the social hierarchy; material possessions of all sorts seem to construct, shape, and style the lives of consumers all over the world. Consumers all over the world are becoming more and more demanding as more and more is being advertised. Many companies, such as Apple, often advertise months in advance for products creating commotion, attentiveness, and desire among the world. Stores, such as Old Navy, inspire consumers to shop at stores like theirs to feel pleased and satisfied with how much can be bought with such small amounts of money; when in reality, the consumers are spending money on their identity.

Consumerism and the effects of branding affect people’s lives. Branding allows consumers to easily identify which products are made by which companies. Yet, the brands create more of an influence on consumer’s lifestyles and in the end decide what kind of consumer that person is. Branding creates a blurred divide in our society. Consumers who are ore likely to purchase the branded products that are associated with better quality and higher prices are put into their own category bucket versus the consumers who choose the cheaper priced products that are made with less quality. When it comes to deciding who you are based off of the products and brands that you associate yourself with, it creates a capital divide in our society. Consumers than associate brands with personal feelings based upon whether or not they associate themselves with those brands. Lives of consumers are heavily influenced. Their lives are worse off when they feel the need to ‘keep up’ with brands in order to feel as if they are portraying themselves in the best light. In a way, this is similar to how all of branding began with livestock. Consumers want to physically brand themselves with specific brands by wearing logos and identifying with a brand. They might not be burning the brands directly onto their skin but they are burning the brands onto their clothes and burning holes in their wallets to keep up with society standards about brands.

In this report, I will be introducing the client, Hewlett Packard (HP), and their background for better understanding of the company. Following this, I will be providing an analysing on a crowdsourcing platform chosen, Innoget, a business model for this platform and analysing the platform in which it benefits HP.

HP has established itself as a solid brand; their success is due to their size and formidable sales machine due to the quality.

Brand Community plays an important role too. As stated in the case study, Brand Communities eliminates the role of company’s marketing team and various agents. This might not be correct every time because even if the customer is not in the brand community then too he can get knowledge of brand through various kinds of marketing techniques such as advertisements. Brands are more important as compared to the Brand Communities. Brand Communities are secondary while the Brands are primary. The reason is, it is the Brand through which customer will be able to recognize a particular product and buy it. After buying that product if the customer is satisfied with it, he/she will be willing to buy that product again. It is then, when the customer will become a part of that particular Brand Community. For example, if we consider Apple, people are first attracted towards it due to its innovative thinking, its brand name and due to the designs of their products. But after they buy their products, for example iPhone, they are willing to buy iPhone every time when its new version is released. So, they will become the part of their Brand