Strategic Brand Management

MKT 603

Faculty Curator: Marcus Collins (Ross School of Business, Marketing)

On view: Winter 2023

Students in Social Media Marketing learn about the challenges posed by the interactive nature of social media advertising and about strategies for effective marketing. A central idea is that an advertisement’s meaning is not produced by its creators, but by the consumers who have to make sense of it. Because of cultural and subcultural differences, audiences might find meanings that vary widely from one another and from what the marketers intended. Social media amplifies this meaning-making by putting consumers in contact with one another and allowing interaction with the marketing campaign itself.

The art we chose for this display asks us to consider the process of meaning-making from several angles. Some of the works are advertisements. How do the meanings that we get from them differ from person to person, over time, and across places? Other works are critical of the media and advertising. What do these satirical images say about consumers’ experiences of advertising and how it has permeated our lives?