Theories of how advertising works

Résumé du document

Nowadays, advertising is pervasive. From the moment people wake up until the moment they fall asleep they are bombarded with all kinds of advertisements. Ads appear on the TV and radio, on billboards, newspapers and magazines, on the Internet. Considering this, Tellis (2004) implies that advertising plays an important role in our economy and society. He also arouses the questions – Does advertising really work? Is it a weak or strong force? Is it just a background noise or does it have a great influence on people's minds? The purpose of this essay is to discuss the main theories of ‘how advertising works' in order to give answers to these questions.

First it will discuss the two schools of advertising – strong and weak. This will be achieved by elaborating different expert views and presenting the effect modules that support and explain the two schools. Then, one of the modules will be applied to a current advertising campaign in order to analyse advertising in the 21st century. Jones (1990) claims that advertising is a strong force that has a great influence on people and positive impact on sales.

He believes that advertising can convince people to buy a particular product. Jones suggests that advertising is a strong promotional tool that works by: ”persuading people to buy, creating and building brands, differentiating between brands and increasing sales” ( Jones, In Pickton & Broderick, 2005:599). However, Ehrenberg et al (1997) sees advertising as a weak force. He argues that advertising cannot persuade people to buy a product or use a service but only reinforces already existing habits, defends companies from losing market share and maintains brands.

Extraits

[...] He also arouses the questions Does advertising really work? Is it a weak or strong force? Is it just a background noise or does it have a great influence on people's minds? The purpose of this essay is to discuss the main theories of advertising works' in order to give answers to these questions. First it will discuss the two schools of advertising strong and weak. This will be achieved by elaborating different expert views and presenting the effect modules that support and explain the two schools. [...]

[...] They explain and support the weak school of advertising theory, or the Habit theory. Ehrenberg's ATR (Awareness, Trial, Reinforcement) and ATRN (Awareness, Trial, Reinforcement, Nudging) models are based on the notion that advertising is not capable of changing people's attitudes on its own but only reinforces opinions formed from consumers' knowledge and experience. He asserts that the consumer first has to become ‘aware' of the new product or brand and perhaps be interested in it. Then, because the customer still does not have a real feeling of the new product or brand, an exploratory purchase may be made trial purchase). [...]

[...] However, Ehrenberg et al (1997) sees advertising as a weak force. He argues that advertising cannot persuade people to buy a product or use a service but only reinforces already existing habits, defends companies from losing market share and maintains brands. Therefore, he claims that advertising effect on sales is less direct than the strong school assumes. Over the years these two views of how advertising works has been analysed and criticized by many experts, including King (1967), Ambler (2000) and Weilbacher (2001). [...]

[...] The model describes the advertising planning process. It shows that in order to create or broaden awareness, to express a particular message or to change attitudes, clear and specific advertising objectives must be defined (Feldwick, 1990). The model presents that an advertising process should follow five steps in persuading people to act Unawareness (of the product), Awareness (of the product), Comprehension (of some claim about the product), Conviction (about this claim) and Action. As King (1967) summarise, the Hierarchy of effects models seem to have three main things in common. [...]

[...] To conclude, I believe that advertising can persuade people to act in a particular way humans are vulnerable and our opinion, although it cannot completely be changed, can be shaped. And advertisments can do it. Through endorsement, emotional and humoristic advertising, other people and I in particular, sometimes prefer one brand and product to another simply because the advertisement has convinced us so. For example, when I was choosing my shampoo a few days ago I remembered the nice advisement of Elseve shampoo with Eva Longoria, my favourite actress, endorsing it - so I bought this brand! [...]