ADVERTISING

Definition and characteristics of advertising:Advertising is a form of communication used to help sell products and services. Typically it communicates a message including the name of the product or service and how that product or service could potentially benefit the consumer. The advertising comes from the Latin word advertere meaning to turn the mind toward. This means that advertisement should attract the attention of the audience, and get them involved or interested in the brand i.e being advertised. The commonly used definition of advertising is given by The American Marketing Association. It defined advertising AS any paid form of nonpersonal presentation and promotion of ideas, goods or services by an identified sponsor. William f. Arens: Advertising is the structured and composed non-personal communication of information, usually paid for and usually persuasive in nature, about products(goods, services and ideas)by identified sponsors through various media.

Characteristics of Advertising:1. Process: Advertising is a creative and systematic process. the process of advertising involves:

Planning of advertising-what to advertise, why, when, where, in which media, and how much funds to be invested. Preparation of advertising-drafting or recording of ads. Placing the ads in appropriate media.

2. Paid/controlled form: The advertiser pays for the advertisement, and thereby, exercises control over the advertising process-i.e., what to say in ad, where and when to put up the ad, and so on. This feature differentiates advertising from publicity. Publicity is not paid. For instance, a company may write a positive news story about its new product or performance and send it to the newspaper for publication. If no

payment is made to the newspaper publisher, then the published story is not advertising but publicity. 3. Non-personal presentation: Advertising is non-personal presentation of commercial message in respect of ideas, goods and services, then it is salesmanship and not advertising. Advertising is done to target audience through various media such as press, radio, tv, etc. it is not done on individual basis. However, there is one form of advertising where commercial messages are addressed individually, and that is direct mail advertising. 4. Ideas, goods and services: Advertising is undertaken to promote ideas, goods, services. Now-a-days, not only goods are advertised, but also services such as banking services, telecommunication, insurance, transport, hotel services, etc. Again, ideas are promoted through advertising. Examples of idea advertising includes family planning and welfare campaigns, anti-drugs campaign, and so on. 5. Identified Sponsor: in advertising, the sponsor is always identified, either by the firms name and/or by brand name. In earlier days, there was more emphasis on brand name, but now-a-days, a good deal of importance is placed on the corporate name as well, and as such you come across the ads carrying both the brand name and the companys name. A strong corporate name often benefits the company to introduce new products, to secure funds from the capital markets to attract and retain competent personnel, and so on. 6. Creativity: A good deal of creativity is required to create goods ads. Every great ad has a big idea that is creative and original, which makes the product or idea to sell. Creative people always try to bring out creative ads, something more exciting,entertaining and effective-different from existing ads. 7. Art, science and profession: Advertising is an art because it requires creative talents to produce good ads. It is a science as ads are planned and prepared after systemic study of the target audience, products, competitors, etc. Now-a-days advertising is considered as a highly specialized profession because advertising is managed by professional agencies.

8. Target audiences: Advertising is normally directed at selected target audience. One cannot sell anything to anyone. The advertiser has to select the right target audience and direct his message to them. 9. Create awareness: Advertising creates awareness among people about goods and services that are being advertised. There are so many products and services on the market today that a big job for advertiser is to make people aware of his brand and the benefits it offers. 10. Facilitates consumer choice: Advertising facilitates customer choice. It informs about the features, price, and other aspects of goods and services. This enables the customers to make a proper choice in their buying depending upon their budget, tastes, likes and dislikes. 11. Builds image: Advertising helps to build image of the company and that of the brand. Creative advertising, the personalities used in the advertisement, the progammes sponsored by the advertiser, etc., helps to build goodwill of the organization and that of its product and/or services. 12. All Persuasive: Advertising can be applied to anything and by anyone. Not only goods and services are advertised but also ideas, events, persons, etc., are advertised. Again not only business firms advertise but also nonbusiness organizations like charitable trusts, educational institutions do advertise. 13. Other Features: There are several other features of advertising, such as: It includes and persuades the target audience to buy the products or accept the ideas. It helps to correct negative attitude towards brand and organization and to build, maintain and enhance positive attitudes. It helps to develop brand loyalty, etc.

