Measures of Advertisement Effectiveness. Principles and Practice

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Abstract

List of content

List of figures

1. Introduction to advertising effectiveness

2. Principles on measures of advertisement effectiveness
2.1 First overview on ad effectiveness
2.2 Process and development in measures of ad effectiveness
2.3 Recognition measures
2.4 Recall measures
2.5 Persuasion measures
2.6 Attitudes towards the objective measures

3. Do persuasive measures improve effectiveness for adventure trip providers?
3.1 Unconscious effects on persuasion
3.2 Regard of location measures and latest research techniques

4. Practice on measures of advertisement effectiveness

Bibliography

Abstract

Measures of ad effectiveness

Advertisement effectiveness and how it is measured is a large research topic. Not only for researchers but lately increasingly important for managers due to cost allocation and huge expanses. It is discussed since decades with constantly new developments and updates due to researchers. Through this process many new views on different measures emerged making it more and more complex for advertisers by considering which advertisement will generate the most profit. Since then marketing science created many good models which will be presented in this paper.

Wiksamkeitsmessung von Werbung

Die Effektivität von Werbung und wie sie gemessen wird ist Gegenstand eines großen Forschungsgebiets. Nicht nur für Forscher ist dies interessant, sondern auch immer mehr für Manager, aufgrund der Kostenallokation und Ausgaben. Das Gebiet wird seit Jahrzehnten erforscht, sodass ständig neue Entwicklungen und Erweiterungen stattfinden. Durch diesen Verlauf entstehen immer mehr Sichtweisen über die verschiedenen Maße, sodass es zusehends komplexer wird für Werbende die Werbung zu entwickeln, die am profitabelsten ist. Die Modelle der Marketingforschung wurden dennoch stets besser. Einige werden in dieser Seminararbeit erläutert.

List of figures

Figure 1: Measures of ad effectiveness

Figure 2: Special methods

1. Introduction to advertising effectiveness

Do you want a 100 meter bungee jump? A tremendously fast race in a formula 1 sports car or do you prefer a survival march through a tropical forest after paragliding down a mountain? Those extraordinary adventures are sold as services by companies like Jochen Schweizer. Advertisement effectiveness and how it is measured is a large research topic. Not only for researchers but lately increasingly important for managers due to cost allocation and huge expanses. It is being discussed since decades with constantly new developments and updates due to researchers. Through this process, many new views on different measures emerged making it more and more complex for advertisers by considering which advertisement will generate the most profit. However, advertisements have to be well created by those companies to target their audience. How can this be accomplished by advertisements? Also, is there a possibility to measure the effectiveness of such ads? What are the measures for effective advertisements?

In the following seminar paper a short review on development, in measures of advertisement effectiveness and how it can be measured, shall be given with suggestions which measures should be picked and an overview of those. This is followed by recent research and different points of view from scholars on this topic. Finally, the question of this seminar paper will be introduced and answered, by giving marketing suggestions, especially concentrated on the part of persuasive measures and their effectiveness.

2. Principles on measures of advertisement effectiveness

2.1 First overview on ad effectiveness

Can the effectiveness of advertisements be measured? This is a question, which does not only interest marketers, but scholars as well and the answer to that question is not easy, through the fact that opinions differ. And still an accountability of marketing is demanded; especially by managers and management consultants (Bauer, Stokburger and Hammerschmidt 2006, 17). Nevertheless some measures of advertisement effectiveness established over time. The typical measures, which are so called traditional, range from quantitative aspects (cognitive to affective to conative) to more tangible measures like revenue (market data) in the chain of advertisement effectiveness and effects, a well-known example is the AIDA- concept (Bauer, Stokburger and Hammerschmidt 2006, 259). In the following chapter a short summery of the development in measures of advertisement effectiveness will be given with a continued overview of today’s topics and methods in this matter.

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Figure 1: Measures of ad effectiveness

Reference: Bauer, Stokburger and Hammerschmidt (2006), S. 260, Abb. 12-4.

There are many different theoretical models trying to conceptualize the measures of advertisement effectiveness.

