Don’t Buy Hamburgers! Would you ever expect a hamburger chain say this to their customers? What is a burger place to do? McDonald’s is selling so many products that are no longer just hamburgers to keep their sales growth. This Swedish hamburger chain Max Burgers is doing something different.
Marketing
They are trying to influence their customers to change their habits and buy less beef. They added chicken, fish and veggie sandwiches to the menu. Unlike McDonald’s they have in store displays to influence their customers to make healthier choices. They even promote a meatless day a week. Can a business influence their customers or do they just satisfy customer needs? In an article called “Have Your Dream Wedding at McDonalds”, I was attempting to influence your choice of wedding venues with a little humor.
Many of you are familiar with Netflix, where you sign up for movie rentals sent to you or downloaded. They take the choices you make over time and make suggestions of your next choice of rental. Why would they do that? If you do not request new rentals for your monthly fee, you will probably give up the service. Suggesting new rentals keeps you as a customer. They are influencing you to use their product.
Supermarkets influence our purchases all the time. They spend a great deal of time in their pricing strategy to lure you into the store. They are very willing to sell certain products at a loss to get you to shop there. As you do all your shopping they make up the profit that they lost on the non essentials you buy such as cleaning or personal products. It doesn’t stop at the supermarket, sales occur at the mall too.
Recently, Borders declared they were going out of business. The advertisement said up to40% off everything. They lured you in to the store with the suggestion of a great deal! Once you go, you find out that many if not most of what they are selling is at 20-30% off. Almost all sales promise a lot more than they deliver. Can you imagine the stores telling you to stay home during a sale?
Well that is not going to happen. Stores or businesses try to influence you with money off, quality of merchandise or a huge variety of merchandise. This hamburger chain is not a health food store and marketing to people who would buy health food anyway. They are attempting to change people’s habits of buying hamburgers (beef) and profit from it. Recently, social media is influencing groups of people for the benefit of a business.
Multimedia Approach
Does influence matter? Check out the resurrection of the Old Spice brand. They launched a multimedia campaign using social media, You Tube and advertising was used to boost their sales. It seems to be working! I remember Old Spice when I was a kid and they reinvented it with this campaign. They are getting new customers to look at their product.
Companies and people do not change easily! Advertising influences us to buy products and services, but those customers are probably not existing customers. Engaging customers and influencing their purchases are the new marketing campaigns. They use social media such as Facebook, Twitter etc. to influence customers. The new multimedia approach personalizes marketing and impacts sales.
Part of this personalization targets people and their circle of their friends to influence your buying decisions. When you look at some celebrities and see how many followers they have on social networks like Twitter or Facebook, you realize they have a huge influence over them. Marketers are using surveys to influence businesses polling different kinds of customers. All of these online sites are interactive and your opinion counts. Businesses are reacting to their customers. If customers like the changes, they will buy more.
Final thoughts
Customers have wanted businesses to listen to them for a long time. Do we mind that the business is trying to influence us; they have been doing it in the form of advertising forever. So what has changed? Advertising has become personal and targeted to your individual choices or habits. Some businesses may influence your purchases, rentals or even the choice of purchases. Is this taking advertising and marketing too far? Don’t Buy Hamburgers!
Photo by: Jon Aslund
Please make sure to subscribe to our RSS feed to get the latest updates!
{ 38 comments }
Well, one sure way to get customers not to buy hamburges, would be to write about the ammonia, pink slime, and animal odds and ends that go into commercially produced beef patties.
I think the goal was still have them eat their other food.
Doesn’t the argument for advertising go something like, “It helps the consumer makes informed decisions, and ultimately aids a free market economy.” I’m not sure if I believe this at all (your old spice campaign is a great example of an effective marketing tool that has nothing to do with the benefits of the the product). Is there some level of advertising that is actually needed in order to make customers aware of what is out there?
