What Makes Advertising Effective - Literature review Example

? Effective Advertising of the Introduction Bronnenberg and Mela (500-518) d that importance of advertising has increased manifold in recent years due to increased penetration of globalization, competitive rivalry and exposure of digital advertisement. In such context, Bruce (659-673) found that global firms are not only competing in terms of product offering, price, service benefits but also they are competing in terms of advertising campaigns. In simple words, advertisement can be defined as the paid form of communication from the side of marketers to promote a new product, service, idea of theme in order to encourage end users to take persuasive actions (Bruce 659-673). Marketers can use different mediums like TV, Radio, internet, billboards, public personnel, celebrity, electronic display boards etc to communicate the message to viewers and in some case press releases are being used to communicate the message. Dube and Manchanda (81-95) stated that important thing is to measure the effectiveness of advertisement and due to non-tangibility of parameters; it becomes very difficult to measure effectiveness of advertisement. In such context, this essay will try to address the theme “Effective Advertising” with the help of research works conducted by various research scholars on that subject. Although, key objective of the paper is to answer the question “What Makes Advertising Effective” but the essay will take funnel approach to concentrate on specific aspect like “role of internationalization on advertising” in the later part. Understanding concepts or factors that might affect the effectiveness of advertisement would also be important part of the discussion. Discussion Literature Review Nguyen and Shi (965-973) pointed out that it is very difficult to summarize all the factors that may affect the effectiveness of advertisement and they also identified macro and micro influencer of advertisement. For macro factor, synchronization of advertisement theme with socio-cultural dimension of particular population or theme variation can play important role in influencing purchase action of viewer. On the other hand, Bruce (659-673) identified micro factors like product involvement and ad/context congruency or cognitive appeal of the advertisement can play important role in determining the effectiveness of advertisement. Considering the vastness of the topic, it is to be understood that addressing or identifying all the factors that may influence effectiveness of advertisement is beyond the scope of this short essay. Therefore, in this literature review, the researcher will focus on issue like impact of internationalization on advertising, theme effects and ad/context congruency etc in order to address key deliverables in the assignment. Theme Effects Bass, Bruce, Murthi and Majumdar (179–195) stated that quality of advertisement might vary over the time and alteration of themes might affect effectiveness of the advertisement. According to these scholars, quality of the advertisement is intangible and relative measure which has indirect link with the themes of the advertisement. For example, these Bass, Bruce, Murthi and Majumdar (179–195) used advertisement example of a fast food joint which has changed its theme over the course of time in order to remain relevant and effective. Bass, Bruce, Murthi and Majumdar (179–195) found that repetition of the same advertising theme in longitudinal manner might decrease the effectiveness of the advertisement. In such context, MacInnis, Rao and Weiss (391–407) found that effectiveness of the advertisement is decided by the existence of pooling effects like emotional appeal, logical appeal, sense of benefits etc in the promoted advertisement. For example, Chandy, Tellis, MacInnis and Thaivanich (399–414) gave examples of argument based advertisement themes in consumer durables sector and stated that effectiveness of the advertisement gets increased when marketers compare the benefits of offering with product/service offering of other brands. Advertisement Medium /Context Congruency Considering the research work of Aaker (137-161), effectiveness of advertisement might also be affected by congruency of attitude towards the brand among customers. In simple words, effectiveness of advertisement can be measured in multitude of processes such as whether people can recall the advertisement or not, whether sales of the company has increased by the advertisement or not, whether positive brand image has been created by the advertisement or not etc. Aaker (137-161) found that presentation style of the advertisement might decide whether customers can connect their attitude with advertisement presentation or not. Bruce (659-673) argued that medium of advertisement can direct the effectiveness of advertisement. For example, TV advertisements can easily promote the message to customers through celebrity endorsement or integration of innovative idea while in case of social media advertisement; customers can also send their feedback to promoter of advertisement. Therefore, it can be said that factors like choice of advertising medium, context of advertising theme, ability of the advertisement to connect with personality & attitude of customers etc can direct effectiveness of advertisement. Now, the essay will shift its focus to understand impact of internationalization on advertising in order to cover assignment deliverables in comprehensive manner. Analysis: Role of Internationalization on Advertising Taylor (7-16) found that internationalization of business might create challenge for marketers to design advertisement that can support marketing activities of the company. Consideration of Taylor’s (7-16) research work reveals the fact that establishing standardization in advertisement has become cause of concern for multinational corporations (MNCs). How can internationalization increase effectiveness of advertisement? Well, that is an interesting question which might not be answered without considering the research works of Taylor (7-16) regarding uniformity of advertisement for a multinational corporation. Present concern among advertising research scholars is cantered on issue like effectiveness of a standardized advertisement in context to variation in cultural environments, market diversity, customer profile etc. Jiang and Wei (597-622) argued that cultural dimension and customer profile of Asian countries like China, Bangladesh, and Japan significantly differs from European countries like Germany, UK, and Belgium hence it will be wrong to assume that same set of advertisements might appeal to all customers of the mentioned countries. Jiang and Wei (597-622) also found that none of the previous researchers were able to prove the effectiveness of standardization of advertisement in different cultures across the globe. Using global consumer culture theory (GCCT) might help readers to understand the impact of internationalization on advertisements. GCCT is one of the recent developments in the field of advertisement and marketing and the model helps marketers