2.2 Process and development in measures of ad effectiveness

Since the 1930s marketers and researchers started to measure advertisement effectiveness with the measure of recognition first started with Daniel Starch in 1932. This process of measuring was then transferred on the recall measure by Gallup and Robinson. Though there was a magnificent debate on which measure is more effective another measure established in the 1940s introduced by Schwerin as persuasion measure, suggesting that what really matters is the purchase in the end and therefore the ability of an advertisement to be persuasive (Du Plessis 2005, 165f.). Persuasion hierarchy is the result from developing new models due to the deficiency of market-response models. Those new are called stimulus- organism-models, which contain change of internal experience creating persuasion (Klapdor 2013, 35). Following this developments many techniques have been created to get data on recall, recognition and persuasive levels that can be compared.

2.3 Recognition measures

Recognition offers the researchers the ability to investigate which areas on advertisements got the attention of the participants and details about the readability of the brand. Of course this technique can be manipulated by the participants, but given a great amount of participants and credibility of those this technique is often used and effective (Böhler and Scigliano 2005, 136ff.).

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Figure 2: Special methods

Reference: Homburg (2012), S. 834, Abb. 13-27.

Today this measure is often supported through high-tech equipment and followed methods such as seen in Figure 2. For a more detailed review about those measurement techniques and their actuality considering their time of release and todays validity read (Wang and Minor 2008, 197-219).

2.4 Recall measures

The recall is divided into two categories; one is the supported recall, where participants get advertisements with overridden brand names or slogans. Furthermore lists of different brand names, which later shall be recalled by the participants.

The unsupported recall is when the participants have to access their memory by themselves and tell which brand names they still know (Böhler and Scigliano 2005, 137).

2.5 Persuasion measures

Persuasion offers the ability to link advertisements with buying behavior of customers. To reach out for this data, many methods have been developed in this case, such as behavioral measures, where a direct response to an advertisement is given through a coupon or actually buying that advertised product by telephone or internet through the number or internet site given in the advertisement (De Pelsmacker, Geuens and Van den Bergh 2010, 322ff.). But not only consumers are to be considered, while studying the measures of ad effectiveness. Sale persons also react to any kind of advertisement and its effects. Those reactions reach a manifestation in increased sales, personal performance and awareness of the brand (Hughes 2013, 1-9).

A further option to achieve a measurement is to use the combination of pre- and posttests on memory change for example a method which implicitly tells that a change of memory means also a change of internal beliefs of the customer and therefore has one of the biggest influences on advertising effectiveness (Braun-Latour and Zaltman 2006, 63ff.).

Another possible way is to instantly interview participants after exposure to evaluate the advertisement by number-point scales on different items such as bad/good, low quality/ high quality or dislike/ like as seen in a study on the influence of persuasion of consumer-generated ads (Thompson and Malaviya 2013, 38).

2.6 Attitudes towards the advertisement and objective measures

Checking the attitude of personal opinions from participants or later on customers can reveal inner feelings about an advertisement such as anger, humor or joy to suggest if the needed emotions where delivered through this ad (Homburg 2012, 831). Objective measures are independent from consumers and researchers, but have an impact on the evaluation of ads. Simple examples are the size of a picture as stated in a study about visual complexity measures for advertising effectiveness (Pieters, Wedel and Batra 2010, 48-51). A furthermore reason, which shall be mentioned, for ad effectiveness is the confidence the consumer have in his cognitive response towards the ad (Brinol, Petty and Tormala 2004, 559565).

The sleeper effect takes place after the exposure and does not decay over time; instead the effectiveness rises as shown in a study about advertising encoding (Mazursky and Schul 1988, 25). The following lasting effect fortifies the effectiveness. Moreover even only one exposure is needed to insure such an effect, making advertising research crucial to effectiveness measures and finally to the brands (Peterson and Gross 1978, 222ff.). It is true that the actual advertisement decays, as a medium delivering content, but the information out of the content stays through sleeper and lasting effects. Actual studies present a forgetting rate of 39% in general (Aravin- dakshan and Naik 2011, 315).

Implicit measures of ad effectiveness have to be considered. Since there is an impact on consumer through ads, which are not directly shown, like on banners placed on websites (Yoo 2008, 2).

Brands known for offering adventures and extreme travels should acknowledge the potential of persuasion through the change of memory. An adventure is only purchased when an internal belief and self-image of the consumer is adventurous. To accomplish an effective ad of this category, a transformation not necessarily with a sleeper effect could be very promising, by influencing the self-awareness of a consumer into a more spontaneous and adventurous.

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