Money Wise
Much to our expectation, Television is a good source of consumer finance information. It is by far the largest communication tool in terms of sending messages to the general public. The majority of families in the country have some form of access to television programs. The financial experts have found out that this can be a good way of reaching the public in terms of recommending products to them.
The first forum is the normal advertising that comes onto the screen from time to time. The banks will promote their products and bring out different people that have positive experiences of working with them. Normally this touches a nerve in the consumers because they have the image in front of them. For example the person might be facing financial difficulties but when they see the adverts for a loan they can then make a decision to put in an application.
The financial companies have aloes worked out ways of making specialist programs that deal with finance. In these programs they will discuss the stock market and the different financial products that are available. Although the program is apparently geared towards education, they do a lot of advertising in the process. For example a finance journalist might tip a certain company to be making profits during the course of the program.
Smart Finance
This is a clever way of disseminating consumer finance information. It allows for the dual objectives of advertising and education to be implemented. Even if the customer does not immediately buy the product, the idea of it will be firmly implanted in their minds and they will go for it at the earliest opportunity.
The middle income families are targeted for consumer finance information because it is assumed that they have a savings culture. This is true for many of them but I am of the view that things are changing. The recent credit crunch showed us that middle income families were very vulnerable to the financial problems that tended to be associated with the poorer segments of society. For example their endemic desire to uplift their living standards meant that they were not resistant to the charms of the credit card.
In fact a lot of their credit card spending was simply atrocious. This was coupled with the fact that we no longer looked at debt as something to be ashamed of. In fact the mere suggestion that one is entitled to apply for credit meant that they were respected by the financial world. That means that the way that consumer finance information is targeted to the middle income families has to change.
Rather than working on the basis of the old stereotypes of a savings culture, we need to present consumer finance information that addresses the reality of the situation for many of the potential applicants. We have to accept that many of them cannot simply afford some of the basic stuff that will take them to the next level on the income ladder. We also have to think about repayment.
