When Marketing Kills

This deep dive is our monthly love letter to the community. We keep it free for everyone because knowledge on commercial influence should be accessible. 

A few years ago, I presented at the annual American Public Health Association (APHA) conference on the misleading marketing practices of Guatemala’s chicken industry. I shared how corporations that sell products made from broilers raised in factory farms were using images of free-roaming chickens raised in backyards on their packaging, advertisements, and social media. I detailed how global brands headquartered in the U.S. and Europe that sourced chicken meat from countries like El Salvador used the word “criolla” for their packaged soups and seasonings, manufacturing the perception that the products contained heritage, backyard chicken from Guatemala, which is what criolla means to local people. I showed how marketing portrayed indigenous women’s chicken production as dirty and unsafe in order to position industrial products as “cleaner”, more “trustworthy” alternatives. 

I then showed how all of these claims were unsupported by scientific evidence. I argued that the words, symbols, and pictures that broiler companies co-opted from indigenous chicken production trick consumers into thinking they’re buying a free range, local chicken product. I also argued that these claims unfairly take away market share from indigenous women’s genuinely home-grown birds, undermining the very way of life of Mayan people in Guatemala. And both consumers and producers are supposed to be protected by the country’s misleading advertising laws. 

“Isn’t that just good marketing, though?” asked an audience member who identified himself as hailing from the livestock industry. I was slightly taken aback by an industry rep attending the country’s biggest public health conference. I was more taken aback by his question as I wasn’t expecting someone to wave off the evidence I presented with a sort of “yeah, but boys will be boys” attitude towards problematic marketing practices.

I can’t remember exactly what I answered that day. I think I just reiterated some of my earlier points. Unfortunately, on that occasion, as it often does, my best response came to me well after the conversation was over. 

I now know what I wish I’d said: 

“While corporate marketing’s goal is to sell more products (and to shape beliefs, attitudes, and policies so that they can sell us even more stuff), most people seem to agree that we are not OK with being misled. We are not OK with marketing making us buy something other than what we think we’re buying, and we are not OK with it unfairly hurting sellers that actually do deliver on their promises. That’s why Guatemala has laws protecting consumers and producers from false advertising, as does the United States, along with over 100 other countries. Together, much of the world seems to think it’s pretty wrong for marketing to be deceptive and manipulative. So, no, sir. It isn’t “just good marketing.” It’s bad marketing. It’s unethical, illegal, and harmful.”

You might be thinking that the chicken ad examples are not that bad. And sure, it’s unlikely that any people will die because of those particular marketing tactics. But deceptive and manipulative marketing practices and the harmful outcomes they yield lie on a spectrum, and the field of commercial determinants shows us that marketing can, indeed, kill.

But before we dive into that, know that there’s more to marketing than advertising. In fact, there’s a lot more to marketing than meets the eye. And marketing’s a lot more present in our daily lives than we know. 

Marketing has always been more than obvious advertising on billboards, television, or print media (see Edward Bernays’ 1928 treatise on corporate propaganda for examples of the variety of marketing tactics used for well over a century from the grandfather of modern PR). Yet, today, marketing—business activities or features whose goal is to sell—is so much of what consumer goods and services companies do: from product design to packaging; from pricing strategies to content, social media, and native platform, gaming, and virtual reality advertising and influencing; and from charitable, educational, and corporate social responsibility programs to corporate political activity. Researchers conceptualize this breadth of marketing as the four P’s: product, place, promotion, and price. And it’s incredibly sophisticated, based as it is, increasingly, openly, and unabashedly, on exploiting our cognitive, emotional, and social biases in a way that has been supercharged by social media and AI.

The case of infant formula shows us how extensive yet covert marketing is these days. Angus et al (2020) detail the grooming process formula companies unleash on unsuspecting soon-to-be mothers around the world. One example of the long game the industry plays is designing and distributing “free” pregnancy and baby community apps to build trust throughout the pregnancy journey. At the same time, crucially, the companies collect personal data, like each mother’s baby’s due date, in order to-–at just the right, perfectly calibrated moments—subtly influence her in the direction of using formula instead of breastfeeding. Another tactic is using doctors, nurses, hospitals, and clinics to give out free formula samples to powerfully suggest these trusted providers’ and institutions’ tacit product endorsement. A third is marketing the exact same product at different price points (an illegal and unethical practice) to different female audiences using different packaging and tailored emotional cues based on their parenting style.

While the marketing in the Guatemala chicken example may not be responsible for deaths, the infant formula example is different. Industrial baby formula is a vital product for women that are unable, for one reason or another, to breastfeed. However, marketing by the breast milk substitutes (BMS) industry is harmful when it convinces millions to not breastfeed when they otherwise could and would. Marketing has been proven to encourage formula consumption, and, as a result, global markets for BMS products reached over U.S.$70 billion by 2019. While only 40% of women around the world now follow World Health Organization’s breastfeeding guidelines, the public health group estimates that if all babies were breastfed - not formula fed - 800,000 infant deaths would be avoided each year.

We see how marketing kills even more clearly in the development, promotion, and sale of undoubtedly harmful products. It’s unlikely that large portions of the population would take up and continue smoking, drinking, or gambling if it wasn’t for marketing. The products are designed to be addictive and aggressively promoted for widespread adoption.