Understanding Interactive Online Advertising: Congruence and Product Involvement in Highly and Lowly Arousing,Skippable Video Ads

Interactive online media are an increasingly preferred format for users and advertisers, and skippable online video advertisements are common on social media networks such as YouTube. The specific features and influences of this interactive marketing tool demand further consideration. Focusing on effective tactics, this article investigates the influence of introducing high-arousal and low-arousal stimuli on skippable ad effectiveness (i.e., ad acceptance, ad attitude, brand attitude, and ad intrusiveness), with the potential moderation of context congruency and product involvement. A pretest and three studies confirm that high-arousal ads are watched for longer time and are more effective in congruent contexts. Users' product involvement determines the intrusiveness of high- and low-arousal skippable ads. These findings, along with their practical implications for this novel setting, provide further directions for research too.     

Consumer Responses to English Accent Variations in Advertising

Abstract

With the growing use of different types of English accents in international advertising, it is important for marketers to understand the factors that influence the credibility of the spokesperson in order to select the most persuasive character. This study investigates the effects of a spokesperson's accent on spokesperson's perceived credibility across high and low involvement products and products of different country-of-origin. Two different accents-the standard English accent and the local Singaporean English accent (Singlish)-were tested. Results indicated that accent, product country-of-origin and product involvement significantly influence the spokesperson's perceived credibility and attitude towards the ads. The accent effects appeared to be strong enough to offset the country-of-origin, gender and product involvement effects, attesting to the importance of considering this factor in advertisements. Specifically, the Standard English accent outperformed the Singlish accent in terms of spokesperson credibility, attitude towards the ad, attitude towards the brand and purchase intentions. However, the Singlish accent outperformed the Standard English accent in terms of attention to the ad. Implications for marketers are discussed.     

Disentangling location-based advertising: the effects of location congruency and medium type on consumers' ad attention and brand choice

Research on location-based advertising (LBA) suggests that the merits of LBA lie in the fact that consumers can be targeted with location-congruent ads on their personal mobile devices. However, LBA consists of two underlying constructs: a mobile (vs. point-of-sales) advertising medium and location congruency (vs. location incongruency). This study aims to disentangle these underlying constructs by showing that they differentially affect the efficacy of an ad. Using a virtual reality lab experiment, this study shows that location-congruent ads result in increased choice for the target brand as compared to location-incongruent ads, independent of medium type. However, in location-incongruent situations, mobile ads attracted more attention than point-of-sales display ads. The advantages of LBA thus do not seem to emanate from medium type, but rather from the congruency between the ad and product location. When the ad is received at a different location than the product, the mobile medium is able to enhance consumers' ad attention.     

Consumers' green involvement and the persuasive effects of emotional versus functional ads

This study compares the effects of four types of ads: a functional green ad promoting the environmental advantages of a product, an emotional green ad using a visual representation of pleasant natural scenery, a mixed type green ad using functional and emotional strategies, and a control group. Findings of an experimental study using a representative sample of U.S. consumers suggest that both the emotional and the mixed-type ads significantly affect brand attitude, mediated by attitude toward the ad. These effects do not depend on consumers' green involvement. Functional ads, in contrast, only impact brand attitudes when involvement, measured as green purchase behavior or green product attitudes, is high.     

Online advertising and congruency effects

Three studies investigate the moderating role of divided attention in the relationship between thematic (in)congruency between a web page and a web ad, and evaluations of and click intention towards the embedded web ad. The first study establishes the traditional priming effect in sequential web page – web ad exposure. Study two manipulates viewers’ opportunity to divide their attention when simultaneously exposed to a web page and a web ad, and Study three measures divided attention by means of gaze jumps in a simultaneous exposure situation. In the case of simultaneous exposure to a web page and a web ad, a congruency effect occurs when there is little opportunity to divide the attention between the web page and the ad, and when there are few gaze jumps between the web page and the web ad. In these cases, web ads that are thematically congruent with the web page result in more positive responses. This effect reverses when there is more opportunity to divide the attention between the web page and the web ad, and when the number of gaze jumps is high: web ads incongruent with the web page lead to more positive responses. Undivided attention benefits web ads that are congruent with the web page in which they are embedded, but divided attention benefits those that are incongruent with the web page.     

