LITERATURE REVIEW ON UNIVERSITY OF PORT HARCOURT STUDENTS PERCEPTION ON THE USE OF BRAND AMBASSADORS ON TELEVISION COMMERCIALS: STUDY OF GLOBALCOM
LITERATURE REVIEW
2.0 Introduction
This chapter focuses on explanations
and descriptions of related literature to this research by evaluating existing
literature, research and documented material on the subject matter especially
with regards to working definitions of the key concepts involved in the
research.
2.1 Theoretical Review
The theories
utilized in the research to create an adequate framework include; the
selectivity theory, the perception theory, diffusion of innovations theory, the
agenda setting theory and the AIDA model.
2.1.2 The theory of
Selectivity
All advertising
audience are divergent in their psychological and attitudinal make-up; as
consumers of advertising messages, these audience members are influenced by
different experiences which appear to affect their perception of reality.
Consequently such divergence, in part, is what characterizes the heterogeneous
nature of such audience members. Heterogeneity suggests that members of the
audience adopt or reject media information (including advertising messages)
based on the individual and collective differences that categorize them; the
significance of these differences is selectivity. Selectivity therefore appears
to be a function of the different qualities that characterize audience members
in their choice of what television commercial they perceive as satisfactory.
Faustinus, Moses and Clement (2013) propose that the audience are not only
selective about deciding the media message they expose themselves to but also
how they perceive such messages as they attempt to satisfy public utility on
media needs, therefore, they engage in three levels of message filtering which
include; selective exposure; advertising audiences consciously allow themselves
to be exposed to a specific range of content they sense are in accord with
their interests and opinions while continuously avoiding those that they
determine to be in conflict with such interests and opinions in order to avoid
dissonance (Faustinus, Moses and Clement, 2013); a psychological position were
the audience is exposed to two divergent (contradictory) ideas (Bem, 1967).
Selective
attention; attention, according to the 7th edition of the Oxford
Advanced Learner’s English Dictionary, is the act of carefully looking at or
thinking about an entity in which some interest is displayed. It may be
described as the conscious application of mind to an object or idea considered
important. It is a concept referring to the idea that an advertising audience decides
on a selection of specific adverts on which to concentrate while alienating
themselves from others. In other words, it is an active process of determining
on what adverts to psychologically apply themselves. This phenomenon is
justified by the theory of inoculation
stating that media audiences develop an attitude that provides an enablement
which boosts their immunity to certain media content that appear to threaten their beliefs and value
systems; creating a natural motivation to resist change in other to protect
such systems, and refutation pre-emption
which is an active cognitive element that allows the audience expose themselves
to specific media content that could be used to refute a potential attack (Pfau
and An, 2004).
Selective
Perception is the manner in which the advert audience perceives the content in
view of their interests; such audience members would pay adequate attention to
information they selectively perceive would satisfy their needs and interests.
Perception is a function of what the audience decides is the best method of
viewing selected adverts which also is likely to determine their responses to
such content.
Selective Retention
implies that media audience creatively apply themselves to developing methods
that enable the retention of information gathered through advertised content;
these methods of retention allow for memorization and recall through
association. Association might be viewed as an attempt to connect an abstract
idea to an experience or something that displays some physical value.
2.1.3 The perception
theory
Faustinus, Moses
and Clement (2013) provide the following principles governing this theory which
include
i.
Audience members are
recognized by their perceptions about media issues as each member’s perception
differs from others as it may not be viewed as a mutual generalization but
uniquely peculiar to each member.
ii.
Perceptions are likely to
change as the audience develops a set of new media experiences or a new way of
viewing pre-existing experiences; the changeability of perception explains why
audience members may exhibit a range of discriminatory responses to media
(advertising) content. This means that a single media product may elicit a
range of responses from a particular audience whose perceptions have been
modified by new experiences. As
described in the works of Faustinus, Moses and Clement (2013); a new response to an old stimuli
iii.
The point of reference for
any audience determines their perception of advertising content. These
references involve a collection of media experiences such an audience
undergoes; in other words, how media content is perceived by media consumers is
dependent on all the possible experiences such audiences have been exposed to
which, in turn, influence how they interprete media products.
2.1.4 The diffusion
of innovations theory
Advertising is an integrated marketing
communications tool predicated on selling physical and abstract ideas as its
messages are intended to influence the perception of the media audience in
convincing such audience members to adopt the advertised ideas in attempting to
better their social, economic, political as well as cultural welfare. The
diffusion of innovation theory, according to Faustinus, Moses and Clement
(2013) is a cultural theory propounded by Rogers (1931-2004) who stated that
the theory centers on the conditions which increase or decrease the likelihood
of a new idea being adopted and spread by audience members who exhibit peculiar
cultural dispositions to whom such ideas may or may not be foreign.