I think advertising is good when it informs! In the U.S. there are so many products, advertising is needed just to reach the customer. What is different with the Swedish hamburger chain was they were trying to influence existing customers to change their buying habits.
The problem is, when does advertising inform anymore? I don’t watch any commercials and come away thinking “wow, that got me thinking”. Everything seems to be over-the -top in order to grab attention, or bashing the competition. Just not worth my time anymore. Oh, and if it tastes good, I’m gonna keep on buying it no matter what the restaurant suggests (but I’ve always been stubborn that way)
The really good informational advertising is in high end magazines. I think they recognize the reader is more sophisticated.
This is why we try to minimize commercial exposure. We don’t watch much TV and I think that eliminated a lot of advertising. I think online advertising is a bit different, it’s not so in your face like the TV.
Advertising does influence us, but there is in store promotions, coupons, product placement and how it is displayed. Supermarkets are notorious for displaying product at certain places and levels to influence your purchase.
Well good for them! I don’t see such a campaign happening here with McDonalds! Atleast they stopped asking customers if they want to super size fries with every meal!
When I had my burger place, we were always trying to add to the sale. The burger place in the article is trying to influence your purchase too.
It’s amazing how vulnerable we all are to advertising, even ones that use clever methods and paths. Like Retireby40, lately I’ve been trying to limit my exposure to TV…
Unfortunately, advertising has become very personal on the internet. It is based on our searches or searching habits. Advertising and promotion has become more subtle over time.
If people are hearing over and over that they should eat more healthy, but they find it too difficult, they should love a fast food place that makes it easy and tasty! Even if the food is nos *as* healthy as it could be, but tastes good and is healthier than a burger, people will love buying it so that they *feel* less guilty.
Advertising is always interesting… remember Dove’s campaigns to promote self esteem in teenage girls? While the same company owns the “Axe” brand whose commercials show tons of tanned, scantily clad girls chasing guys because they’re wearing Axe. Sure, Unilever is being fake about it’s values when they play those Dove commercials, but isn’t it still better to have the Dove commercials as well as women-as-objects Axe commercials, rather than having only Axe-type commercials?
Buy-on-tv-only products are also interesting because most consumers just laugh at those commercials (sweatpants that look like jeans! toenail clippers with a flashlight on them!) because the commercials are so obviously trying to convince you that you need something that you obviously don’t need. But viewers don’t realize that the regular commercials they watch are just as bad about making you feel like you *need* things that you don’t need, only you don’t notice as much…
Now advertising and promotion is everywhere influencing our purchases based on preferences or habits on the internet. As consumers, we can influence companies by not buying their products. The infomercial products consistently surprise me that anyone would fall for that stuff.
I think that’s great they are doing that. I’m trying to eat less meat in general myself, esp beef. Advertising and marketing will always evolve. As long as their methods don’t become invasive or entirely misleading I don’t worry about it. -Sydney
Advertising on the internet is becoming more personal and targeted. It is based on your personal preferences and searches. I also think the line between advertising and information is becoming blurred too.
I don’t think advertising goes too far. Educated consumers can make up their own mind. Thr tradgedy only unfolds when there is no promotion of the better alternatives. Pay Day lenders for example, have the resources and profit from you making the bad decision to do business with them. There is little profit and motive for competing alternatives to advertise an alternative.
Unfortunately, too many people just listen to advertising and allow someone else to make their decision for them. Some of the promotion is very subtle such as in supermarkets where placement is more important. Internet advertising is becoming more targeted and is based on preferences. I think the phrase of buyer beware may be more appropriate!
I don’t mind these advertising tricks too much because it is targeted so in theory, it should make your shopping experience more fun and efficient. But I agree, can’t just buy everything hook line and sinker, who knows if they are pushing you to some mystery meat made of who knows what. Great point about Old Spice and the new generation marketing push. How can we apply these techniques to our blogs?
