Maslow's Human Needs

Maslow's Pyramid of Human Needs is a hierarchy for displaying the needs of humans. They begin with the basics needed for survival, without any emotional development. This is the Physiological segment. As each level progresses it is less about just surviving, and more about comfort and development. Safety, Love and Belonging and Esteem are all based upon enabling the person to be fulfilled in life and to be happy. The top most segment, Self-Actualisation is about intellectual development - creativity, problem solving and lack of prejudice.

For a person to look at the higher segments, they must have fulfiled some, if not all, of the needs in the lower levels. This is a logical way of looking at it - after all you're not likely to want sexual intimacy if you haven't had a meal for a week.

For my strategy for the products and in the advertising I am going to assume, with my audience being that of one higher on the socio-economic hierarchy, that the Physiological (food, water, breathing etc), Safety, Love / belonging and Esteem are already at least partly existing within the individual.

Because of this I am going to appeal to the Self-Actualisation part of the pyramid. Creativity and spontaneity. Creativity is an area I'd like to focus on most, since my target audience will be the generation who have access to new tools and the time to learn them. Artistic students and those who work in creative industries are the prime targets and I must aim my advertising and themes around them.