You should spend about 40 minutes on this task.
Write about the following topic:
In their advertising, businesses nowadays usually emphasise that their products are new in some way. Why is this? Do you think it is a positive or negative development?
Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience.
Write at least 250 words.
Sample Answer 1: [View: It is a negative development.]
Businesses often have to endure the cut-throat competition in order to attract customers and increase sales and profit. As a means to attract more customers, they have a tool called “advertisement” which emphasises how their products stand out from the crowd and how uniquely novel they are. I believe advertising new and unique features of a product is a marketing and branding strategy to boost sales, and in my opinion, it is mostly a negative development.
Every brand claims that they have the best product in the market, and their goods have fascinating new features. They do so to create a positive impression to the consumers to increase their sales and profitability while also staying ahead of their competitors. Take the advertisements that we watch on TV for consumer products like shampoo, soaps or body lotion – all of which proclaim that their products have the best ingredients and something new that their counterparts do not have. Even they beat their old versions by adding a new vitamin or flavour (which is often ridiculed by scientists) and claiming that this is the best ever product! Clearly, this is a marketing strategy to boost sales and profitability while also creating a craving among the consumers for their products.
It is mostly a negative trend because the new features that the businesses advertise are nothing novel in the true sense. They are just another version of the same product with a change in look, flavour or ingredients. It is true that industries like car manufacturers and electronic device manufacturers sometimes do extensive research to revamp their products and truly add new features for their customers. But most often consumer products and even the famous hardware brands add more creativity to their advertisements than the real products, thus making a false sense that people need their new products.
In conclusion, novelty and innovation in products come through research and development, not through marketing and advertising tricks – which is often the case in the adverts we are exposed to. It is expected that advertisements by brands would reflect the true features of goods rather than claiming something new and innovative every now and then.
Sample Answer 2: [View: It is a positive development.]
Brands often promote their products as innovative and novel. They primarily do so to attract more customers and increase their sales. In my opinion, any effort, on the part of businesses, to describe their products or services in a new light should be considered a positive thing because, without such practices, we would not be able to know about many of the necessary products and services that we use today.
The obvious reason for this trend is that all businesses want to boost their sales and revenues. But, unfortunately, increasing sales and revenues is not always as easy as it may sound, especially, when they are operating in a very fiercely competitive market. And that is exactly why they need to employ innovative advertising ideas and business strategies to show their prospective customers that their products indeed are “something new” and offer better values for the prices they pay.
Such “tactics” is also a positive development and indeed needed because it helps businesses and companies reach and attract a larger customer base from different lifestyles, cultural backgrounds, professions, ages, races and religions. In other words, we all are different, with different tastes and preferences, and therefore it is only natural that the businesses would want to target each group of these customers with different and unique messages in order to showcase and identify their products as something “new”. Moreover, such strategies employed by businesses bring positive results to many consumers because, the majority of the customers today, if not all, expect more out of their life. In other words, they do not necessarily like to remain satisfied with the same kinds of products that offer the same kind of “values”. The companies and manufacturers, of course, also know this too well except they are just not able to come up with different kinds of products every month, so to speak, to meet their customers’ demands.
In conclusion, to keep customers on board and enhance sales businesses often advertise their products and services as innovative and new. It helps both customers to satisfy their more-than-life expectations as consumers while also bringing in more revenue to businesses.