to understand global consumer mindset. Akaka and Alden (37) explained global consumer culture (GCC) as “a collection of common signs and symbols, including brands that are understood by significant numbers of consumers in urban markets around the world.” In simple word, culture of different countries varies significantly and it is responsibility of marketers to understand signs, symbol, and cultural orientation of particular market in order to create successful advertisement that can be accepted easily without creating cultural clash. Jiang and Wei (597-622) supported GCCT as the key context of understand cultural asymmetry across globe. One advertisement might create purchasing intension among customers in USA while the same advertisement might get poor response in China. According to GCCT, due to globalization and advancement of communication technology, customers from different cultures are getting connected easily and they are also sharing product information with each other. Due to such free flowing communication, social interchange and knowledge transfer, customers from developing countries are getting aware of the international brand. As a result, these globalized customers have become potential target market for MNCs despite the fact that culture of foreign country might differ from culture of home country of MNC. Jiang and Wei (597-622) suggested that becoming international has become source of competitive advantage for companies and henceforth, companies need to decide their advertising strategy which can not only supports its internationalization strategy but also help the company to generate brand awareness in uncharted territory. In such context, Jiang and Wei (597-622) used foreign consumer culture positioning (FCCP) as part of internationalizing the brand or better to say reshaping the advertisement in accordance with cultural orientation, personality of people, occasions of the foreign country. Hence, it can be said that incorporating local cultural elements in the advertisement can help MNCs to create the brand awareness among foreign customers. In such context, one might consider advertising strategy of Procter & Gamble (a renowned multinational consumer good company) in China. In the initial phase of entry strategy in China, Procter & Gamble launched the standardized (already broadcasted in USA) advertisements in China and Chinese customer could not connect with their attitude with the USA driven theme in the advertisement and ultimately the advertisement failed to generate response among Chinese customers (Kotler 475-482). After getting the rude shock, Procter & Gamble changed its advertising strategy by incorporating Chinese cultural elements like language, sign, picture of animals, colours, Chinese celebrities endorsing P&G items etc and finally the company got positive acceptance from Chinese customers (Kotler 475-482). At present, P&G has become one of the popular brands in China due to involvement of high degree of local elements in advertisement designed by the company to encourage customers to make purchase decision. Example of the mentioned campaign is showing that internationalization can significantly affect the advertising strategy of companies and MNCs change their advertising strategy in accordance with cultural orientation of foreign countries in order remain relevant to requirements of foreign customers (Jiang and Wei 597-622). In such context, the study will also cite the research design of Jiang and Wei (597-622) to analyze role of internationalization in determining effectiveness of advertisement. For example, Jiang and Wei (597-622) compared more than 200 print advertisement campaign published in countries like France, Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, Korea, China etc and found that most of the MNCs like GM, Ford, Toyota, GE, P&G, McDonald etc prefer to incorporate local cultural elements while broadcasting advertisement in foreign countries. Such results are evident enough to show the impact of internationalization in directing advertising strategy of companies. These examples also showing that not only culture but other issue like customer profile, business strategy, organizational resources play vital role directing multinational companies to synchronize international norms in advertising strategy. Conclusion It is evident from the above discussion that there can be multitude of factors that might affect the effectiveness of advertisements and there are possibilities that incorporation of such factors might even affect the top line and bottom line growth of companies. It is clear from the argument that macro factors like internationalization can significantly influence companies to redesign its advertising strategy. On the other hand factors like theme of the advertisement, media type might influence the effectiveness of advertisement. In conclusion it can be said that in a globalized environment, companies need to experiment with layout, design or message of the advertisement in order to remain relevant in context to requirements of target market. Works Cited Aaker, David A. Managing brand equity. New York, NY: Simon and Schuster, 2009. Print. Akaka, Melissa A, and Dana L Alden. Global brand positioning and perceptions: International advertising and global consumer culture. International Journal of Advertising 29.1 (2010): 37-56. Print. Bass, Frank M, Norris Bruce, Sumit Majumdar, and B P S Murthi. Wearout effects of different advertising themes: A dynamic Bayesian model of the ad-sales relationship. Marketing Sci 26.2 (2007): 179–195. Print. Bronnenberg, Bart J, and Carl Mela. Market Roll-out and Retail Adoption for New Brands of Repeat Purchase Goods. Marketing Science 23.4 (2004): 500-518. Print. Bruce, Norris I. Pooling and Dynamic Forgetting Effects in Multitheme Advertising: Tracking the Advertising Sales Relationship with Particle Filters. Marketing Science 27.4 (2008): 659–673. Print. Chandy, Rajesh K, Gerard J Tellis, Deborah J MacInnis, and Pattana Thaivanich. When to say when: Advertising appeals in evolving markets. J. Marketing Res 38 (2001): 399–414. Print. Dube, Jean-Pierre, and Puneet Manchanda. Differences in Dynamic Brand Competition Across Markets: An Empirical Analysis. Marketing Science 24.1 (2005): 81-95. Print. Jiang, Jing, and Ran Wei. Influences of culture and market convergence on the international advertising strategies of multinational corporations in North America, Europe and Asia. International Marketing Review 29.6 (2012): 597-622. Print. Kotler, Philip. Principles of marketing: A south Asian perspective. New Jersey: Pearson Education, 2010. Print. MacInnis, Deborah J, Ambar G Rao, and Allen M Weiss. Assessing when increased media weight of real-world advertisements helps sales. J. Marketing Res 39 (2002): 391–407. Print. Nguyen, Dung, and Lei Shi. Competitive Advertising Strategies and Market-Size Dynamics: A Research Note on Theory and Evidence. Management Science 52.6 (2006): 965-973. Print. Taylor, Charles R. Moving international advertising research forward: a new research agenda. Journal of Advertising 34.1 (2005): 7-16. Print. Read More