it is not uncommon thatSamsungsmart phones are used everywhere in all walks of lives, including students, workers

Fantastic news! We've Found the answer you've been seeking!

Question:

it is not uncommon thatSamsungsmart phones are used everywhere in all walks of lives, including students, workers and officers. Its advertisements of the newest model of smart phones are also shown on TV, on social media, in magazines (etc.) most of the days; if not all.

Samsung is one of the largest information technology companies, sharing almost all markets withApple, its major competitor. With making US$30 billion dollars net income per year, however, it may be hard to imagine that Samsung is submerged in some unethical marketing practices.

However, in October 2013, the unthinkable occurred. A shocking news story reported in October of 2013 grabbed attention all over the world, including that of Samsung's customers and its competitors as well. Taiwanese regulators eventually fined Samsung the equivalent of US$340,000 for an astroturfing campaign directed against HTC.

How did we get here?

Although Samsung has such a large market share in the smart phone industry, with almost half of it, their marketers were still not satisfied with it and wanted to further enlarge its share in Taiwan. The marketers used hired writers to post fake comments about HTC (one of the competitors of Samsung) in different forums in Taiwan. The objective was to persuade potential consumers not to buy HTC smart phone products.

Back in April (2013), Taiwan's Fair Trade Commission opened an investigation into Samsung's advertising practices, after news broke that a local marketing company working for Samsung had hired a large number of writers to post negative comments against HTC and other competitors. Not only did the writers post negative comments about HTC, a Taiwanese company that manufactures smartphones, they did the converse. They wrote positive comments about Samsung products in Taiwanese forums.

The anonymous commenters, who were unmasked turned out to be students, bloggers and designated employees of Samsung. They were paid to badmouth competitors and praise Samsung's own products; a practice that is not only unethical, but also illegal.

How did they do it?

The FTC found that Samsung went through one of its Taiwan units, called Opentide,to pull off the marketing ploy, according toAgence France-Presse (AFP). The paid writers, hired through a third-party marketing company, and Samsung employees hid their true identities as they posted negative reports about One, HTC's flagship cell phone.

"This is the first case of its kind in Taiwan that a company has concealed its genuine status while attacking a rival," commission spokesman Sun Lih-chyun told AFP.

"The deceitful behaviour has negative impacts on market order and violated the fair trade law."

Following the opening of the investigation, Samsung announced it ceased all marketing activities involving comments and claimed the campaign was a mistake caused by "insufficient training". TheAFPreported at the timethat Samsung was risking a fine of up to US$835,000.

When the investigation first started in April, Samsung issued the following statement:

"Samsung Electronics Taiwan (SET) has ceased all marketing activities that involve the posting of anonymous comments, and will ensure that all SET online marketing activities will be fully compliant with the company's Online Communications Credo,"the statement read.

While the fine (US$340,000) is a significant amount, it's just pocket change for the largest smartphone manufacturer in the world, widely expected toannounce another quarter of multi-billion profits in 2013.

Unethical marketing practice

Samsung was fined US$340,000 for this unfair marketing strategy. The unethical marketing practiceperformed by Samsung was said to be a deceptive practice. Since Samsung paid many bloggers or writers to blacken the image of its competitor, HTC, in order to attract potential customers away from HTC to its own brand.

The innocent customers may have blindly believed in the massive fake comments as these comments appeared in many phone-related websites and they could not reasonably ascertain the identity of the writers of the comments.

Therefore, the customers may have a worse image of HTC and switch to another brand, which might most probably be Samsung's. The marketers of Samsung use such an unethical marketing method to try to cheat the customers by providing misleading and deceptive promotions in an indirect way should not be appreciated. Indeed, profitable customer relationships are built with value and trust.

Samsung products do have their value and own relatively high quality compared with its competitors. Therefore, there is no reason for Samsung to destroy the image of others by spreading fake rumours through the Internet. The trust between the company and their customers will be deteriorated and it would be really hard to reconnect the trust between them once it is broken. In the future, Samsung should put much emphasis on its value and trust between customers to bring itself back to the right track.

Public image

The insult of getting caught red-handed is probably much harder to stomach for Samsung than the fine, at a time when its public image has been tarnished bybenchmark rigging,the region locking debacle, and, most recently,rumours of a clampdown on unofficial accessories. Moreover, Samsung has suffered from criticisms for their planned obsolescence.

Samsung like Apple have been criticized for the obsolescence that they planned with the sole objective of making more profit by selling more models of their phones. Both of them persistently introduce new models of smart phones every year. Plenty advertisements are made in different channels to transmit the information of the new products to the public.

Although the changes in both outer look and inner equipment do not have a big difference when compared with the old one, many people are excited with the announcement of the new products and wanted to buy one once they have been launched. Price was not a factor. Since the whole society is submerged into materialism, people are judged by what they own, while the makers of Samsung successfully grab the weaknesses of the consumers and persuade them to buy the latest in order to keep themselves trendy or looks fashionable.

Therefore, it creates a trend of obsolescence that people still consume the newest model even if the one they own is still fully functioning.

Indeed, the unethical marketing practice harms not only their customers, but also the society. The waste that planned obsolescence created, most likely the electrical wastes, contains much toxic chemical material which may badly affect the soil of the land and also last long for hundreds of years. People may be poisoned when the wastes are not treated properly. The social cost should also be considered when making marketing decisions. Things can be done better by Samsung given the criticism of planned obsolescence.

This should include having a balance struck between the products they introduce and the impact to the whole society.

References:

https://acasestudy.com/case-study-of-marketing-ethics/

https://www.foxnews.com/world/samsung-fined-for-hiring-people-to-post-fake-online-comments

https://www.androidauthority.com/samsung-fine-fake-comments-286106/

QUESTION

Consumers can alter their self-image. Explain how self-image alteration can increase Samsung's sales citing examples from the Case and making any necessary assumptions. (10 marks)