Active participants in advertising:1. Advertisers: the advertiser include seller of product and services,

trade intermediaries such as retailers, and social organizations. It is

the advertiser who targets audience, the media if advertising, the period of ad campaign, and the size of the ad budget. There are advertisers who run a couple of ads in a year, and there are others who may run thousands of advertising message in a year. The advertisers may advertise throughout the country or they may advertise in a particular region or local area.
2. Advertising agencies: the advertising agencies is an independent

business organization, composed of creative people who plan, prepare and place advertising messages in advertising media for sellers seeking to find customers for their goods and services. The advertising agencies earn a commission of 15% of the media bill. They charge out-of-pocket expenses to their clients, i.e., the advertisers. There are agencies who employ a few employes and yet others employ hundreds of people in their offices.
3. Audience: it refers to the recepients of advertising messages, i.e.,

readers, listeners or viewers. Every advertising message is directed to either mass audience or to selected class of audience. Every advertiser intends to convert audience into prospects and prospects into buyers. The message are directed to non-users who may purchase the product in future.
The messages are also directed to the users of competitors

products, so that they switch over to the advertisers product.

4. Advertising media: The media are the channels of communication

through which ad messages are transmitted or communicated to target audience. There are several media of advertising. Each media has its own limitation and merits The most frequently used are newspapers, magazines, television, radio, posters, bill boards and neon sign. In India, newspaper account for a major share of advertising revenue, followed by television and magazines.

5. Advertising Production Firms: These include copywriters, artists,

photographers, typographers, layout designers, producers, editors, and others. They may be the personnel from the ad agencies or they may be hired from the outside by the agencies on job basis. These are the people who transform the idea of an ad into a finished form. The success or failure of an ad largely depends on these people.
6. Government Authorities: the government authorities control the

functioning of the entire advertising industry. The government adopt laws and regulations which have a direct or an indirect bearing on advertising. For instance, ads of liquor and tobacco products are not allowed on television, and radio. There are advertising clubs, associations of advertisers and agencies, audit bureau of circulation, a number of research firms, institutions imparting advertising skills, and so on.

Advertising as a tool of communication:Communication comes from the Latin communis which means common. When we communicate we are trying to establish commonness with someone. So to say we are trying to share information, an idea or an opinion. Who to whom Advertisers Says what Ad message Media in what channel Audience

With What Effect (effect on customer behavior) Communication always requires at least 4 elements the source (sender), the message, the medium, and destination(receiver). Advertising is a form of communication. It takes the form of who says what, in what channel, to whom and with what effect. This can be explained as follows:

 Who refers to the advertiser(sender of message) Says what- refer to the advertising message (advertisement). In what channel-refers to the media channels such TV, radio etc., To whom- refers to the audience who receives message. With whom effect- signifies the response that is desired from the

audience. For instance, the retailer may expect response as buy at my store. A national advertiser of branded product may desire response as buy my brand.

Elements of Advertising communication:1. The sender: The sender of advertising message is the advertiser who

wants to communicate with the readers, listeners or viewers in respect of his products or services.
2. The Message: The message is in the form of advertisement. Through

ads, the advertiser not only provides information but also persuades people to believe or to do something. A persuasive ad will try to establish, reinforce or change an opinion, a build a logical argument, touch an emotion or convince the audience about the superiority of he product or services so advertised.
3. Medium: The medium of communication refers to the media of

advertising. The media are the channels of communication through which ad messages are transmitted by the advertiser to the audience. The most frequently used media are newspaper, magazines, radio, TV, posters and other outdoor media. Each media has its own distinct features and this is the reason that accounts for their survival and success in the competitive media world.
4. The Receiver: it refers to the recipients or audience of advertising

message i.e readers, listeners and/or viewers. Advertising message is directed to either mass audience or to class audience. It is the desire of every advertiser to reach his message to maximum number of desired audience. Again, every advertiser intends to covert audience into prospects and prospects into buyers.

The Audience also include dealers with whom the advertiser communicates to stock and promote the sale of his product. At times, the advertisements are directed to professional people like doctors, architects, professors, etc.; so that they prescribe or recommend the products promoted by the advertiser. The advertiser may also communicate with the general public, with the government and with the shareholders.

Objectives of advertising:1. To create awareness: one of the important objectives of advertising

is to create awareness of the brand. Brand awareness is mostly required at the introductory stage. Now-a-days, it is not enough to create awareness, but it is important to create top-of-mind(TOM) awareness. The TOM awareness may facilitate the purchase decision, especially, in the case of impulse purchases.
2. To provide information: Advertisers may provide information of the

brand to the consumers. The information may be the features, uses and other special points of the product, especially, when the product is newly introduced or modified.
3. To build or reinforce Attitude: Ads needs to create, maintain and

reinforce attitudes in the minds of target audience. The target audience should develop favourable attitude towards the brand. Positive attitude towards the brand results in increased sales.
4. To correct Negative Attitude: At times, people develop negative

attitude towards certain products or brands. For instances, some people have a negative attitude towards ice-creams, i.e. consumption of ice-cream causes cough and cold. The advertisers through effective presentation of facts need to correct negative attitude.
5. To develop brand Image: It is said that advertising is a long term

investment to build brand image. Advertiser need to develop intended image of the brand through effective advertising. There are several factors that can develop good image of the brand through advertising. The personalities used, the content of advertising message, the media selected, etc. do help to build brand image.

