Is Manipulation Wrong?

Coke’s Marketing Success

Is Manipulation Wrong?

Decades ago, Pepsi launched an advertising campaign that had people drink Pepsi and Coke from two different cups that were label-less and asked them to decide which drink they preferred. The results showed that Pepsi was preferred to Coke. This prompted Coke to launch a campaign that slightly altered its age-old recipe. But the campaign failed miserably.

A scientist uncovered something fascinating that Coke would have liked to have known. Years of dedicated marketing aimed at successfully associating positive feelings such as community, Christmas, and family with Coke. The result was that people found Coke tastier than Pepsi – only if they knew that they were drinking Coke. This story is covered in depth in the book “Buyology” by Martin Lindstrom. The conclusion was interesting but unsettling – our perception of a product can change our taste of it.

The Placebo Effect

There are several other examples of this. Another instance is found in Dan Ariely’s book, “Predictably Irrational”, where he gets college students to drink beer with vinegar in an experiment. His findings suggested that the students’ beer reviews was based not on their taste buds – but on the information they were presented with before tasting the beer. When they were told that the beer they were drinking contained vinegar; they rated it much lower than when they tasted the same drink without knowing that vinegar was added to it.

It’s easy to use placebos to manipulate people and it’s what marketers constantly do. But it can’t be self-induced. To try to convince yourself something is real undermines your ability to genuinely believe it. You cannot make yourself believe that eating a strawberry will cure you of a headache because you know of no good reason to believe that strawberries can cure headaches. Going back to the Coke vs Pepsi example, what this finding underscores is that marketing is extremely effective, and companies should and will invest as much money as they can to find innovative ways of trying to manipulate people.

The Ethics of Persuasion

However, is it unreasonable to condemn corporations? They are only responding to the incentives created by the marketplace, after-all. People’s predictable reactions to cues will be exploited by other competitors if not by them. Many people are often insulted at the thought of being controlled (take the Facebook controversy) but isn’t that a natural part of human behavior? Whenever we lie, exaggerate, compliment, flirt, joke with other people, are we not trying to provoke some kind of response? And we do so without ever asking for their permission.

When you lie to compliment someone for your own gain – you know that they never explicitly expressed their desire to like you. You are, in effect, manipulating them. The difference between the flirting with someone and companies using marketing on people is difficult to decipher. Someone who is being flirted with is given an explicit message. She knows what to expect and she can draw her conclusions accordingly, but sometimes she can’t. The man flirting with her can use subtle tactics that can fool his unsuspecting victim. Some advertisements aren’t asking for your permission, while others are.

As Seth Godin has pointed out numerous times in books such as “The Icarus Deception”, “Purple Cow” and “Permission Marketing”, the new way of marketing is not the same as before. You can no longer pay large sums of money to the TV industrial complex and force millions of viewers to pay attention to your ad. The internet age has made it imperative for advertisers to better disguise and package their ads. But beneath the surface, the same game is being played. They are still trying to manipulate your behavior – either to get you to buy a product or to believe in their message or brand.

The craze of content marketing wasn’t the result of marketers suddenly caring about people’s sensitivities. It’s the result of reacting to the increasing amount of choice that has been made available to the modern consumer. There is nothing implicitly good or bad about manipulation or marketing, the same way there is nothing implicitly good or bad about technology, flirting, or politics. They are all means to an end – and will be evaluated (only by some) on the results of their implementation and/or the motivations of their agents.

The problem is that marketeers don’t need consent to advertise your message. The subliminal messages they are pushing on you can be done so with minimally invasive methods such as exposing you to a particular shade of color (A cigarette company’s launched a very effective advertising campaign by merely coloring billboards with a certain color).

As long as economic incentives exist, there will be plenty of ways for marketeers to manipulate your thoughts.

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