Editing Perception management (section)

=== Marketing ===
The best medium for businesses to affect the perceptions of the public is through marketing. To get people to buy products, marketers must identify a ''need'' and manage the perception of the public so that they feel the product will fulfill that need.

This is not the same thing as manipulation, where businesses create something people don't need, and marketers convince them that they do need it. Good perception management is to the benefit of the [[consumer]], as it fulfills more of the customer's needs, and to the benefit of the business, as it increases their revenue.<ref>{{cite web|author=Smith, B.|year=1994|title=Perception Management|publisher=The Empire Club of Canada Speeches 1994-1995|url=http://www.empireclubfoundation.com/details.asp?FT=yes&SpeechID=1270|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160130172724/http://www.empireclubfoundation.com/details.asp?FT=yes&SpeechID=1270|archive-date=2016-01-30}}</ref>

In some{{which|date=October 2013}} marketing schemas, marketers create a need that was not present and then offer to fulfill that need. A good example of this is credit card companies. [[Credit card]] companies are companies that, like most other companies, started off by providing a convenience to the population.

Credit cards offer an alternative method of payment to cash or check and make life simpler for many people; however, today there are over 600 million credit cards issued in the United States alone and four major credit card companies.<ref name="creditcards.com">{{cite web |author=CreditCards.com |url=http://www.creditcards.com/credit-card-news/credit-card-industry-facts-personal-debt-statistics-1276.php#most-popular-searches |title=Credit card statistics, industry facts, debt statistics |publisher=Creditcards.com |access-date=2012-02-23 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100207180147/http://www.creditcards.com/credit-card-news/credit-card-industry-facts-personal-debt-statistics-1276.php#most-popular-searches |archive-date=2010-02-07 |url-status=dead }}</ref> It is no longer even possible to buy a car, get a home loan, or rent an apartment from many companies without a positive [[credit score]].

This fact has necessitated the need for almost every citizen to have a credit card. However, many credit cards companies manage their perception to make sure that people continue to need credit cards, and control their perception so that many people do not fully understand what they are getting into. However, the fact that the average household in the United States is in over fifteen thousand dollars worth of debt never reaches the widespread public.<ref name="creditcards.com"/> Instead, they publicize how they will help if a card gets stolen, or that they have the lowest interest percentage compared to the other major competitors. But no company tells their customers that the promoted [[interest rate]] more than doubles if they do not pay the minimum balance on time. For instance, [[Discover Card|Discover's]] interest rate increases to 18.99% after the first minimum balance is not paid on time.<ref>[https://www.discovercard.com/cardmembersvcs/acqs/app/exec?dynaviewMain=INFO&brand=MORE&sc=KBL9&icmpgn=1007_cc_grdt_cbcterm_btn_001 Discover Card Contract]</ref>

In short, though credit cards are convenient and fulfill a need, the companies often make no mention of the negative effects that they might have on many of their users.