Introduction
Graphic design communicates virtually using images to pass information or a message as effectively as possible. A text is regarded as an image in graphic designs since images are an abstraction of symbols that can be sounded. Graphics designs are, therefore, visual skills and cognitive abilities involving photography, illustration, typography, layout, and image processing. In digital marketing, graphic designs act as product and packaging, and brand design plays an essential role in visual communication. Consumerism in graphic design is the luxury aspiration that desires goods that happen not to be so crucial. Through the use of advertisements and marketing then, consumerism is encouraged. For the business industry, graphic design has a significant impact featuring consistent visual identity. This work is aimed at identifying relevant graphic design techniques used in modern marketing and developed to influence demand and consumer interest.
Consumer Interests Increasing
Consumer interests have constantly increased through advertising and strategies put to use to influence targeted consumers, and this has always been a significant challenge in the marketing sector (Michael & Rolhion, 2018). To engage consumers, retailers and manufacturers have come in with several strategies and approaches that aim at creating a brand value that they term promotional offers. Graphic elements then go in there to draw the attention of buyers (Belboula, 2021). For this to happen, the shape of a product, its color, display information on packages, and so many other graphics have been implemented. One of the most purchasing incentives is the visual appeal of a product. Manufacturers’ desire to attract consumers with their products by making them look appealing to their eyes has created a lot of creativity among marketers. They aim to develop relevant graphic design techniques, mainly used in modern marketing to impact consumer interests and increase demand in the long run; therefore, graphic design can be considered the center of consumption culture for products.
The constant search for opportunities to increase consumer interest through unique advertising and individual strategies for influencing target consumers has always been a significant marketing challenge. In their attempts to engage customers, manufacturers and retailers use a variety of approaches and solutions based both on creating brand value and on more primitive steps, such as promotional offers. Many tools designed to draw buyers’ attention is the use of graphic elements, including the color of the product, its shape, the principle of displaying information on the package, and some other instruments. The visual appeal of products is one of the purchasing incentives, which make opportunities for marketers to be creative.
Consistent Visual Identity
The visual identity of a company is not limited to a logo design or slogan. The components visible in a company’s brand, such as shape, color, form, and texture, give or convey an important message to the community, target consumers, and internal and external audiences, putting a value base into the image. The ad creates sufficient awareness, loyalty, and trust in the company’s brand products, which is considered brand awareness and strength. A company with a consistent visual identity continues to be more successful as it effectively resonates with customers through strong associations between external branding and internal reputation through operations and corporate social responsibility. This consistency in identity allows the brand to be remembered and recognized more effectively, reducing the amount of time spent on marketing and advertising: the more significant the brand in the market, the more room for innovation the company has.
Consumer expectations are achieved through a consistent identity and never get confused about what a particular company makes and offers. Having a company look and feel with a consistent identity makes customers believe they are getting the right product once connected to the company internally, from customer support interactions to product offerings. Thus, through graphic design, companies have created ways to ensure identity consistency by creating brand books describing the proper ways to implement consistency in a virtual identity, helping future employees, contractors, and partners to be consistent while avoiding brand value degradation. These brand books guide the use of fonts, shapes, icons, colors, proportions, and bold colors when presenting a brand.
Companies also used internal clients for consistency. Working with the same design partners is another way as they are experienced and able to complete future design projects without inconsistencies. Companies, including chemicals and flavors, ingredients, and fragrances, are moving forward to develop digital communications and creative prints that match visual identities, meaning graphic design is best. Draskovich said that 60% of consumers would instead use products from a brand they are familiar with and then switch to products they have never heard of or tried before (2007). However, with the rapid development of technologies integrated into marketing, the need for an innovation policy is necessary for remaining competitive and recognizable, mainly due to the brand’s visual identity and such phenomena as product labeling.
Product Labelling
The aesthetic function is not the only aspect that brings in consumers’ preferences. According to Petrova and Garcia Retamero (2018), graphic designs enable consumers to address concerns about their health through labeling appropriately. Through transparency in the labeling of products, manufacturers help consumers make buying decisions (Petrova & Garcia- Retamero, 2018). By including the composition of goods on the packages, manufacturers do not happen to violate the goods or food products’ design. Therefore, labeling is directly correlated with making the right decision as far as purchasing intentions decisions are concerned. Labelling also creates an advertising power to the consumers. That being said, Hosseini Siahdashti (2019) highlights cache space allocation within other obvious benefits of labels. Thus, this is a universal interaction system between the manufacturer and the buyer, thanks to which consumers receive all the necessary information about the purchased goods without resorting to additional sources. Appropriate and adequate labeling emphasizes the satisfaction of a wide range of interests of the buyer since not all of them perceive the visually received information in the same direction. In other words, labeling streamlines consumer consciousness in the short and long term and can become a tool for reflecting the values of the company.
