(IV) Advantages to Society
Advantages of advertisement available to society, in general, may be explained as under:
1. Employment Opportunity. Advertisement has become an industry these days. It provides handsome employment to a very large number of persons directly and indirectly. (MCom 2nd Year Advertising Sales Management Study Material Notes)
2. Increase in Standard of Living. Advertisement increases the standard of living of society. It provides new goods and commodities to society. It also helps in developing new uses for the goods.
3. Encouragement to Healthy Competition. A great advantage of advertisement is that it encourages healthy competition among manufacturers. All the manufacturers want to develop new products and new uses of the products, so that they may attract more and more customers. (MCom 2nd Year Advertising Sales Management Study Material Notes)
4. Encouragement to Research and Development. As all the manufacturers want to win the race of competition and produce or present something new, it encourages research and development. This is all due to advertisement.
5. Industrial Progress and Prosperity. As advertisement increases the sales of products in the market, it helps in increasing the scale of production. A high scale of production brings industrial progress and prosperity.
6. Help to Press. Advertisement is a boon for the development of newspapers and magazines. Newspapers and magazines would not have become so popular and cheap in the absence of advertisement. Advertisement yields revenue for these newspapers and magazines and it only keeps them alive. (MCom 2nd Year Advertising Sales Management Study Material Notes)
7. Encouragement to Art. Advertisement encourages art and design in the country. Advertisement copies need these designs and arts which provide an opportunity for the artists to develop their art.
8. Educative Value. Advertisement is very educative. It provides complete information about the products and their uses to society.
Conclusion
The above discussion makes it clear that there are numerous advantages of advertisement. It is beneficial to all the concerned producers, middlemen, customers, and consumers. In this time of cutthroat competition, it is not enough to produce the quality product at a low cost, it is also necessary that it should be made known to the consumers for whom it is produced. This is done by advertisement. Advertisement covers the long and large gap between manufacturers and consumers.
It creates the demand for new products, increases the demand for going on products, and maintains their demand. It helps in increasing sales, production, and profit. An increase in the scale of production brings many economies to the manufacturers and enables them in lowering the cost of production. Thus, it provides goods and services of high quality to the consumers at the most reasonable prices. Thus, it can be concluded that money spent on advertisement is an investment and not a waste.
CRITICISMS AGAINST ADVERTISEMENT
Though there are many advantages of advertising, it can not be said that there is no disadvantage to advertising and it is free from criticism. The fact is that it has been strongly criticized by many eminent scholars because of many reasons. Some scholars have commented that “Money spent on advertising is wasteful.”
Some other scholars have commented, “Advertisement leads to falsehood in business.” Some are scholars who have nut rightly rejected the need and importance of advertising by saying, “Advertising should be scrapped to save consumers from marketing frauds.” In the light of such strong criticisms, it becomes necessary to analyze the reasons for which it is criticized. Important disadvantages of advertisement may be explained as under:
1. Money Spent on Advertising is a Burden upon Consumers. A huge amount is spent on advertisement by the manufacturers because all the media of advertisement are fairly costly. This amount is added to the cost of production which increases the total cost and cost per unit. Thus, money spent on advertising proves a burden upon consumers.
2. Encouragement to Monopoly. Advertisement encourages monopoly because almost all the effective media of advertisement are too costly to be afforded by the manufacturers of large-scale only. It makes the products of large-scale manufacturers popular which encourage monopoly. (MCom 2nd Year Advertising Sales Management Study Material Notes)
3. Encouragement to Excessive Expenditure by Consumers. Advertisement encourages excessive and sometimes unnecessary expenditure by consumers because repeated and frequent advertisement for a product compels them to purchase it even though they do not need 5 it. It increases their expenditure.
4. Encouragement to Luxurious Life. Advertisement for luxurious goods and presented in the manner that the consumers feel it necessary for themselves and consider them as a status symbol. Thus, they want to lead a luxurious life, even if they are not capable of doing it. (MCom 2nd Year Advertising Sales Management Study Material Notes)
5. Creation of Unhealthy Competition. Advertisement is criticized for the reason that it creates unhealthy competition in the market. Unhealthy competition causes many malpractices among businessmen.
6. Encouragement to Desire and Buy the Things which are not within the Means of Consumers. Advertisement creates the desire for new things and it persuades customers to buy these things. Sometimes, they are compelled to buy things that are not within their means. (MCom 2nd Year Advertising Sales Management Study Material Notes)
7. Encouragement to Waste and Obsolescence. The advertisement brings new and improved products into the market and encourages customers to buy these products. Purchase of these new and improved things necessitates old products to be wasted. Thus, it encourages waste and obsolescence.
8. Misrepresentation of Facts. It has been the experience that almost all the advertisement messages explain the benefits of products in an expanded way and the benefits claimed by these messages are not enjoyed by the consumers in full.
9. Wastage of Natural and National Resources. A serious criticism against advertisement is that it involves heavy wastage of natural and national resources, particularly paper, ink, etc.
10. Difficulty in Making Selection. Advertisement has made it difficult for the customers to make the selection because so many brands and varieties are advertised that it becomes very difficult for the customers to decide which particular brand is better.
11. Wastage of Money. Sometimes, the demand for the product does not increase even after the advertisement. In this case, the money, spent on advertisement becomes a waste.
12. Social Evils. A serious objection against advertisement is that it gives birth to many social evils because some persons being impressed by advertisements adopt evils. Examples of such evils are smoking, drinking, etc.