Consumers' Responses to Positive and Negative Comparative Advertisements - Assignment Example

Name: Tutor: Title: Critical reflection paper for the advertising report Course: Date: Critical reflection paper for the advertising report Introduction According to Levy (2008) a well thought out strategy is the key to any successful advertisement. The advertising message should be very focused and specific for the advertisement to be compelling which necessitates making intricate choices and leaving out alternatives that are rational, conceivable and attractive as well. A creative strategy identifies the critical choices necessary in developing an advertising message and therefore the creative strategy is what defines what will be said regarding the product or service being advertised. Additionally a creative strategy explains how one wants the audience to perceive the brand. Accordingly, a well written creative strategy clearly explains how the product or service will be presented to the targeted audience. This was presents a critical reflection of the team’s creative strategy developed within the advertising report. Critical thinking and academic theory will be applied in the analysis of the creative strategy. Overall objective of the advertisement The purpose of the advertisement is clearly articulated. According to Gregory (2008) every advertisement has an overall objective; which is the purpose for making the communication and the intended action/ result from the communication. The advisement should show what it is trying to achieve with the advert campaign and what the audience is expected to do. This advertisement clearly stipulates the objective of the advertisement which is to sensitize the targeted audience on the importance of donating organs. The purpose of the advertisement is to inform people that they should donate organs because the culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) communities are suffering from complications relating to organ failure due to low organ donation rates from people who share similar cultural backgrounds. This is because people are not willing to donate the organs due to various reasons such as strong religious beliefs and hence the advertisement aims at encouraging the people to donate organs willingly. Therefore, the indented action or result of the advertisement from the audience is that the audience will be ready to donate organs willingly and the rate of organ donation in the area will increase as a result of the advertisement. Target audience The target audience in the advertisement is appropriate. Target audience refers to the audience the advertisement message is being directed to. Demographic, psychographic as well as other suitable segmentation variables should be used to describe the target audience and give a market-driven underlying principle for selecting the specific audience. More importantly, knowing the target audience is important because it helps in defining the information to be conveyed in the advisement, how to say it and how the message will be delivered (Gregory 2008). The target audience in this advertisement is Muslim of Arabic decent and the demographic segmentation is the audience living within metropolitan Australia, particularly on Greater Sydney. The rationale behind choosing this demographic segmentation is that this region has a high number of Muslims of Arabic decent and hence most of the targeted audience will receive the advertisement message. The age of the targeted group is between 18 and 34 years and therefore targeting this age bracket is a good idea because most of the Muslims in Australia are aged between 29 years and below and thus the advertising message will reach a big number of the targeted audience. Knowing the targeted audience was important in defining how the advertisement message would be delivered because it was possible to know that since the target audience consists of the relatively young people, they would be more open-minded to modern medical treatment unlike the older people and hence there would be minimal resistance to the advertisement message. Additionally the young people use internet often and internet should be one means of conveying the message because studies have shown that online advertisement is very effective among young people (Evans 2009). Market insight The market insight of the advertisement is great because it has taken into consideration all aspects that will assist in reaching a big number of the targeted audience at once. For instance, the advertisements will be shown around Islamic festival of Eid a period when the targeted audience is likely to be more receptive and thus emotions of the audience will be exploited in the advertising strategy. At this time, the advertisement will focus on the emotions of the audience since the emotions greatly influence the decisions of the consumer. For instance, during this period Muslims are normally in celebratory mood, jovial, happy and always willing to give and hence they will not only be receptive to the advert message but the message will create an in interest in the mind of the audience regarding organ donation. Consumer insight research/ key consumer insight The consumer research that was carried out was not satisfactory because the method that was used in research did not entirely provide information whether the advertisement would be successful. Surveys were conducted and Arabic Islamic societies from Sydney universities regarding their knowledge and views on the issue. One-on-one in-depth interviews should have been carried to find out both the thoughts of the audience on issue as well as explore the behavior of the audience and identify of the advertisement would be successful (Karns 2005). Normally, a consumer research should not only assist in exploring the behavior of the targeted audience but it should also identify if the marketing will be successful and hence help determining the advertising scope and focus (Boyce & Neale 2006). Campaign media platforms Even though the chosen media platform “short films” if remarkable, variety of campaign media platforms should have been chosen. For instance, it would be recommendable to use road-shows