6. To develop brand loyalty: Advertiser tries to develop brand loyalty.

They expect repeat purchases from their customers and at the same time to spread good word about the brand in the market. Brand loyalty can be developed through proper marketing mix. Good advertising can help to develop brand loyalty.
7. To persuade audience: through effective ads, one can persuade

audience to act favourably. Persuasion through advertising can be effected through testimonials, product demonstration, offering gifts or premium offers, contests, etc.
8. To educate the audience: some of the ads intend to educate the

audience regarding the use of the product, the handling operations, etc. Public awareness campaigns educate the citizens regarding the negative effects of noise and dirt pollution, child labour, etc. advertisers should not try to achieve only business objectives, but also social objectives through advertising.
9. To counter competitors claims: the advertiser may counter the

claims made by the competitors. Often competitive advertising refutes directly or indirectly the claims made by the rivals. The advertiser may claim the superiority of his brand in the advertisement.
10.

To expand Markets: The advertiser may intend to expand his market from local to regional or national (marketer). Therefore, the advertiser may advertise not only in the local area but throughout a particular region or throughout the country.

Advertising strategy: Communication target market: specific definition of characteristics Positioning: the chosen location in the perceptional map.
Concept: theme, motive, main message, one for each advertisement,

secondary message as required. Creative strategy: main elements.

Media strategy: initial media & budget planning and logic behind it.

Changes in advertisement:-

 In the nineteenth century advertisement was on simple shooting

based.
But with the new scientific technology, with

shooting they have more

visual effects in their Ads.

They are more animated. so that the ads are more attractive and can

create more impact on the audience, viewer, listener or receiver. Visual aid always has more impact on consumers mind than any other form

Put Downs: Advertisers often put down other products to make their products

seems best
For example: cadbury says eat cadbury because its the 1st date of

the month and nestle munch says u can eat the munch on any of the date.
1 more very good example is of Pepsi and Sprite. They try to put

down each other products.

Appeals and Execution Style: Advertising Appeals : The approach used to attract the attention of consumers and/or To influence consumer feelings toward the product, services or cause. Execution style : The way a particular appeal is turned into an advertising message. The way the message is presented to the consumer.

Star Power: Sports hero are used in commercials to tell kid what to wear and what to eat.
If the children or teens will see their idol eating or using the product,

they also want the same product. This way they think they will become like their hero.
Example M.S.Dhoni & Bipasha basu in Reeboks ad.

Commercials: Most commercial ads are 30 seconds or 1 minute long but some can be much shorter at around 15 seconds. The companies make them short because they dont want their viewers to get bored. Also commercials cost a lot so the companies prefer to make them short. But if the ads are interesting it sometimes exceeds 1 minute.

Did you know..?

Did u know that you all watch an average of 22,000 hours of television before graduating from your high school?
This is just a simple information for your knowledge.

Targets of Advertising:

Advertising targets young people because they are more sensitive than adults about what they wear and use. If they see their friends using or wearing a product they might be more interested in getting it. Some teens watch more T.V and use the computer a lot which will open them up to more advertising.

Why advertising is important?

It is important in our society,like an old slogan Advertisement,your right to choose. Advertisement helps the consumer informed about whatever new product or services are available in the market at their disposal.

Advertising on the whole helps business as well as the economy to prosper and makes the consumer aware of the various choices that are available to him.

Bandwagon: Companies make u think that you will be left behind and everyone has that product so they are telling you if you dont purchase then you are a loser. So these force you to buy their product.

For e.g-in their commercials, Nokia telephones shows a whole bunch of people walking around using their phones.

General roles of advertising:The role of advertising are many. It is designed to inform and induce people to act upon the advertising message. Most advertising, however, is for the marketing of goods and services. The role can be explained as follows: Communication: there is always a need to inform the consumers

about the availability of new and better goods and services. It is very difficult to personally approach the prospects throughout the market area and bring to their notice the availability of goods and services. Advertising solves this problem through mass communication in newspaper, magazines, radio, T.V, etc. Advertising create awareness of the goods and services that are available in the market.