Advertising, as noted earlier, is a marketing communications media strategy
that employs audio and/or visual efforts in designing messages aimed at
influencing the perceptions and by extension, the buying behaviour of the
audience; what this implies is that an advert is intended to shape the views
and opinions of the audience to the point where there is a favourable physical
response, patronage. Whether the idea is
adopted in expanding the experiences or is rejected according to Rogers (1995)
depends on four (4) stages which include; the
invention or innovation (the idea around which the message is designed to
influence the audience perception); the
communication channel (this is the means through which the message moves
from one individual to another, for the purpose of the research, the
television); time (the length of time
required to pass through the innovation-decision process: in other words, the
time taken to move from the introduction of the innovation to the adoption or
rejection of the idea by social members); the
social system (a social system, according to Rogers (1983) is a set of
interrelated units that are engaged in joint problem solving to accomplish an
advancement by modifying perceptions which may result in adopting or rejecting
ideas through information and decision making).
Rogers (1983) states that the
innovation-decision process within any social system can be categorized into
three (3) which include: the optional
innovation-decision (the adoption or decision is made by an individual
based on his own perception, who is in some way distinguished from the others
within a social system); collective
innovation-decision (the decision or
adoption is made collectively by a predominant number of members within
the social system who may or may not share a degree of perception); authority innovation-decision (the decision or adoption is made for the entire
social system by administrative and governmental institutions which are
powerful enough to make such decisions on behalf of the members of a social
system who may or may not agree).
The process of adoption or rejection
is based on how an advert is likely to move audience members through a sequence
of five (5) stages which may likely affect how the idea is perceived; according
to Rogers (1962); knowledge (the
individual or group to whom the idea is publicized through advertising, who may
lack adequate information; such audience are also not immediately motivated to
inquire about such ideas); persuasion (the
audience become interested in the innovation while actively seeking the details
about it);decision (the audience
weighs the benefits against the potential problems on the platform of facts in
attempting to decide whether to accept or reject the innovation); implementation (the innovation is
employed by the audience to varying degrees depending on the situation while
simultaneously seeking additional information); confirmation (the innovation, as decided by the audience, may be
used optimally in finalizing the decision to completely adopt it).
Advertised messages may or may not
introduce foreign ideas nevertheless, it is armed with a promise to improve the
standard of life of audience members whose perceptions influence their
behaviour towards the idea. The diffusion of innovation theory therefore
provides a framework that explains how advertised ideas flow from the
advertiser to members of the society who constitute the audience as they decide
on the adoption or rejection of the idea in view of how such ideas are
perceived.
2.1.5 The agenda-setting
theory
The first scholar to formalize the
agenda setting theory, according to Childs and Reston (1959) was a prominent
American journalist, Walter Lippmann who stated that the mass media have the
ability to mentally order or organize the world for people as it transmits a
concentrated range of issues in order to influence what the public discuss and
argue over at an interpersonal level (Daramola, 2003).
Cohen (1963) states that the press may
not be particularly successful in telling people what to think, but it is
stunningly successful in telling its audiences what to think about; this also
is expressed in the words of Shaw (1979) who proposes that the mass media
appear to exhibit a universal influence but it is not principally convincing.
That statement summarizes the most significant of the currently accepted social
facts and research findings about the mass media globally. The mass media
therefore may be considered persuasive in focusing public attention on specific
events, issues, and persons and in determining the importance people attach to
public matters. The agenda-setting theory seems to propose that because of
newspapers, television, and other news media etc. people are aware or not
aware, pay attention to or neglect, play up or downgrade specific features of
the public scene; as they tend to include or exclude from their cognitions what
the media include or exclude from their content while assign in an importance
to what they include that closely resembles the emphasis given to events, issues,
and persons by the mass media. Superficially, agenda-setting resembles the
Hypodermic-needle Theory (also known as the Magic Bullet Theory proposed by
Lasswell in 1987) which assumes that media messages impacts the audiences in
the same way so that their response is not arbitrary but similar (McCombs and
Shaw, 1972); the agenda setting theory proposes that the mass media exhibits a
non-direct, impact of the media on the perceptive shift of media audiences as a
result of its gatekeeping functions. In other words, the media, by describing
and detailing what is out there, present people with a list of what to think
about and talk about.
The agenda-setting approach aligns
itself with the’ multiple-step flow’ model, which eventually displaced the 1984
view of media impact by emphasizing the role of personal influence in changing
human behaviour to which the agenda-setting recognizes; that is the importance
of interpersonal relations in determining the ultimate impact of media content
on people rather than a direct exposure to media messages (Kline and Tichenor,
1972). Advertising is a media function that appears to influence the direction
of human interaction by setting the conversational agenda of the interactants;
through discussion and argument, social members are able to filter information
as well as decide what information should be acted on in view of advancing
their totality of life.