and organize for a “meeting” with the target group to pass on the message. For instance, the road-shows can be conducted during the Eid festival in the areas with high number of Muslims, as per the demographic segmentation of the target audience. Additionally, when the target audience gathers to celebrate the Eid festival, the message can be passed after arrangement with their religious leaders to spare some short time to address the audience regarding the advertisement message. Road-shows and addressing the target audience during a gathering can be an effective way of passing the message to individuals who might not view the films and can be a useful way of making one-to-one contact with the audience and address any issues, questions the audience might have regarding the issue and clarify such issues (Whitehead 2005). The Big Idea The big idea in the message in the campaign is outstanding because it has all-important concept; it has a satisfying storyline for the target audience, has an emotional theme, a brilliant tagline and an incredible image as well (Sen & Bhattacharya 2001). The caption “Help is close when you need it the most” captures the single-minded thought that the campaign aims at instilling in the minds of the audience. The emotional theme of the big idea is that Muslims perceive helping and giving as an extremely important thing especially during Eid and hence it touches and informs the audience. An incredible image has been included where a young Muslim in need of an organ has been incorporated and thus such an image will touch the audience on seeing their own suffering because of a problem they can help and hence they will be compelled and prompted to donate organs to such suffering people and thus the campaign message will have been delivered successfully. Strategic rationale The key message of the campaign is that life is priceless and it is necessary to help when one’s life is at risk. For the Muslims, the Eid is about sacrificing and helping those in need. The key message which focuses on helping those in need and the demonstration that life can be solved by the closest person rationalizes the emotional and logical appeal of the campaign message. Creative execution/creative rationale The advertisement message effectively provokes thoughts and emotions that there is need to help people who are in need of organs. The portrayal of a young Muslim man who is hospitalized because he is need of an organ is touching and the suffering the man is going through invokes emotional feelings of sympathy and empathy and thus the need to help the man get out that situation. The fact that the man is a Muslim from the same cultural background invokes the urge to help one of their own when in a similar situation. More importantly, the image of the previously sick man, celebrating Eid after recovering following the organ donation depicts the significance of organ donation and how organ donation can help in easing suffering and saving lives of those close to us and those we love. Therefore, the advertisement successfully conveys the message that it is extremely important to donate organs through the film (Russell et al. 2013). The concept of helping those in need is underlines the Muslim teachings and thus the concept of helping in the film was logical and appropriate. At the end of the film, the message “Help is close when you need it the most” comes up and information about Transplant Australia and how to register for organ donation follows. At this point, it is most definite that the audience is likely to take note of registration details and all information regarding transplant in Australia for them to able to make donations to help those in need. This message and the detail information is shown at the time when the audience have the whole picture of the importance of organ donation and how important it is and therefore the audience is likely to take the campaign message seriously and will be inclined to donate organs in future. Conclusion The creative strategy of the advertisement is basically excellent apart from a few weaknesses. The purpose and the objective are clearly articulated and the target audience is suitable because the appropriate segmentation variables have been used in describing the target audience and market-driven underlying principles for selecting the specific audience have been given. The market insight is also appropriate because it targets the audience during Eid period when the target audience is most likely to be responsive. However, during consumer research, more research methods like in-depth interviews should have been used to get more information and also more campaign media platforms should have been used to reach as many people as possible. Bibliography Boyce, C & Neale, P 2006, Conducting In-Depth Interviews: A Guide for Designing and Conducting In-Depth Interviews for Evaluation Input, Massachusetts: Pathfinder International. Evans, S 2009, The Online Advertising Industry: Economics, Evolution, and Privacy, Journal of Economic Perspectives, 23(3): 37-60. Gregory, M 2008, Handbook of marketing and society, Sydney: Sage publications. Karns, G 2005, An update of marketing student perceptions of learning activities: structure, preferences, and effectiveness, Journal of Marketing Education, 27(2), 163-171. Levy, J 2008, Broadening the Concept of Marketing, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 33), pp. 10–15. Sen, S & Bhattacharya, B 2001, Does Doing Good Always Lead to doing better, Consumer Reactions to Corporate Societal Responsibility, Journal of Marketing Research, 38 Schultz, D et al. (2007). In search of a theory of integrated marketing communication, Journal of Advertising Education, 11(2), 21-31. Whitehead, T 2005, Basic Classical Ethnographic Research Methods: Secondary Data Analysis, Fieldwork, Observation/Participation Observation, and Informal and Semi-structured Interviewing. Maryland: Department of Anthropology, University of Maryland. Russell, N et al. 2013, Consumers' Responses to Positive and Negative Comparative Advertisements: The Moderating Effect of Current Brand Usage, Journal of Current Issues & Research in Advertising, 34(2). Read More