The Characteristics of high-trial new product advertising.
Journal of Advertising Research, David Olson
This journal article deals with determining what constitutes good new product advertising. It describes a study done at Leo Burnett Co., a large advertising agency.
First, researchers went back through agency files and found 65 commercials that they could say achieved high trial, average trial, or low trial. Second, they had consumers view each commercial and rate whether 52 statements applied to it. Further analysis sorted these 52 statements to 7 basic dimensions of advertising:
1. News: how informative was the ad?
2. Relevance: how personally meaningful?
3. Purchase Interest
4. Stimulation: how entertaining or interesting was the ad?
5. Empathy: how involving was the ad?
6. Confusion
7. Familiarity: how much just like other ads?
The high trial commercials scored better than the medium and low-trial commercials across all seven factors. Still further analysis of the data determined that using just two of those seven factors permitted 66% success in predicting trial for the new product. Adding the other five only pushed this up to 75%.
The first of the two very strong factors was Relevance. Relevance is measured by five of the original 52 statements.
1. The commercial showed me the product has certain advantages
2. The product is important to me
3. The commercial reminded me that I am dissatisfied
4. During the commercial I thought about how the product can be useful to me
5. The commercial made me feel the product is right for me
Naturally, if the product is poor those five statements will be hard to get yes answers on. Good advertising is not usually thought capable of selling poor products. But, given good product concepts, the advertising should say so. If it does, the five statements are agreed to, and the relevance score goes up.
The second major factor was Stimulation. Its presence is measured by answers to the following six of the original 52 statements:
1. The persons in the commercial captured my attention
2. The enthusiasm of the commercial was catching
3. The commercial was amusing
4. The commercial was playful
5. The commercial was fun to watch and listen to
6. I thought it was clever and quite entertaining
The chances of obtaining high trial are only about 10% if the commercial is below average on both relevance and stimulation. It is 25 – 30% if the commercial is above average on one or the other factor. It is 50% if above average o both factors.
In a second qualitative phase of the agency’s study, analysis was undertaken to study how creative people view these two factors, and how they may interrelate in a given ad. A search of the agency’s archives yielded ten products where there were two different commercials with different relevance scores. The commercials were shown to creative staffers in the agency and each person was asked to identify the commercial that had the higher relevance. In most cases they were able to do so (without using consumers or the five of the fifty two original statements to guide them).
The author cautions that the above analysis should not be taken to mean that advertising could be written by formula. How one creates relevance is still an art, but it appears an ad should have lots of relevance (and stimulation too), and their presence can be measured.
First, researchers went back through agency files and found 65 commercials that they could say achieved high trial, average trial, or low trial. Second, they had consumers view each commercial and rate whether 52 statements applied to it. Further analysis sorted these 52 statements to 7 basic dimensions of advertising:
1. News: how informative was the ad?
2. Relevance: how personally meaningful?
3. Purchase Interest
4. Stimulation: how entertaining or interesting was the ad?
5. Empathy: how involving was the ad?
6. Confusion
7. Familiarity: how much just like other ads?
The high trial commercials scored better than the medium and low-trial commercials across all seven factors. Still further analysis of the data determined that using just two of those seven factors permitted 66% success in predicting trial for the new product. Adding the other five only pushed this up to 75%.
The first of the two very strong factors was Relevance. Relevance is measured by five of the original 52 statements.
1. The commercial showed me the product has certain advantages
2. The product is important to me
3. The commercial reminded me that I am dissatisfied
4. During the commercial I thought about how the product can be useful to me
5. The commercial made me feel the product is right for me
Naturally, if the product is poor those five statements will be hard to get yes answers on. Good advertising is not usually thought capable of selling poor products. But, given good product concepts, the advertising should say so. If it does, the five statements are agreed to, and the relevance score goes up.
The second major factor was Stimulation. Its presence is measured by answers to the following six of the original 52 statements:
1. The persons in the commercial captured my attention
2. The enthusiasm of the commercial was catching
3. The commercial was amusing
4. The commercial was playful
5. The commercial was fun to watch and listen to
6. I thought it was clever and quite entertaining
The chances of obtaining high trial are only about 10% if the commercial is below average on both relevance and stimulation. It is 25 – 30% if the commercial is above average on one or the other factor. It is 50% if above average o both factors.
In a second qualitative phase of the agency’s study, analysis was undertaken to study how creative people view these two factors, and how they may interrelate in a given ad. A search of the agency’s archives yielded ten products where there were two different commercials with different relevance scores. The commercials were shown to creative staffers in the agency and each person was asked to identify the commercial that had the higher relevance. In most cases they were able to do so (without using consumers or the five of the fifty two original statements to guide them).
The author cautions that the above analysis should not be taken to mean that advertising could be written by formula. How one creates relevance is still an art, but it appears an ad should have lots of relevance (and stimulation too), and their presence can be measured.
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