The Nature of Marketing Arguments
As we discussed in Chapter 1, an argument is a set of statements comprising premises and a conclusion. Because arguments are meant to persuade, some philosophers do not insist that arguments contain True, with a capital “T” premises. Rather, an argument’s premises simply need to be persuasive to your audience—that is, you need to supply your audience with good reasons and logic to believe that your argument’s claims are true. Here’s how Professor Kevin deLaplante explains this qualification:1
Let me just wrap up with an objection to this modification that [premises just need to be plausible to one’s audience and not necessarily true] ... Some people might object that what I’ve done here is redefined the concept of truth into something purely relative and subjective, that I’m denying the existence of objective truth.
This isn’t what I’m saying. All I’m saying is that the persuasive power of an argument isn’t a function of the actual truth of its premises. It’s a function of the subjective plausibility of its premises for a given audience. A premise may be genuinely, objectively true, but if no one believes it’s true, then no one will accept it as a premise, and any argument that employs it is guaranteed to fail, in the sense that it won’t be judged by anyone as offering good reasons to accept it.
This point doesn’t imply anything about the actual truth or falsity of the claims. We can say this and still say that claims or beliefs can be objectively true or false. The point is just that the objective truth or falsity of the claims isn’t the feature that plays a role in the actual success or failure of real world arguments. It’s the subjective plausibility of premises that plays a role ....
From now on, we use the term true to mean a premise that is either true with a capital T or plausible to your audience.
There are two general kinds of arguments—deductive and inductive. “A deductive argument is an argument that is intended by the arguer to be (deductively) valid, that is, to provide a guarantee of the truth of the conclusion provided that the argument’s premises (assumptions) are true.”2 We come across deductive arguments in fields such as mathematics (e.g., geometry), physics (e.g., Newton’s laws of motion), and chemistry (e.g., how various elements interact with each other). For example, given a certain amount of purified water, atmospheric pressure at 1,000 mb, a temperature of 0°C, and the laws of physics (our argument’s premises), our conclusion that water will freeze is guaranteed.
By contrast,
An inductive argument is an argument that is intended by the arguer merely to establish or increase the probability of its conclusion. In an inductive argument, the premises are intended only to be so strong that, if they were true, then it would be unlikely that the conclusion is false.3
If a firm increases its marketing and advertising budgets—the premises of a marketing strategy—the conclusion that sales will increase is likely, but not guaranteed. Nearly all good arguments in marketing are inductive (not deductive) because, if their premises are true, their conclusions are not guaranteed to be true—they are just likely to be true.
Figure 2.1 shows a few terms related to deductive and inductive arguments. Deductive arguments can be valid or invalid and, if they are valid, they can also be sound or unsound. A valid argument is one in which, if the premises are assumed to be true, then the conclusion is guaranteed to be true. For example, consider the following argument:
Premise 1: If a sales rep exceeds her sales quota by 20 percent, she is eligible for a salary bonus of 10 percent.
Premise 2: Mary exceeded her sales quota by 25 percent.
Conclusion: Therefore, Mary is eligible for a 10 percent salary bonus.
Figure 2.1 Deductive and inductive arguments
This argument is valid because if you assume that the premises are true, then the conclusion is guaranteed to be true. Furthermore, if the premises are indeed true, then the argument is sound. So all sound arguments are valid, but not all valid arguments are sound, as in the following example:
Premise 1: All dogs are robots.
Premise 2: Spot is a dog.
Conclusion: Therefore, Spot is a robot.
This is a valid deductive argument because if you assume that the premises are true—even though in reality dogs are not robots—the conclusion is true. This argument, however, is not sound because one of the premises is false—all dogs are not robots.
In contrast to valid or invalid, and sound or unsound deductive arguments, inductive arguments can be strong or weak, and cogent or not cogent. A strong inductive argument is one in which, if the premises are true, then the conclusion is likely, but not guaranteed to be true. The answer to the question, “How likely does an argument need to be to be considered ‘strong’?” is subjective. It depends on whether or not your audience is persuaded that your argument is likely.
If an inductive argument is strong and the premises are true, the argument is cogent. For example, consider the following simple (and admittedly incomplete) marketing argument to help explain strength and cogency:
Premise 1: Increases in perceived brand quality, all other factors held constant, cause increases in market share, based on a recent marketing research study.
Premise 2: Our product is perceived to possess only average quality among consumers who considered but rejected our brand, based on a recent marketing research study.
Conclusion: Therefore, if we can improve prospects’ perceptions of our brand’s quality, all other factors held constant, market share will increase.
This is a strong inductive argument because, if you assume true premises, the conclusion is likely.4 Your audience would have good reason to accept this conclusion because Premise 1 serves as a kind of “law” or empirical regularity in the market, which, when combined with Premise 2, makes the conclusion likely. (Clearly, other premises are required to make this a stronger argument—for example, high-quality brands need to be competitively priced.) The argument is cogent because (1) it is a strong argument and (2) the premises are plausible because they are based, presumably, on valid research.
Returning to a comment we made earlier that marketing arguments are nearly always inductive, not deductive. There are several reasons for this. First, marketing behavior is not deterministic as are many physical laws such as gravity. For example, although the law of supply and demand says that the quantity demanded of a product is inversely related to its price, sometimes when a product’s price increases, demand increases too. Consider the following story recounted by Rand Fishkin:5
Savador Assael, the Pearl King, single-handedly created the market for black pearls, which were unknown in the industry before 1973. His first attempt to market the pearls was an utter failure; he didn’t sell a single pearl. So he went to his friend, Harry Winston, and had Winston put them in the window of his 5th Avenue store with an outrageous price tag attached. Then he ran full page ads in glossy magazines with black pearls next to diamonds, rubies, and emeralds. Soon, black pearls were considered precious.
Second and related to the above, consumers are not robots. We assume that they have some kind of free will. No matter how compelling a marketer might believe his marketing offer is, sometimes consumers won’t buy it.
Third, often the premises of marketing arguments contain information about the features of a market—how many potential consumers are in a given market, competitor market shares, information on what motivates brand choice, and so on—and this information is inaccurate or incomplete. For instance, marketing research—a great tool for measuring attributes of a market—can often only estimate these attributes. These characteristics generally cannot be measured with 100 percent accuracy—often research projects interview samples of populations and not entire populations—and small amounts of measurement error (e.g., respondents not answering questions accurately) may greatly affect the likelihood of our conclusions. Additionally, once a research study is complete, the market may have changed. In short, marketers rarely possess perfect knowledge; consequently, marketers’ arguments at best can be inductively strong, but rarely deductively valid.
In conclusion, instead of trying to formulate valid and sound deductive marketing arguments, strive for strong and cogent inductive ones. Certainly, one way to do this is to avoid using the logical fallacies defined in this book. Other ways are presented in subsequent Think Better sections.
Chapter Takeaways
To make good arguments, your premises need to be at least plausible to your audience; they don’t need to be true with a capital “T.” For simplicity, we use the term true to mean a premise that is either true with a capital “T” or plausible to your audience.
If you intend for your argument’s conclusion to be guaranteed, given true premises, you are making a deductive argument. If you simply intend for your argument’s conclusion to be likely to your audience, then you are making an inductive argument.
A deductive argument is said to be valid if its conclusion is guaranteed, assuming true premises. A valid deductive argument is sound if its premises are also true.
An inductive argument is said to be sound if its conclusion is likely, assuming true premises. A sound inductive argument is said to be cogent if its premises are also true.
Marketing arguments are almost nearly always inductive because human behavior is not deterministic in nature and marketers do not possess perfect knowledge.
Avoiding logical fallacies contributes to making good arguments.