2.1.6 The AIDA model
As proposed by
Faustinus, Moses and Clement (2013) AIDA is an acronym utilized in marketing
and advertising describing a common list of events that are very often a
business undergoes in its campaign to influence the economic nature of the
consumer’s decision in attempting to patronize a product, service or idea. The
model was created by Strong in 1925; it is a behavioural model (as it sought to influence the economic behaviour
of the consumer through a process)that has as purpose to make sure that an
advertisement raise awareness, stimulate interest, and leads the customer to
desire and eventually action (Hackley, 2005). The model is seen as a highly
persuasive and is said to often unconsciously affect our thinking (Butterfield,
1997) as it attempts to explain the steps outlined in the process of sales
recognized in a linear hierarchy.
Every day, the consumer is bombarded by a host of information in attempting to
solicit adequate attention. In a world filled with advertising information, a
multinational corporation as the source of the message must emphasize the
conscious systematic deign and transmission of advertising messages that
compete favourably in the market therefore
with the AIDA Strong (1925)
suggests that for an advertisement to be effective it has to be one that:
commands Attention;
leads to Interest in the product; and thence to Desire to own or
use the product finally, the advert must lead to Action; the actual purchase of the product,
service or idea (Mackay, 2005)
2.2 Conceptual review
2.2.2Audience Perception
Scientists in
attempting to create artificially intelligent systems or A.I. are discovering
just how complicated the process of perception is. Neuroscientists have
estimated that the areas of our brain responsible for the processing of sensory
information occupy up to half of the total cerebral cortex space (Tarr, 2000).
The central research to the issue of perception is explaining how human beings
attach meaning to the sensory information we receive. The vast topic of
perception can therefore be subdivided into visual perception, auditory
perception, olfactory perception, haptic (touch) perception, and gustatory
(taste) perception but in view of this work the focus is on visual and
auditory perception as these are advertising targets (Perception: Recognizing
Patterns and Objects, 2013).When an individual experiences an object, specific
bits of information are acquired about it, including its location, shape,
texture, size, and (for familiar objects) name. James Gibson (1979). The goal
of perception is assimilating information about the world, in this case
advertising with intent to interprete as it is more than the sum of sensory
inputs clearly involving some integration and, perhaps, some understanding of
the sensations we receive.
Researchers,
who formed the Gestalt school of psychology, were particularly concerned with
how people apprehend whole objects, concepts, or units; proposing that when stimuli occur close to one another in space and in time, they
may group perceptually into coherent, salient patterns or wholes. Such
Gestalts, as they are called, abound in our perceptual world, as when leaves
and branches cluster into trees, and when trees merge into forests; when eyes,
ears, noses and mouths configure into faces; when musical notes coalesce into
chords and melodies; and when countless dots or pixels blend into a photograph.
These resulting wholes may have properties their component parts lack, such as
the identity or expression on a face that is unrecognizable from any one part
or the key in which a melody is played that cannot be deduced from any single
note. Understanding how parts combine into perceptual wholes was recognized as
a central challenge in perceptual theory nearly 100 years ago (Pomerantz and
Portillo, 2011)
According
to Pomerantz and Portillo in 2011; there
are five (5) principles of perception referred to as the Gestalt principles
which include; the principle of proximity or nearness (how close the experience projected
by the advert is to those of the audience affect how such members interprete;
in other words, the farther the experience an advert is from those of the
audience, the more likely such information by the audience is filtered out); the principle
of similarity (audiences of
adverts are capable of determining messages that exhibit sameness or commonness
with something with which they are familiar); the principle of good
continuation (adverts
should exhibit a logical continuity without which members of the audience are
likely to lose interest and consequently filter away); the principle of closure(this Gestalt principle suggests that
there is an innate tendency to perceive incomplete objects as complete, to
perceive asymmetric stimuli as symmetric. Media
audience want closure because their selection of advertorials is determined by
their expectations, therefore if an advert does not satisfy these expectations,
there is a tendency to filter away such content); the principle of common fate(The idea is that elements that move
together would be grouped together; this implies that media audiences are
likely to categorize adverts that appear to suggest the same experiences in
attempting to provide a general approach to information that ought to be
retained and those are to be done away with)
Audience perception is not a passive
process but an active participation of the audience who logically process the
information provided by adverts in attempting to integrate such information
into their lives.
