7.1 Advertising

Concept of Advertising

Advertising is any impersonal message through which a product is introduced using mass media and is paid for by an identified party. This definition of advertising reflects the following:

1.	Advertising includes a message since it is a communication process between at least two parties.

2.	What is advertised is a product it is generic sense. It could be a good, a service, an organization, an idea,

or a person.

3.	Advertising is an impersonal means of communication, done through mass media such as radio,

television, newspaper, magazines, and Internet sites.

4.	Advertising is a paid form of promotion; it is paid by the organization which advertises. This characteristic

distinguishes from advertising from publicity which takes an advertising form, since the letter is an unpaid

form of promotion/communication.

5.	The advertiser is identified, known, and explicitly mentioned or referred to in the advertisement.

Types of Advertising
Advertising can be classified according to a number of bases. Among these are: geographic coverage, its objectives, the subject advertised, type of demand in question, expected effect, type of advertising appeals, type of advertiser, type of audience, and advertising medium.

7.1 Advertising

According to the geographic coverage, advertising can be classified into local, national, and international advertising. Using the advertising objectives sought, advertising is classified into informative, educational, guiding, competitive, and reminder advertising.

According to the subject, advertising is classified into: goods advertising, services advertising, organization advertising, persons advertising, and places advertising. Classification of advertising according to the type of demand, to be stimulated by it, distinguishes between advertising at the primary level, and advertising at the secondary demand level.

According to the expected effect, advertising is classified into advertising which seeks a direct response and advertising that seeks an indirect response. The first type focuses on motivating/pushing the audience to make an immediate decision to buy the product in question. On the other hand, advertising which seeks an indirect response is not concerned with making an immediate decision.

Based on the appeals utilized, advertising can be classified into advertising which uses emotional or irrational appeals and advertising which utilizes rational appeals. According to the advertiser, advertising can be classified into a producer's advertising, and a distributor's advertising, and cooperative advertising which are shared between both the producer and the distributor and the individuals' advertising.

According to the audience to whom advertising is directed, it can be classified into advertising directed to individual consumers, and advertising directed to organizations/individual buyers. Finally, according to the...

7.1 Advertising

...media used, advertising can be classified into newspapers advertising, magazines advertising, radio advertising, television advertising, Internet site advertising, and other types of advertising in different media.

It is important to note that classifications are not mutually exclusive. This means that the same ad can be classified into more than one type simultaneously.

Advertising Decisions
Since advertising is one of the promotion mix elements/variables, advertising decisions have to be preceded and/or accompanied by a number of stages which are related to promotion. These stages are as follows:

1.	Setting the promotion objectives.

2.	Setting the promotion objectives.

3.	Determining the role which should be played by each of the promotion elements in achieving these

objectives.

4.	Setting the promotion budget and allocating it to the objectives.

5.	Allocation the promotion budget to its different elements.

The decisions which are related to preparing/designing an advertising program delve into the following elements:

1.	Advertising objectives.

7.1 Advertising

2.	Advertising expenditures.

3.	Advertising message.

4.	Advertising medium.

5.	Measuring and evaluating advertising results/outcomes.

Objectives: There are several objectives which advertising might seek to achieve, such as:

1.	To Inform: Inform the market of a new product, suggest new uses for the product, inform the market of a

price(s) change(s), demonstrate how the product function, describe the available services, reduce

consumers' perceived risk, create and build an image for the company.

2.	To Persuade: Create brand loyalty, encourage switching to the company's brand, change consumer

perception of the product characteristics, persuade the consumer to buy immediately at once, persuade

the customer to receive a sales call by the company sale representative.

3.	To Remind: Remind the consumer that he needs the product in the near future, remind him of the places

where the product is sold, keep the product in his memory in its off-season time.

It is worthwhile to note that the objectives which are related to providing information become important in the early stages of introducing a product to the market as a result of the need for creating the primary demand.

7.1 Advertising

Advertising is heavily used to achieve the persuasion objectives in the competition stage, in which concern is gives to build selective demand. Importance of advertising which aims at reminding consumers and public relations audience of certain aspects emerges in the maturity stage of the product life cycle, when the concern is to make consumer and audience think of the product or idea. It is also important to indicate that these objectives have to be measurable.

Budgets: After setting the advertising objectives, the money which should be spent on advertising each of the products has to be determined, usually referred to as advertising appropriation or budget. Of course, the advertising role should be to move the product demand curve upward. The company has to determine the money spent on advertising in such a way to achieve the objectives sought.

The methods which can be used to determine advertising budget are usually classified into simple (and commonly used) methods and sophisticated methods. Among relatively simple methods are:

1.	The method which depends on how much the company can allocate to advertising

2.	Percentage-of-sales method

3.	Competitive party method

4.	Objective -end-task method. Each of these methods has advantages and disadvantages which have to be

studied before deciding which method(s) to use.

7.1 Advertising

Among the sophisticated methods used to determine how much to spend on advertising is the sales-response and Decay model developed by Vidale and Wolf. According to this model, the rate of change in sales in time (t) is a function of four factors/variables. They are advertising budgets, sales response (constant), sales saturation levels, and sales decay (constant).

The message: The advertising message plays a key role in the success of the advertising program. The quality of and creativity in the message might be more important than what is spent on advertising. There are steps to go through in order to develop the message:

1.	Creating the message

2.	Evaluating and choosing the message

3.	Executing the message

Advertising medium: Selecting an advertising medium requires going through a number of steps. They are:

1.	Determining reach, frequency, and effect

2.	Selecting among major media

3.	Choosing the specific medium

4.	Choosing time (timing).

7.1 Advertising

Measuring and evaluating advertising results: After actually advertising, the results reached should be measured and evaluated. Based on the evaluation, advertising effectiveness can be judged, and mistakes in future advertisements can be avoided.

It is worthwhile to indicate that advertising can be evaluated using several approaches. Among these are the reorganization approach (measure whether the audiences are able to recognize the ads they got exposed to), the recall approach (determines whether consumers are able to recall the ads they got exposed to), the attitude approach (measures attitudes towards the product advertised or towards the ad itself), and the action approach (measures effect on the audience's actions as a result of the ad).

Advertising Creativity
Although creativity and innovation are needed in all the organization activities, advertising has been a good target for such creativity and innovation and might come directly after innovation in the product element. Creativity/innovation refers to coming up with unusual/unconventional/extraordinary ideas and putting them in action. Creative advertising contributes to its effectiveness.