Effects of culturally verbal and visual congruency/incongruency across cultures in a competitive advertising context

Existing consumer behavior theories suggest that consumers tend to recognize, better comprehend, and respond favorably to information that is both relevant and consistent with their beliefs and values. This study extends these theories by employing cultural arguments and pictures to examine the effects of culturally verbal and visual congruency/incongruency on consumer ad and brand attitudes in multiple-ad and multiple-brand environments. The studies were conducted with subjects in Canada and China. The results suggest that, when the contrast ad is culturally incongruent, an ad containing a culturally congruent argument and congruent picture elicits the most positive responses, compared to other ads with different combinations of arguments and pictures. However, an ad containing a culturally incongruent argument and incongruent picture also elicits more positive responses than an ad with a culturally congruent argument and incongruent picture or a culturally incongruent argument and congruent picture.     

Children's Television Advertising: The Attitudes and Opinions of Elementary School Guidance Counselors

Abstract

Advertising researchers often assume that the audience reacts to ads homogeneously, but evidence suggests that individuals process ads subjectively on the basis of their membership in groups defined by ethnicity or gender, or their life themes or experiences. The authors examine how one group, heterosexuals, reacts to the portrayals of an out-group, homosexuals, in ads. They find that heterosexuals' emotional and attitudinal responses to a homosexual ad depend on their general attitude toward homosexuality. The effect on attitude toward the brand sponsor is more muted. Practical implications are noted for advertisers facing consumer groups that have diverse opinions on social issues such as homosexuality.     

Super Bowl ad likeability: Enduring and emerging predictors

US advertisers love the Super Bowl because it reaches a huge and highly receptive audience. One metric that Super Bowl advertisers watch closely is ad likeability as this is correlated with sales success. Tomkovick, Yelkur, and Christians (2001, Journal of Marketing Communications 7: 89–108) studied ad likeability for Super Bowl ads in the 1990s. In this paper, we replicate and extend their research using USA Today's measurement of Super Bowl ad likeability in the decade of the 2000s as our dependent variable of interest. Our findings on 438 Super Bowl ads show that humor, animals, and product category were enduring predictors of ad likeability. Product information and the presence of children in Super Bowl ads were found to be emerging predictors of ad likeability. Most notably, the amount of product information provided in Super Bowl commercials was inversely related to ad likeability. Implications for advertisers are presented, as are conclusions, study limitations and directions for future research.     

Metaphor as Visual Thinking in Advertising and Its Effects: Focus on Brand Familiarity and Product Involvement

One of advertisers' favorite communication techniques is the visual metaphor. In fact, metaphor usage perennially increases in ad images. This study, which looks at consumers with varying levels of brand familiarity and product involvement, investigates how their attitudes and purchase intentions of are influenced by the persuasive effects of visual metaphors in various advertising conditions. The findings reveal that consumers' attitudes and purchase intentions are enhanced more by visual metaphor-based ads than nonmetaphor-based ads when the advertised product is in a low-involvement product category. Nonmetaphorical ads are found to have a more positive influence with high-involvement products than do metaphorical ads. The results show a significant three-way interaction effect. When the advertised product is in a low-involvement product category, visual metaphors lead to favorable brand evaluations and higher purchase intentions in the ads for a low-familiarity brand. However, nonmetaphors are more persuasive than visual metaphors only for the low familiarity brand in a high-involvement product category. Theoretical and practical implications are addressed in the discussion.     