 Education: Advertising brings to the knowledge of the audience about

the various features of the product, such as quality, uses, advantages, price and such other aspects. This helps the prospects to make a proper choice of brand before he decides to purchase. Also, the audience are made aware of social problems that are forced by the society, such as child marriages, dowry evils, noise pollution, smoking effects etc. through public service advertisements.
Employment: the advertisement offers directly or indirectly jobs to

thousand of people. There are media people, advertising agencies, models, photographers, producers, copywriters, artists, researchers, and many more who earn their income through advertising.
Entertainment: Advertising, especially on TV provides a mean of

entertainment. By sponsoring programmes, the advertiser brings entertainment to the homes of millions of people every day. Again, advertisements by themselves are entertaining, especially to children.
Economic growth: since advertising helps to expand consumer

markets, it enables large scale production and distribution. New and better variety of goods enter the market scene and continue to get response from the prospects. This helps the economic development of the country.
Expansion of market: effective advertising helps to stimulate more

and more demand from the audience or prospects. This helps to boost up large scale production and marketing. The manufacturer/seller can expands his market from local level to regional, to national level and even to international level.
Raises standard of living: advertising helps to promote the sale of

new and better goods and services. Consumers can enjoy the new products at reasonable prices. The consumption of new and better goods and services improves standard of living of the society.
Finances mass media: advertising brings revenue to the media.

Some of the newspapers, and magazines depends to a great extent on ads.even radio and TV earns crore of rupees through advertising. Most of the media would not have progressed and prospered, but for the revenue from advertising.

Advertising research

 Main article: Advertising research

Advertising research is a specialized form of research that works to

improve the effectiveness and efficiency of advertising. It entails numerous forms of research which employ different methodologies. Advertising research includes pre-testing (also known as copy testing) and post-testing of ads and/or campaignspre-testing is done before an ad airs to gauge how well it will perform and post-testing is done after an ad airs to determine the in-market impact of the ad or campaign on the consumer. Continuous ad tracking and the Communicus System are competing examples of post-testing advertising research types.

Types of advertising: Commercial advertising media can include wall paintings, billboards, street furniture components, printed flyers and rack cards, radio, cinema and television adverts, web banners, mobile telephone screens, shopping carts, web popups, skywriting, bus stop benches, human billboards, magazines, newspapers, town criers, sides of buses, banners attached to or sides of airplanes ("logojets"), in-flight advertisements on seatback tray tables or overhead storage bins, taxicab doors, roof mounts and passenger screens, musical stage shows, subway platforms and trains, elastic bands on disposable diapers, stickers on apples in supermarkets, shopping cart handles (grabertising), the opening section of streaming audio and video, posters, and the backs of event tickets and supermarket receipts. Any place an "identified" sponsor pays to deliver their message through a medium is advertising. One way to measure advertising effectiveness is known as Ad Tracking. This advertising research methodology measures shifts in target market perceptions about the brand and product or service. These shifts in perception are plotted against the consumers levels of exposure to the companys advertisements and promotions. The purpose of Ad Tracking is generally to provide a measure of the combined effect of the media weight or spending level, the effectiveness of the media buy or targeting, and the quality of the advertising executions or creative. See also: Advertising media selection

Covert advertising
Main article: Product placement

Covert advertising, also known as guerrilla advertising, is when a product or brand is embedded in entertainment and media. For example, in a film, the main character can use an item or other of a definite brand, as in the movie Minority Report, where Tom Cruise's character John Anderton owns a phone with the Nokia logo clearly written in the top corner, or his watch engraved with the Bulgari logo. Another example of advertising in film is in I, Robot, where main character played by Will Smith mentions his Converse shoes several times, calling them "classics," because the film is set far in the future. I, Robot and Spaceballs also showcase futuristic cars with the Audi and Mercedes-Benz logos clearly displayed on the front of the vehicles. Cadillac chose to advertise in the movie The Matrix Reloaded, which as a result contained many scenes in which Cadillac cars were used. Similarly, product placement for Omega Watches, Ford, VAIO, BMW and Aston Martin cars are featured in recent James Bond films, most notably Casino Royale. Blade Runner includes some of the most obvious product placement; the whole film stops to show a Coca-Cola billboard.

Television commercials
Main articles: Television advertisement and Music in advertising

The TV commercial is generally considered the most effective massmarket advertising format, as is reflected by the high prices TV networks charge for commercial airtime during popular TV events. The annual Super Bowl football game in the United States is known as the most prominent advertising event on television. The average cost of a single thirty-second TV spot during this game has reached US$3 million (as of 2009). The majority of television commercials feature a song or jingle that listeners soon relate to the product. Virtual advertisements may be inserted into regular television programming through computer graphics. It is typically inserted into otherwise blank backdrops or used to replace local billboards that are not relevant to the remote broadcast audience. More controversially, virtual billboards may be inserted into the background where none exist in real-life. Virtual product placement is also possible.

