The ethical consequences of brand management

a system-theoretical approach

Kai-Uwe Hellmann

pp. 165-180

in: Peter Koslowski (ed), Elements of a philosophy of management and organization, Berlin, Springer, 2010

Abstract

From the microeconomic point of view all the actions for the purpose of the creation of the brand and brand loyalty are the most significant investments of marketing if regarded purely strategically. In order to make a certain product attractive and saleable the whole product communication, which includes the product, its packaging, advertising and further promotional actions, is characterised by and reinforced with certain special features, all of which strive to comply with the AIDA principle: attention, interest, desire and action.Thereby manipulation, i.e. the intent to influence the consumer positively in the sense of the AIDA principle, is clearly the intention of marketing. To put it bluntly, marketing thus follows a very simplified form of causation, namely the successful marketing of the product as cause and the hoped for sales of the product as effect, whereupon the brand serves as medium and form at the same time. Hence one can say that marketing is a kind of applied social technique, a technique being regarded here as an efficient simplification of the process of communication that unquestionably achieves certain effects because it needs neither reflexion nor decision for that.