CSR Communication through Packaging
Corporate social responsibility is becoming an integral part of the activities of any relatively large company, which can also be manifested through visual identification. The empirical studies show that several customers are switching to sustainable products (Cowe & Williams, 2001). The perception of CSR among customers plays a very significant role in buying behaviors (Harrison, Newholm & Shaw, 2005). The perceptions are achieved through improvements in the communications of CRS (Du, Bhattacharya &Sen, 2010). (Schmeltz, 2012) found that customers quickly notice CSR information in the packaging. Thus, through this channel, feel safer than using company websites or social media to access this information. Therefore, packaging as one of the graphic designs acts as a very appropriate way for in-store contexts to make customers make purchasing decisions so fast (Underwood & Ozane, 1998). Some expectations claim a big concern for cause-specific CSR, including environmental and health protection (Agariya, 2012). However, ignoring problems can have a more significant negative impact on reputation than even the most minor steps towards saving the environment and respecting people and society.
When presented in a misleading and unclear manner, CSR claims lower customers’ opinions and positive intentions, making them not buy that product (Newell, Goldsmith & Banzhaf, 1998). According to Habermas’s theory concerning communication action (Underwood & Ozane, 1998), CRS messages should be conveyed trustfully and credible. Furthermore, packaging should also attract customers (Bloch, 1997) to reinforce CSR communication. Cause unspecific CSR can be communicated through packaging color following the current study (Johnson, 2021). Customers respond to their perceptions concerning the understandability and how sincere the CSR messages are conveyed by using color in CPG packaging.
Color Patterns as Marketing Incentives
Product design is a complex operation that includes consideration of consumer interests. Packaging color when it comes to consumers’ preferences is one of the subject areas in extensive marketing research (Crozier, Grossman & Wisenblit, 1999). This perception is mainly caused by the individual observation of the light that the object has reflected. Traditionally, some visual methods are associated with perception stereotyping, for example, aggressiveness, shown through red or mystery, conveyed by dark colors. The response of individuals to color is instinctive and part innate (Humphrey, 1976). Positive experiences can lead to individual preferences for specific colors. These experiences may be religious, latent philosophical, cultural, or literary, giving people different meanings to similar colors. These colors’ associations influence individuals’ stimuli reactions (Aslam, 2006). Therefore, the color of the packaging acts as an element that is integral to communication. Color serves as a fast way of communicating, which gives arousing powers.
Moreover, colors can bring connotations to objects according to their associated situations (Aslam, 2006). Thus, the correct colors must be chosen to convey some customer messages. Currently, marketing literature lacks inquiry into the subject of color and CSR communication (Barchiesi, Castellan & Costa, 2018). The lack of attention is the acceptance that the green color is associated naturally with sustainability, CSR, and eco-friendliness (Hine, 1995). According to Delong and Goncu, 2012, the green color is not related to social and economic responsibility despite being associated with environmental responsibility. Respondents claimed that the color green is overused, becoming so eco- cliché (Barchiesi, 2018).
Design change and less use of green can create consumer confidence since white and blue colors are considered safe (Zeng, Deschenes & Durif, 2020). The marketing fields seem narrow, but so many dynamic shifts are done. From a deeper market perspective, color is mainly used by marketers to bring some cultural characteristics to the targeted audience. Customers perceive some products based on ethnic or other factors (Hoseini, 2019), which should be considered when manufacturing goods. (Yew et al., 2020), gives support to the idea by adding that palette which is an appropriate action as triggering reminding shoppers of specific products.
This factor can be used to advantage in creating unique marketing propositions, but preliminary segmentation of the target audience should be performed. Thus, color is a significant element in graphic design, greatly influencing customers purchasing decisions and stimulating sales of particular products. Regarding cultural characteristics, the packaging of products can be designed using unique historical patterns using appropriate colors, which can significantly lead to effective and increased demand amplification instruments. Therefore it is essential to examine how different colors could serve better and attract customers by improving the CSR claims’ clarity and credibility, fostering ethical consumption.
Aesthetic Appeal through Shapes
In addition to packaging colors, various designs can be used to attract consumers’ attention. Packaging design can be three-dimensional, designed to attract customers. (De Bondt, 2018) noted in their study that anthropomorphism is a production strategy used by many manufacturers. Products made in the same style as the body figure are perceived as unique compared to traditional flat shapes, and therefore they are in high demand. According to the researchers, this practice aims to satisfy buyers’ aesthetic needs. For example, the sight of a human figure can create apparent gender differences and possibly connect a product to a natural person (De Bondt, 2018). Therefore, simple forms of anthropomorphism are used for this. The practice is a simple graphic design principle but has an incredible way of capturing consumers’ attention.
Anthropomorphic forms on the market are mainly used in cosmetics and personal care. Shampoo bottles have different designs, liquid soaps, and lotions from other personal care products. The bottles are mainly made of human figures, which evoke noticeable associations among buyers. The primary purpose of these designs is to create an aesthetic stimulus, and marketers expect the plans to allow consumers to have this difference in their respective products in a similar line. According to Hoseini (2019), many buyers do not even have a clear idea of what the product they want should be, but aesthetic preferences act as a guide in the buying process: 73% of buying decisions are made during the sale. Therefore, graphic design has an essential function that significantly impacts buyers.
