please please rate my AWA im gonna take the exam in 2 weeks !
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05 Dec 2016, 09:48
The following appeared in an announcement issued by the publisher of The Mercury, a weekly newspaper:
“Since a competing lower-priced newspaper, The Bugle, was started five years ago, The Mercury’s circulation has declined by 10,000 readers. The best way to get more people to read The Mercury is to reduce its price below that of The Bugle, at least until circulation increases to former levels. The increased circulation of The Mercury will attract more businesses to buy advertising space in the paper.”
Here my answer :
The argument that The Mercury will attract more businesses to buy advertising space in paper by reducing its selling price below that of Bubble, fails to mention several key factors on the basis of which the argument could be evaluated. The argument is flawed not only because it assumes that higher selling price than that of Bubble is responsible for the the reduction in circulation but also because it assumes that the most effective way to increase its sales is to reduce its selling price.
Firstly, the argument readily assumes that there is a causal relationship between high price and decrease in sales. This statement is stretch and not substantiated anyway. While there is rough correlation between the factors, it does not mean that one causes another. It is possible that even after Mercury decreases its selling price, it will not experience increase in circulation because their audiences are different. To illustrate, if one writes about politics and the other about arts, then reducing the selling price will have little effect if not no effect at all. Another alternate reason for the decline in sales of the paper is that the readers were unpleased with the quality of paper’s content.
Secondly, while it is clear that increased circulation will make the paper more attractive to advertisers, it is not obvious that lowering the price is the most effective way to gain readers. Actually, there are many better ways to gain readers. For instance, Mercury can make its articles available online with the same price. As result, Mercury will have more readers who otherwise cannot get access to Mercury content because of their locations.
In order to remedy the flaws in the argument, the author must fix two parts of the argument. First, the argument needs to demonstrate how lower price than that of competitor will increase sales; evidence about readers’ attitude toward lower selling price could be gathered. Second, the argument needs to prove that all the other strategies are not more effective than the strategy mentioned in the argument; information about the other strategies could be gathered.
Clearly, the argument is not appealing as it ignores crucial information. To assess the merits of certain situation, it is essential to have full knowledge of all contributing factors.