Marketing communication: principles and practice

A D V E R T I S I N G A S C O M M U N I C A T I N G
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BOX 14.2
THAT’LL GET THE NEIGHBOURS TALKING . . .
A direct mail pack drops through the letterbox one Saturday morning. It has a
photograph of a new car and is headed 
The Telegraph
. But what could the newspaper
have to say about cars?
Intrigued, I open it to find out what it is about. The letter thanks me for recently
completing a reader questionnaire. I expressed interest in car financing, and the
enclosed brochure details the Freeway scheme. ‘You expect a diverse range of news
and comment from 
The Telegraph
, and I hope we’ve opened your eyes to an exciting
way to drive a new car’ ends the letter. 
The pack connects my stated interest with a product. Arguably, this helps both the
provider and the buyer.

---

Ambitious advertisers can also attempt brand conversion – converting loyal
users of other brands into loyal users of the brand advertised. 
Thus mostly advertising works to contribute to something being added to
(or not dropped from) a consumer’s repertoire, or causing purchase to be
more frequent (or preventing less frequent purchase). A consumer’s brand
repertoire consists of several brands in a particular category, purchased with
varying frequency. In recent years, supermarket checkout barcode data has
shown that few of us stick to just one brand of coffee, beer, or breakfast cereal
– continual temptation by competing promotion turns us into promiscuous
shoppers. 
Few marketers today still believe that buyers and consumers are merely
passive receivers of messages. Social psychology has shown us, as we
discussed at length in chapters two, three, and four, that communication is
a far more dynamic and essentially interactive process than the old idea would
suggest. We have to accept that people take away from advertising (and other
forms of communicating activity) largely what they choose to, and also bring
existing preconceptions with them. Pre-existing images of brands influence
the perception of product offer presentations.
Today, conventional step-by-step, hierarchical and transmissive models
that imply a rational consumer being moved, by the advertiser, through a
sequence of steps to product purchase are being reviewed critically. The
DAGMAR model, for example, provided a simple framework for defining
advertising goals for measured advertising results. Research has shown that
far from attitude change causing behaviour change, it is more likely that
attitude change may be caused by behaviour change, at least in part. Further,
there is evidence that advertising can affect behaviour directly without
intermediately affecting attitudes. 
In the short-term, advertising works by establishing presence (Moran,
1990). Ehrenberg (1997) has referred to this as ‘salience’. When a product
is present and salient (i.e. stands out), it is more likely to be purchased. In
the longer term, advertising is part of the presentation of the product – a
fundamental part of manufacturing the product (Joyce, 1991). 
The Foote, Cone and Belding (FCB) grid (Figure 14.1) relates type of
product to an appropriate particular type of advertising strategy and
sequential model of the advertising process. This shows that advertising has
a different function for different types of products.
Essentially, advertisements are representations of a product that bring
people and products into meaningful relationship. The task of the viewer is
to interpret advertisements in order to make sense of them, and this occurs
within four basic communicative formats (Leiss 
et al
., 1986 – see Figure
14.2). The four types have appeared in chronological order as the dominant
type in use by advertisers, although all types may be in use in a market sector.
Sought advertising content is that which is actively looked for during the
information search phase of purchase activity. This requires design that
includes all salient aspects for the purchase decision. Unsought advertising
content may not be actively looked for but may nonetheless trigger recognition
of a need or become part of the information search at a later stage.