You can ignore advertising which I do routinely! Supermarkets routinely place products in such a way that you pick it. The internet provides an opportunity for targeted advertising and promotion based on a user’s preferences.
As bloggers, we promote ourselves through our product (content) in such a way that followers of all kinds as well as search engines can easily find. We try to put the content in front of interested people who will help distribute it through social media. As it rises to a certain level, mainstream media helps distribute as well. There is still considerable growth possible.
As much as I believe to the contrary-I know I’m influenced by the media and marketers. And after it happens I am always surprised that someone as intelligent as I am can be influenced just like the “average joe or jane.”
The reason you are influenced is because it can be subtle! To me the supermarket is subtle how they place products and item pricing. The internet is using targeted marketing based on your searches or preferences.
I still remember some McDonald’s jingles from my childhood…..
“Big Mac, Filet-o-Fish, Quarter Pounder, French Fry. Icy Coke, Thick Shake, Sundaes and Apple Pie!”
Good advertising can absolutely work. I probably ate more burgers when younger because of it.
We are all vulnerable to advertising. The media has been studying how to do it well for a very long time! I like that many restaurants are offering healthier items on their menus. I think it’s because consumers demand it. So they have to respond to what we want sometimes!
I remember some some old advertising too! Alka Seltzer had plop,plop fizz, fizz oh what a relief it is. Advertising is much more targeted and personal based on internet searches or preferences.
Advertising is becoming more personal and targeted on the internet. Supermarkets use placement which is far more subtle. The Swedish hamburger chain attempts to change preferences in the store. One of the consequences of social media is companies are now more responsive to consumers too.
Interesting article. Don’t we, as a blogger, try to write to our readers’ tastes? We give readers a food they will most likely eat. Businesses are no exception
I think everyone (including businesses) tries to satisfy demand, however some try to persuade or influence different choices. Supermarkets influence our choices and so did this Swedish hamburger chain.
Nice article KC. Very valid points about advertising and social media.
Thanks, I like the psychology of changing our choices and how we are influenced in subtle ways.
I’d like to think that I don’t fall for advertising, but I would probably be shocked to see all the things that I fall for.
Many of the promotions are subtle such as product placement in supermarkets or the clerk at the burger stand asking if you would like cheese on your burger. After all advertising is a form of sales. Even something as mundane as coupons influence our buying decisions.
But I like hamburgers
I’ve made it a point to not be influenced by advertising, product placement, etc recently, but when I was younger I was definitely influenced a lot more. I can see where making a connection with people and marketing via that connection/relationship is more effective than the traditional repetitive ads.
We are influenced by a lot of things, but friends can influence us even more. Supermarkets and coupons are far more subtle, but quite an influence too.
Judging by the title, I thought this post would be about the lack of nutrition in burgers, which it kind of is, but I do appreciate the turn to marketing in general. With the burger thing, though, I have to say I don’t mind the influence. Of course they’re influencing customers in order to make money– it’s a business. But at least they are influencing customers in a healthy way! So if you’re going to be spending money at their establishment anyway, at least it is on something better for you. They get money. You get a healthier meal. Win win. At Mango, we recently did a post on weeding out the healthier items on fast food menus, so even if businesses aren’t blatantly promoting these healthier foods, you can still find them for yourself. (http://www.mangomoney.com/blog/trends/fast-food-nutrition-fact) And remember, don’t buy hamburgers!
)
Sometimes the influence is very subtle whether it is the placement in supermarkets, or coupons. They are influencing our purchases and you are not aware of it.
Oh, businesses absolutely influence customers. Notice how the most expensive products at the grocery store are at adult eye level, while the overpriced Dora the Explorer kids bandaids are at kid-eye level? …. Good for Max Burgers for trying to get us to eat less beef! Cutting back on red meat is better for our health AND the environment!
One of the reasons my wife shops with a list is to avoid the influences. Max Burgers was trying to broaden their menu and in turn serve the health conscious too.
{ 6 trackbacks }