How do marketers influence self esteem? One important route is a process of social comparison, which is a basic human tendency. And many marketers tap into our need for benchmarks when they supply idealized images of happy, attractive people who just happen to use their products. So we don't tend to assess our self esteem in a vacuum. We're often asking ourselves the question at least unconsciously compared to whom, in a study that illustrates the power of the social comparison process, female college students who were exposed to beautiful women in advertisements afterward expressed lower satisfaction with their own appearance. The social comparison process even operates when we decide how much we want to eat.

Another study found that people who were served food by a server Who was either fat or thin? chose different portion sizes? All the time for a pop quiz. Let's see if you can answer this question. I certainly hope so. Sara Lee found that consumers who are low in self esteem a were more likely to eat cake B lacked self control and valued set portion sizes.

C wanted to sample a wider variety of snack products, or D tended to hide their snacking from their friends and family. If you pick B give yourself a pat on the back. The takeaway here is that we often see so called aspirational marketing strategies that offer consumers a vision of their identity. Real selves that is where they could be not where they are now. And this is a plus as long as this vision is not viewed as totally unattainable. In other words, consumers tend to want to see a picture of themselves as a work in progress and to believe that they will be better tomorrow and even better the next day.

So if you show them a social comparison image that is a little bit farther along than they are, they will respond very well to that. On the other hand, if you show them an image that is totally unattainable, they're more likely to just throw up their hands and say, Well, I'm never going to attain that. So why bother? Now this aspirational marketing strategy, which is very common, very common and advertising, highlights the importance of comparing the real and ideal selves when a consumer compares some aspect of himself to an item Deal. This judgment influences his self esteem. So he might ask, am I as good looking as I would like to be?

Or do I make as much money as I should. The ideal self is a person's conception of how he would like to be. Whereas the actual self refers to our more realistic appraisal of the qualities we do and don't have. We choose some products because we think they are consistent with our actual self, while we buy others to help us reach an ideal standard. We also often engage in a process of impression management, in which we work hard to manage what others think of us. This means that we strategically choose clothing and other products that will show us off to others in a good light.

If you've ever talked to students who are agonizing over what to wear on a job interview. You can certainly sympathize with the process of impression management and how much thought and indeed agonizing thought people often give to this process. Opportunities for impression management abound. And as you know, this includes how you act at business dinners or networking events. Indeed, researchers recently found evidence of what they call an imbibing idiot bias. These researchers found that even when they are not actually impaired, people who simply hold an alcoholic beverage are perceived to be less intelligent than those who do not.

In their study job candidates who ordered wine during an interview held over dinner, were viewed as less intelligent and less hireable Then candidates who ordered soda. Ironically, the job candidates themselves believe that ordering wine rather than soda helped them to appear more intelligent. Another important aspect of the self is fantasy, which is a way that we bridge the gap between the real and ideal selves. Most of us experience a discrepancy between our real and ideal selves. But for some consumers, this gap is especially large. These people are good targets for marketing communications that employ fantasy appeals.

A fantasy or Daydream is a self induced shift in consciousness, which is sometimes a way to compensate for a lack of external stimulation, or perhaps to escape from problems in the real world. One interesting application that we're seeing a fantasy appeals comes in the form of virtual makeovers. During a virtual makeover, a consumer can experiment with different looks before she actually takes the plunge in the real world. So we talked in an earlier module about the importance of perceived risk. What we're seeing here is that technology is presenting exciting new ways to almost totally eliminate the risk factor. When people are looking at products that might enhance the self.

It's a very, very important change in technology. That has huge consequences, I believe for a lot of marketing applications. So the takeaway is that many products and services succeed because they appeal to our fantasies and add may transport us to an unfamiliar, exciting situation. Things we purchase may permit us to try on Interesting or provocative roles. Think carefully in your own line of business about whether consumers are looking to satisfy the needs of a real self or an ideal self. The answer is going to have a big impact on how you position your products.