Blog Entry #10 - Letter!

Blog Entry #9 - Homework for Tuesday, November 2nd

1. How does advertising influence consumption?

        Usually the best ways to communicate something are through visual and audio images, video, figures, etc. Advertisement uses the same thing, with visual images or short videos to advertise a particular product or service, and therefore it has a huge influence on consumption. People don’t just buy stuffs; they have to know about it first. Companies spend a lot of money in advertising their products/services, and their purpose is to get people extra consumed the products or services. In order to do so, they have to make it appealed by telling the efficient sides of that products or services, making people feel like they should/ want to consume those for their good as well as satisfaction. 

2. Do you think citizens are sufficiently informed about the sustainability of our consumption habits? If not, how can we become more informed about sustainability issues?

        Citizens are not all the times sufficiently informed about the sustainability of our consumption habits because first of all, habits are something we do involuntarily. Possibly advertisement for consumption aims to create those habits so that their product or service can be more consumed, in which they will earn more profit. And in order to that, they hardly ever tell about the negative impacts of the product/service, or if they tell, they’ll tell just a few portion of what they actually have to tell to educate people about sustainably using the product/service. For instance, in Vietnam, there are mostly the poor class and the middle class, in which what most of them care about is survival, not sustainability. Therefore, advertisements about services and products in Vietnam aim for the majority of population, which are the poor and middle classes, in which the advertisements just tell what the people what they need or desire. Meanwhile, the government doesn’t educate the citizens about sustainability nor do any campaigns like using posters, games, or advertisements to do that which explain why not all people know about sustainability.
  • Meanwhile advertisements can misinform people, news are actually informing about sustainability or accusing the products/services that seriously damage the society and environment. Therefore, people should update the news, or basically read daily news so that they have a sense of what’s going on and what they should be aware of.
  • Schools should educate young generations about sustainability so that they can educate their parents or members of their families.
  • Media should have more advertisements, games, movies, etc about sustainability issues to raise awareness.
  • Government should create more programs about sustainability and give prizes.
  • Companies shouldn’t only produce products that economically benefit them, but it also should minimize pollution, conserve or recycle natural resources, and promote a healthy society. Additionally, they can be more generous on their advertisements, and once they follow the rules of sustainability, they will be able to tell about the efficient sides of the products as well as the negative sides of the products and how people should consume their products in ways that both benefit them and the companies without damaging the society, environment, and economy.
  • Teens should be more educated about spending their money on products/services.  
  • In brief, firstly people have to be educated in order to know about sustainability issues and how they can seriously affect our lives right now and our children/descendants’ lives in the future. People will not know or even care about sustainability if they are not informed what it is.

3. Do you think these advertising techniques influence what you and your friends purchase?

        I think advertising techniques greatly influence what me and my friends purchase because most of the time when I turn on the TV, or I surf the internet, there are tons of advertisements that are made only for teens, which are our age. As teens, we like colors, music, technology, clothes, games, celebrity, etc. Advertisements use those elements that teen desire in order to get them consumed the products. Also, most of the time advertisements for teens use celebrities that are well-known or at least teens admire, which motivates us to consume the product to be like our idols. In addition, at this age we require and want a lot of things. Most of us receive monthly pocket-money from our parents and just go buy stuffs without considering the consequences. It’s reasonable why we don’t consider that because we don’t make the money. And that’s the point where advertisements pop in and lure teens’ mind to consume their products.