2.2.2 Advertising
According to
Ndimele and Innocent (2006) advertising serves as an adjunct to mass
communication; an adjunct is an ancillary which provides services that sustain
the activities and functions of the mainstream media which are also known as
agencies of mass communication. Stigler (1961) points out that advertising
provides information about the existence of a brand, product or serviceas well
as about its quality. This leads to increased consumer awareness of the
attributes of available brands, reducing search costs and expanded
consideration sets, which, in turn, results in more elastic demand. The market
power view of advertising is that it creates the perceived degree of
differentiation among brands. This will increase brand “loyalty” which, in
turn, will reduce demand elasticity, increase markups of price over marginal
cost, increase barriers to entry and reduce consumer welfare (see, e.g., Bain, 1956;
Comanor and Wilson, 1979). However, it is controversial whether advertising
actually creates barriers to entry, because this depends on how effectively new
brands can use advertising to induce trial by consumers who are loyal to other
brands (Schmalensee, 1983, 1986; Shapiro, 1982; Shum, 2002).
The effect of the
advertising on consumers rests on the theory of message repetition. It can be
classified into three main effects: a current effect on behavior, a carryover
effect on behaviour and a non-behavioral effect on attitude and memory
(Pechmann and Stewart 1988; Sawyer 1981; Sawyer and Ward 1976).
The term
‘Advertising is derived from the Latin word ‘advertere’ which implies ‘to turn
the attention towards an ideal Advertising aims to turn the attention of the
mass audience towards a product, service or idea. Therefore it is known as the
activity of attracting public attention to a product or business as by paid
announcement in the print, broadcast or electronic media. Advertising therefore
is any form of non-personal presentation of ideas, goods, or services by the
use of mass communication through advertising media such as print, broadcast,
cinema, outdoor, or electronic media (Czinkota & Ronkainen, 2001).
Advertising is often most visible element of a company’s overall marketing
communications programme (Wells, et al., 2000). Additionally, Wells et
al. (2000) describe advertising to be a form of mass communication that
both informs and transforms a product by creating an image for that product
that goes beyond straightforward facts.
2.2.3 Brand ambassadors
A brand ambassador
is an endorser of a brand, product or service; such an ambassador is a
representative whose presence in an advert functions in providing a connection
between the product, service or brand to the audience. There appear to be
several product categories in the market; hence attributes like quality, value
for money alone do not count as there has to be an effective medium to make the
product reach towards the customer; endorsement therefore has been adopted by
marketing communications to enable consumers associate their perception of a
product that they consume with the ambassador associated with it (Goutam, 2013). According to Brogdon
(2012) in many ways a brand, product or service is a living breathing thing
because it is emotional and behavioral. Behavior reinforces emotion; audience
members connect with, not just mentally but emotionally, with an advertised
product or service, the consequence is that this emotional disposition translates
into action (purchase).This may be why advertising today appears to integrate
the presence of ambassadors in attempting to convince media audience to
patronize products, services and ideas; this phenomenon has resulted in an
enormous debate on whether it really contributes to the brand building process
or whether it is just another lethargic tool void of a systematic process to
make the brand more visible in the minds of the consumers. The perceived
benefits have motivated firms to invest huge amounts as advertising expenditure
for hiring the right celebrity in order to convince consumers to perceive the
brand, product, service or idea as having superior quality as a result of being
endorsed by a socially credible source. (Goutam, 2013)
2.3
Empirical review
2.3.1 The role of brand
ambassadors in advertising
The primary
importance in advertising is given to the consumer psychological behavior
although the effects of
advertisement may be both psychological and behavioral; advertising maybe
considered psychological in the way that they inform or they create appeals in
the mind of the customer and behavioural
as it influences the audience to take action (Yousaf and Shehzad, 2013). In
contemplating the importance of the media audience who constitute customers,
advertising campaigns adopt the function of brand ambassadors who
appear on the front line in attempting to persuade such consumers such
representatives possess a range of sophisticated skills to ensure that
audiences enjoy an enriched product or service experience. The roles of these
ambassadors according to the event and marketing agency guide to leveraging brand ambassadors (2013) include:
Consumer Feedback
Many campaigns now incorporate ways to
gather consumer feedback. Whether it’s collecting general opinions about a
brand, product or service, capturing quantitative data, or gathering consumer
information for follow-up communication, employing brand ambassadors who can
engage audience members and collect information is essential for many advertising
campaigns. Additionally, brand ambassadors themselves also can provide their
personal feedback about consumer reactions toward featured products or program
elements.
Sales
Advertising encourages consumers to
patronize products, services as well as brands; brand ambassadors help improve
sales as they engage these potential consumers in answering detailed product
questions as well as creating a positive experience for audience members.
Technology
Technology is constantly becoming a
more central element in advertising; products are becoming automated therefore
there is some degree of complexity in utilizing such products therefore brand
ambassadors with developed technical aptitudes provide the audience with a
step-by-step application of such products.
Social Media
Advertising also exist on social media
enabling local products and services to gain national and international reach.
Brand ambassadors are usually equipped with a deep understanding of social
media capabilities and large personal networks to drive traffic towards
enhancing sales
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