Advertising
Advertising is a non-personal from of mass communication whose objectives is to attract attention to provide information about the product to ensure increase in sales and improvement in brand image.
Meaning of Measuring Advertising Effectiveness
Measuring advertising effectiveness refers to evaluation of advertising results against the pre-established standard of performance and objectives. There is different viewpoint for measuring advertising effectiveness.
All advertising efforts are directed mainly towards the achievement of business, marketing and advertising objectives i.e., to increase the sales turnover and thus to market the maximum profit. The advertiser spends lakhs of rupees in to this advertising activity. In the background of all these efforts, is an attempt to attract the customer towards the product through advertising. As soon as the advertising campaign is over, a need is generally arisen to measure the effectiveness of the campaign. Whether, it has achieved the desired results in terms the change in customer’ behavior in favour of the company’s product.
In order to measure the effectiveness of advertising copy, two types of tests pre-tests and post-tests can be undertaken. There are several pre and post-tests techniques to measure the effectiveness of the advertising copy.
The effectiveness of advertising media may also be measured in any of the following ways;
- By giving different addresses to different media,
- Different newspapers may be selected for advertisements of different departments,
- Coupon blank etc. May be provided with the advertisement
- Enquiry from consumers should mention the name of the source of information.
The technique is known as keying the advertising. Thus, in measuring the effectiveness of advertising we include measuring of the effectiveness of advertising campaign, advertising copy and the effectiveness of individual media.
Measuring the effectiveness of advertising of Philip Kotler
According to Philip Kotler and Armstrong, there are two most popular areas which need to be measured for knowing the effectiveness of advertisement are –
- Communication effect – Communication effect research consist of three types of researches:
- Direct rating method – customers are directly asked to rate the advertisement and then these rating is calculated.
- Portfolio test - the customers see the advertisement and listen carefully to the ads and all the contents of the ads and then they are asked to recall the ad and the contents.
- Laboratory tests – different tools to measure the heart rates blood pressure etc. are used on the customer after he or she watches the advertisement to know the physiological reactions of the body.
- Sales effect – depends on the change in sales of the company there are many factors affecting sales like product availability, the price of the product, contents of the product and sometimes the competitors, so this method is a little difficult than the communication.
- Pre-test – from the stage of ideation to stage of copy and message development, focus group discussions in depth interviews, consumer jury test and intended to buy test.
- Post-test – After message is shown through media unaided and aided recall test, recognition test and historical sales.
Importance of measuring the Effectiveness of Advertising
- It acts as a Safety measure: Testing effectiveness of advertising helps in finding out ineffective advertisement and advertising campaigns. It facilitates timely adjustments in advertising to make advertising consumer oriented and result oriented.
- Provides feedback for remedial measures: Testing effectiveness of advertising provides useful information to the advertisers to take remedial steps against ineffective advertisements.
- Avoids possible failure: Advertisers are not sure of results of advertising from a particular advertising campaign. Evaluating advertising effectives helps in estimating the results in order to avoid complete loss.
- To justify the Investment in Advertising: The investment in advertising is a marketing investment and its objectives should be spelt out clearly indicating the results expected from the campaign. If the expected rate of return is achieved in terms of additional profits, the advertisement can be considered as effective one.
- To know the communication Effect: The main purpose of advertising is communicated the general public and existing and prospective consumers, various information about the product and the company. It is therefore desirable to seek post measurements of advertising in order to determine whether advertisement has been seen or heard.
- Compare two markets: Advertising is published in test markets and results are contrasted with other. The measurements made to determine results may be measurements of change in sales, change in consumer attitudes, changes in dealer display and so on depending upon the objectives sought by the advertiser.
Methods of Measuring Advertising Effectiveness
Advertising is aimed at improving the sales volume of a concern so its effectiveness can be evaluated by its impact on sales. Most of the managers believe that the advertisement directly affects the sales volume and hence they evaluate the effectiveness of the advertising campaign by the increase in the sales volume.
There may be two types' measures –
- Direct Measures of Advertising Effectiveness - Under direct measures, a relationship between advertising and sales is established. A comparison of sales of two periods or two markets may be done and the corresponding changes may be noted. The following are some of the methods that are generally used in measuring that advertising effects. -
- Historical Sales Method - Some insights into the effectiveness of past advertising may be obtained by measuring the relationship between the advertising expenditure and the total sales of the product
- Experimental Control - This method is quite expensive when related to other advertising effectiveness measures the sales effectiveness of advertising is test marketing.
- Before-after with Control Group Design: This classic design uses several test and control cities in this design two types of cities are selected. the normal sales level is calculated for both type of cities prior to advertising campaign, and then the advertising campaign is presented to the test cities and not the central cities.
- Multivariable Experimental Designs: Multivariable designs Produce these explanations and are, therefore used by some very large firm because of their diagnostic value.
- Indirect Measures of Advertising Effectiveness - These measures do not evaluate the effects of advertisements directing on sales or profits but all other factors such as customer awareness goals of the business indirectly. Despite the uncertainties about the relationship between the intermediate effects of advertising and the ultimate results, there is no other alternative but to use indirect measures. The most commonly used measures are;
- Exposure to Advertisement: Advertisers may obtain an idea of exposure generated by the medium by examining its circulation or audience data which reveal the number of copies of the magazine, newspaper, T.V. and radio sets at various points of time
- Attention of Advertising Message Content: This is one of the widely used measures of advertising results. Attention value is the chief quality of the advertisements cannot be said to be effective unless they attract the attention of the target consumers.
- Brand Awareness: The marketers who rely heavily on advertising often appraise its effectiveness by measuring the customer’s awareness about the particular product or brand.
- Attitude Change: Since advertising is considered to be one way of influencing the state of the mind of the audience towards a product, service or organization, the results are very often measured in terms of attitudes among groups exposed to advertising communication.
- Action: The action or intention to take an action may be measured on the intention to buy measuring instrument. Consumers are asked to respond why they are interested in purchasing the product or brand.
Thus, these above measures (direct or indirect) are used to evaluate the effectiveness of advertisements. It seems from the analysis of the above methods of measuring effectiveness that directly or indirectly changes in sales or profits are taken as the measuring rod of the effectiveness of the advertising.