Effects of comparative advertising format on consumer responses: The moderating effects of brand image and attribute relevance

In this research we distinguish between ads that compare two different brands (Across-Brand Comparison or ABC ads) and those that compare different versions of the same brand (Within-Brand Comparison or WBC ads). Results from an experiment indicate that when comparative ads use attributes that are relevant to product performance, ad type and brand image interact such that an ABC ad leads to less favorable consumer perceptions than a WBC ad when image of the sponsor brand is low but not when it is high. However, when the ads use attributes that are irrelevant to product performance an ABC ad leads to less favorable consumer outcomes than a WBC ad, regardless of the image of the sponsor brand. We further propose and show that ad believability mediates these effects. Theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed and directions for future research are provided.     

Symbols or icons in gay-themed ads: How to target gay audience

This study examines the characteristics of gay-themed ads, focusing on culturally meaningful symbols or iconographies, in gay magazines (specifically Out and Curve). In recent years, advertising scholars and practitioners have grown more interested in how gay-themed ads influence gay consumers and nongay consumers. In gay-themed ads, advertisers employ culturally meaningful symbols or iconographies as part of an effort to not alienate nongay consumers. Gay-themed advertising, however, has yet to be deeply analyzed in terms of creativity or consumer reactions. We go on to clarify the findings' implications, discuss some concerns raised over gay-themed ads, and suggest directions for future research.     

Using Internet Behavior to Deliver Relevant Television Commercials

Consumer footprints left on the Internet help advertisers show consumers relevant Web ads, which increase awareness and click-throughs. This “proof of concept” experiment illustrates how Internet behavior can identify relevant television commercials that increase ad-effectiveness by raising attention and ad exposure. Product involvement and prior brand exposure, however, complicate effective Internet-targeting. Ad relevance matters more for low-involvement products, which have a short pre-purchase search process. For the same reason, using Web browsing behavior to make inferences about current ad relevance is more accurate for low-involvement products. Prior brand exposure reduces information-value, even for relevant commercials, and therefore dampens ad relevance's effect on attention and ad exposure.     

Benevolent Dictators. Cummings,Bart A. Chicago: Crain Books, 1984. 344 Pp. $24.95

Abstract

A mall-intercept study recruited 601 subjects in three cities who viewed simulated Yellow Pages ads for florists or caterers. Ad information was either generally stated or specific to the product involved. Ads either did or did not contain color. Color was used to attract attention to the ad or else to enhance product appearance. Subjects selected an initial consideration set and a final set of ads to call. Ads with product-specific information were more likely to be considered and called. Findings showed that ads with color were more likely to be considered, but only using product-enhancing color increased chances that an ad would be called. Ads that used enhancing color in a manner that substantiated verbal claims were most likely to be called first.     

Using food pictorial metaphor in the advertising of non-food brands: An exploratory investigation of consumer interpretation and affective response

Using visual metaphors in ads is one of the communication techniques that brands have adopted to grab consumers' attention. The phenomenon of using food pictorial metaphors in non-food brand ads has spread in recent years, and given food's sensory nature, using this cue for a non-food brand can affect the way in which consumers interpret such ads. This research seeks to understand whether and how consumers perceive and process such a rhetorical figure. An exploratory qualitative approach is taken in two studies by using semi-structured interviews to explore consumers' reactions to different types of ads with food visual metaphors. The results reveal the predominance of congruency as a key processing mechanism of the ad at three levels: (a) between the food pictorial metaphor and the brand product category, (b) between the food visual metaphor and the brand itself, and (c) between the visual metaphor and the headline. Moreover, the food appetizing dimension, ad creativity, aesthetic appreciation of the ad, and consumers' aesthetic sensitivity are all revealed to play major roles in attitudes toward the ad.     

Music-brand congruency in highand low-cognition radio advertising

Many radio commercials use background music to accompany a message. This research examines how brand-congruent music (i.e. music that ‘fits’ the brand) will affect ‘Attitude towards the Ad’ (AAd) and ‘Attitude towards the Brand’ (ABrand), specifically when used with different types of ad copy that are more or less demanding of cognitive resources (high-cognition vs low-cognition advertising copy). In high-cognition ads, congruent music results in a more positive AAd and ABrand compared to incongruent music or no music. However, this effect is not found with low-cognition ads, where AAd (and ABrand) are similar for all three conditions of congruent music, incongruent music and no music.     

