Group membership

This lesson was all about what different groups people belong to and how they can influence what people purchase and the reasoning behind why we actually purchase them.

First of all we looked at Burberry and how that it being associated with different groups can effect their sales. As we know Burberry is an expensive product that is normally associated with the upper-class group however their image of being a high class brand changed and it got labelled as clothing for ‘chavs’ and this made it that no body wanted to be associated with that brand and it lost them money. To Change their brand identity and make their cloths more appealing again to their intended target audience they had an advertising campaign that included Kate Moss.

A Burberry advert using Kate Moss



Using Kate Moss to advertise their product Burberry has been able to move back to its intended target audience and breakaway from the chav label it was branded with a few years ago.

We then looked at what different groups a person can belong to and they are as followed…..

Ascribed groups
The group you a born into (family)
Peer group
Your peers, School, friends
Associative groups
Groups you realistically belong to, college, 6th form
Contrived groups i.e.
Formed for a specific reason, football club
Disassociation groups
Groups you don’t want to be associated
Aspirational groups
Groups you would like to belong to, celebrities, cool kids
Acquired groups
Groups you have joined, face book, twitter
Reference groups
looking to a specific lifestyle you want to be part of

Maslow’s hierarchy of needs



We then were showed a vw advert that was classed as aspirational because it stressed the fact that whils everyone else is sleeping because they have to be up the next day you can drive when you want because you dnt have any boundries or consrtaints

Vw advert


We also found that humans needs to feel a sense of belonging, the reason for this is because when we are children we all lean though being praised. The fact that most people want to feel a sense of belonging has helped marketers learn how to advertise different products. They do this by making their products seem like they are giving the buyer a sense of belonging this then in turn convinces the person to purchase that particular one over a competitors.

We also looked at Zimbardo's Stanford prison experiment which showed us how people well conform and how they adopt the roles weather they be good or bad. I have posted the experiment below …. Watch and see for your self’s what happens.