Infomercials
There are two types of infomercials, described as long form and short form. Long form infomercials have a time length of 30 minutes. Short form infomercials are 30 seconds to two minutes long. Infomercials are also known as direct response television (DRTV) commercials or direct response marketing. The main objective in an infomercial is to create an impulse purchase, so that the consumer sees the presentation and then immediately buys the product through the advertised toll-free telephone number or website. Infomercials describe, display, and often demonstrate products and their features, and commonly have testimonials from consumers and industry professionals.

Celebrities
Main article: Celebrity branding

This type of advertising focuses upon using celebrity power, fame, money, popularity to gain recognition for their products and promote specific stores or products. Advertisers often advertise their products, for example, when celebrities share their favourite products or wear clothes by specific brands or designers. Celebrities are often involved in advertising campaigns such as television or print adverts to advertise specific or general products.

Media and advertising approaches

Increasingly, other media are overtaking many of the "traditional" media such as television, radio and newspaper because of a shift toward consumer's usage of the Internet for news and music as well as devices like digital video recorders (DVR's) such as TiVo. Advertising on the World Wide Web is a recent phenomenon. Prices of Web-based advertising space are dependent on the "relevance" of the surrounding web content and the traffic that the website receives. Digital signage is poised to become a major mass media because of its ability to reach larger audiences for less money. Digital signage also offer the unique ability to see the target audience where they are reached by the medium. Technology advances has also made it possible to control the message on digital signage with much precision, enabling the messages to be relevant to the target audience at any given time and location which in turn, gets more response from the advertising. Digital signage is being successfully employed in

supermarkets. Another successful use of digital signage is in hospitality locations such as restaurants and malls. E-mail advertising is another recent phenomenon. Unsolicited bulk Email advertising is known as "spam". Spam has been a problem for email users for many years. But more efficient filters are now available making it relatively easy to control what email you get. Some companies have proposed placing messages or corporate logos on the side of booster rockets and the International Space Station. Controversy exists on the effectiveness of subliminal advertising (see mind control), and the pervasiveness of mass messages (see propaganda). Unpaid advertising (also called "publicity advertising"), can provide good exposure at minimal cost. Personal recommendations ("bring a friend", "sell it"), spreading buzz, or achieving the feat of equating a brand with a common noun (in the United States, "Xerox" = "photocopier", "Kleenex" = tissue, "Vaseline" = petroleum jelly, "Hoover" = vacuum cleaner, "Nintendo" (often used by those exposed to many video games) = video games, and "Band-Aid" = adhesive bandage) these can be seen as the pinnacle of any advertising campaign. However, some companies oppose the use of their brand name to label an object. Equating a brand with a common noun also risks turning that brand into a genericized trademark - turning it into a generic term which means that its legal protection as a trademark is lost. As the mobile phone became a new mass media in 1998 when the first paid downloadable content appeared on mobile phones in Finland, it was only a matter of time until mobile advertising followed, also first launched in Finland in 2000. By 2007 the value of mobile advertising had reached $2.2 billion and providers such as Admob delivered billions of mobile ads. More advanced mobile ads include banner ads, coupons, Multimedia Messaging Service picture and video messages, advergames and various engagement marketing campaigns. A particular feature driving mobile ads is the 2D Barcode, which replaces the need to do any typing of web addresses, and uses the camera feature of modern phones to gain immediate access to web content. 83 percent of Japanese mobile phone users already are active users of 2D barcodes. A new form of advertising that is growing rapidly is social network advertising. It is online advertising with a focus on social networking sites. This is a relatively immature market, but it has shown a lot of promise as advertisers are able to take advantage of the demographic information the user has provided to the social networking site. Friendertising is a more precise advertising term in which people are able to direct advertisements toward others directly using social network service.

 From time to time, The CW Television Network airs short programming breaks called "Content Wraps," to advertise one company's product during an entire commercial break. The CW pioneered "content wraps" and some products featured were Herbal Essences, Crest, Guitar Hero II, CoverGirl, and recently Toyota. Recently, there appeared a new promotion concept, "ARvertising"; its supported on Augmented Reality technology.

Conclusion: Thus we can conclude that advertising is the hardest job to do. Its not simple as it seems. It needs lot of hard work from the production of goods & services to the advertising of the product. Marketing & promotion of goods & services is the important part of the advertising.