Historical Narrative as a Purchasing Driver
Graphic design products act as advertising commercially tracking so efficiently in its change and development. It is an essential tool that manufacturers, marketers, and buyers can use due to its ability to create attention among consumers and customers by emphasizing the individuality of products (Baek, Choo & Lee, 2018). The use of graphics can be tracked from the provincial newspaper and periodicals back in the eighteenth century. Therefore it has proved improvements in the local press which are vital in the 1780s. Through advertising, consumer revolutions were made to bring to the people the idea that they could decorate their homes and even bodies with graphic design elements, which were barely affordable. Signs and symbols in the ideologies of consumption and consumerism are seen in various forms of advertisements for the goods of consumers and bring out their significance in industrial societies. They create ad visuals and hence manage the perceptions of consumption and culture back in the community, making capitalism accepted by many and applied using effective advertising media today.
Before, graphic design was also a visual language and has continued to grow with the growing technology and has shown its activities in diverged areas. Graphic design products continue today due to their commercial natures, for they can be used for various purposes ranging from social campaigns and projects (Belboula, 2021). The art and craft movement, begun by William Morris, marked the beginning of a new process in the graphics field, which was in opposition to moral, artistic, and social complexity in the industrial revolution (Bektas, 1991). Advertisements have now found their way. In the 1980s, the development of mass communication products through graphics began, and everyday life motifs turned into industrial materials (Augun, 2006). Thus, the spiral between information and communication technology, graphic design, and mass communication continues to strengthen.
Unique cultural patterns have influenced demand, and this is a decisive marketing move that brings many manufacturers to the buyers. Historical narratives that any manufacturer places on the products in packaging act as a strong purchasing driver to the buyers. Having products with graphic elements that reflect cultural and historical needs makes the buyers feel tenderness, nostalgia, and other pleasant emotions (Chimenz & Sorrentino, 2017). Buyers and manufacturers experience satisfaction in this provides an example of geopolitical events, social movements, and other contexts specific to a particular cultural community and unite the target audience through a standard message and similar attitudes (Chimenz & Sorrentino, 2017). When seeing familiar plots on the packaging, consumers have confidence in the manufacturer, which is one of the main tasks of demand formation. Marketers make any historical narrative linked to the past or the future into subconscious cues of shoppers, creating a sense of personal impact and proving that graphic design is a viable strategy.
Conclusion
Visual identity is an essential part of marketing and advertising and is used as a tool to highlight the unique features of a product or service. Color and shapes are mainly used for aesthetic purposes in addition to historical narratives, which are a client-centric approach. Labeling as a means of communication, reflecting only the vital message of the product, acts as a marketing ploy and ensures the safety of consumer decisions. Thus, universal graphic elements allow customers to have primary data on relevant products, allowing marketers to interact more with the target audience in a communication mode. Graphic design in industry and consumerism is causing changes that reflect geopolitical, cross-cultural, and many other factors.
References
Aslam, W., Augun, T.S (2006). Connotation of objects according to different colours. Journal of Business Research, 88, 91–101. Web.
Baek, E., Choo, H. J., & Lee, S. H. (2018). Using warmth as the visual design of a store: Intimacy, relational needs, and approach intentions. Journal of Business Research, 88, 91–101.
Barchiesi, M. A., Castellan, S., & Costa, R. (2018). In the eye of the beholder: Communicating CSR through colour in packaging design. Journal of Marketing Communications, 24(7), 720–733. Web.
Belboula, I., & Ackermann, C.-L. (2021). Consumer response to service brand physical elements: Using a semantic priming task to explore the implicit understanding of service brand meaning. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 61, 102019.
Chimenz, L., & Sorrentino, N. (2017). I am known for the unknown. Images from the past for the present future. Proceedings of the International and Interdisciplinary Conference IMMAGINI? Brixen, Italy, 27–28 November 2017. 1(9), 865. Web.
De Bondt, C., Van Kerckhove, A., & Geuens, M. (2018). Look at that body! How anthropomorphic package shapes systematically appeal to consumers. International Journal of Advertising, 37(5), 698–717. Web.
Draskovic, N. (2007). The marketing role of packaging: a review. International Journal of Management Cases, 9(3-4), 315-323.
Hoseini Siahdashti, S. J. (2019). Investigating the role of food packaging in design and colour in consumer purchasing behavior. International Journal of Management, Accounting & Economics, 6(7), 542–550.
Johnson, E. R. (2021). Sensation and perception. Salem Press Encyclopedia of Health.
Michael, G. A., & Rolhion, P. (2008). Cool colours: Color-induced nasal thermal sensations. Neuroscience Letters, 436(2), 141–144.
Petrova, D., & Garcia-Retamero R. (2018). How to effectively communicate risks to diverse consumers. Analiz Riska Zdorovʹû, 4, 114–119. Web.
Yew, L. K., FengQiao, C., Hoo, W. C., Omar, R., & Kowang, T. O. (2020). The influence of packaging attributes on the customer buying decision. INTI Journal, 2020, 278–283.
Zeng, T., Deschenes, J., & Durif, F. (2020). Eco-design packaging: An epistemological analysis and transformative research agenda. Journal of Cleaner Production, 276. Web.