Effects beyond click-through: Incidental exposure to web advertising

While Web advertising tends to be based on a direct response model, there is a growing debate about the brand building potentials of Web ads. Click-through rates (CTR) are disappointingly low, but Web ads can be effective at brand building in an environment where Web ads are outside of consumers' attentional focus. With this in mind we conducted two experiments. The first experiment examined the effects of incidental exposure to banner ads. Subjects who were incidentally exposed to banner ads reported greater priming effects induced by implicit memory, more favorable A_ad, and greater likelihood for the advertised brand to be included in a consideration set over no exposure to the ad. These effects were found without significant improvement on explicit memories (i.e. recall and recognition) and click-through intention. The second experiment to assess the conditions conducive to incidental exposure examined two advertising strategies: format (animated vs. static) and placement (congruency vs. incongruency). Findings suggest that the level of congruency between an advertised product and Webpage content play significant roles in affecting consumers' responses to incidentally exposed banner ads. This paper examines the results of these two experiments before discussing the implications for the role of Web ads on brand building and directions for future research.     

Advertising Management: Its Role in Marketing. Sachs,William S. Tulsa,Oklahoma: PennWell Books, 1983

Abstract

The advertising literature contains some evidence that offensive advertising is multidimensional in nature, but little is known about the character of these dimensions. In an exploratory study of TV advertising, two different dimensions of “offensive” were identified. These dimensions were labeled Offensive Products and Offensive Execution. This distinction is important both for the study of the construct as well as for advertisers who are faced with decisions on advertising execution. The Offensive Products dimension contains those products related to consumer problems which social norms dictate should not be discussed in public. The Offensive Execution dimension, the dimension over which the advertiser has more control, consists of those ads which are perceived to be offensive by the nature of the execution or themes and/or topics of the ad and not the product itself.     

Creativity,attention and the memory for brands: an outdoor advertising field study

This study investigates whether creativity is sufficient by itself to attract attention to the ad space or whether the ad must also be conspicuous. Attention to the ad is an important driver of message processing that leads to favourable advertising effectiveness outcomes, such as improved memory for the brand. To provide insight on this, we conducted a field study of billboard advertising along an urban expressway to explore the variables that affect recognition of outdoor advertising. Using a computational neuroscience software program, we find evidence for the presence of an attention capture threshold. That is, creativity's message processing promoting strategy only improves memory when billboards cross a threshold, i.e., when the ads are at a sufficient level of conspicuity within an individual's visual field. This threshold represents a boundary condition for creativity and provides evidence that attention must first be captured in some contexts before creativity increases the memory for brands in advertising. Results also show that billboard size, visual saliency, and brand familiarity increase recognition rates.     

The role of product type and country‐of‐origin in decisions about choice of endorser ethnicity in advertising

Two experiments examine the effects of endorser ethnicity and product country of origin on consumer responses toward ad and brand, and investigate the moderating role of utilitarian versus hedonic product type. In Experiment 1, for utilitarian products, participants showed more favorable responses when the endorser's ethnicity was incongruent with the product's country of origin compared to when it was congruent, supporting an attribution‐theory explanation. For hedonic products, however, participants preferred ads that featured an endorser whose ethnicity matched their own, irrespective of the product's country of origin. In Experiment 2, building on the attribution explanation, two endorsers of different ethnicities generated more favorable responses than two of the same ethnicity. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Congruency of humour and cultural values in print ads

International advertisers routinely struggle to adapt humorous ads for the domestic markets of different countries. In order to provide them with better guidelines, we conduct a content analysis of humorous print ads from China, the United States and France. We found that the cultural values deemed important in a given country are rarely portrayed in humorous ads. This suggests that advertisers may be using humour to promote their products and services with cultural values not endorsed by the general population. Alternatively, advertisers may be ridiculing values that are less important, to attract attention while not offending audiences. Finally, we found that the type of humour used when a given human value is made salient is usually not the same in different countries.