The uncommon sense of advertising--understanding contemporary advertising appeals in print of top advertisers in India.
Swaminathan, Freda ; Bansal, Ipshita
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Introduction
Advertising is a reality in contemporary society and is often a
topic of controversy because of its strong influence on target
consumers. The advertising industry in India is over Rs. 38.5 billion
(2013) in value with print and television being the primary media
vehicles accounting for 39 percent and 43 percent respectively. Stimuli
used in advertising, are creative and appealing and often referred to as
advertising appeals. Advertising appeals aim at meeting advertising
objectives and creatively building the efficacy of the promotional
strategy of a brand or corporation. In the process, advertising also has
an influence on the social dimensions of society, especially culture.
This paper studies the advertising appeals being used in the Print
medium and analysis its content with a special focus on culture.
Culture is a term that is often used loosely--a person is seen as
uncultured when not behaving in a particular manner. Culture is
reflected in the way groups of people live, in language, art and music,
and in their value and belief systems. Significant amount of research
has been conducted on cross-cultural advertising, using the dimensions
of culture as defined by Hofstede. According to Hofstede (1980), culture
is "the collective programming of the mind which distinguishes the
members of one human group from another". Culture determines the
identity of a human group. Hofstede distinguishes 'values' as
individual and 'cultures' as societal, and describes the
dimensions of culture to include Power Distance, Masculinity versus
Femininity, Individualism versus Collectivism and Uncertainty Avoidance.
The first cultural dimension, Low versus High Power Distance (PDI),
may be observed in contemporary advertising. Do the advertising appeals
used reflect the unequal distribution of power between less powerful
members and more powerful members in the country? How autocratic and
paternalistic are the creative treatments in the advertising vis-a-vis
treatments being consultative and democratic. Is there respect for the
elderly and senior members of society? Indian families are undergoing
major transitions including the changing role of patriarchy,
urbanization, the questioning of joint family living and other aspects
that come with the modernization of society.
The second cultural dimension is Individualism versus Collectivism
(IDV). Though Indian culture lays great emphasis on family, village and
community, Hofstede's research did rate India as moderate on
Individualism. Advertising creates aspirations. Are Indian aspirations
that are projected in print advertising promoting a sense of
individualism or collectivism?
The third cultural dimension, Masculinity versus Femininity (MAS)
is reinforced by projecting male aspirations linked with success, money,
assertiveness, competition and materialism. Feminine qualities are often
projected as being modest, nurturing and caring. Success is depicted
with symbols like a child bringing home a trophy or getting a good job.
Does advertising project the male as macho, adventurous and as the
economic provider of the family--while women are projected as nurturing,
gentle, kind, loving and focused on being a wife or a mother?
The fourth cultural dimension, Uncertainty Avoidance (UAI) may be
assessed when Indians are depicted as being uncomfortable in
unstructured situations and have a fear of taking risks. The ability of
Indians to improvise and to save has been much written about. Is this
reflected in the advertising?
The long-term versus short-term orientation as a cultural dimension
was added to Hofstede's cultural dimensions, keeping in mind Asian
markets. Does Indian advertising project respect for tradition,
fulfilling of social obligations, and the quality of thrift and
perseverance ? This dimension will not be covered in this report because
it was not reflected in the earlier research (which is the basis of this
paper) undertaken by Albers-Miller et al (1996) correlating advertising
appeals with Hofstede's cultural dimensions.
This paper studies advertising and its reflections on culture in
the context of different product categories, depending on the level of
consumer involvement in the category and the rational or emotional
consumer decision-making. Products are categorized as high involvement
or low involvement products. Usually the former are priced relatively
high and consists of products that involve some amount of rational
consumer decision making. The latter are usually priced lower and
consists of products that are purchased on impulse or through emotional
appeals. In order to study a variety of products, this research has
looked at products that are high or low involvement, and those that use
rational or emotional appeals. Four types of product advertising
categories, of different involvement have been classified:
High involvement/rational: This category includes expensive
purchases, for example, financial services, purchase of a home or car or
major appliances and electronics. Products of this kind usually require
advertising which has more information, with clear explanations of
features and benefits.
High involvement /emotional: For consumers, this includes jewellry,
weddings, and holiday travel plans. In India, the marriage market like
matrimonial advertising for the selection of a husband or wife will also
fall into this group. Advertising in this category tends to focus on
visual, music and emotional appeals.
Low involvement/rational: Low involvement products of this kind are
bought out of habit or with very routing decision making processes that
require only minimal amounts of rationalization. These include FMCG
products that are purchased spontaneously like shampoos and detergents.
Advertising plays an important role in terms of positioning and loyalty
building.
Low involvement /emotional: These products are purchased on an
impulse and offer the benefit of emotional or sensory gratification.
Soft drinks, sweets, an entertaining magazine, or a birthday card--all
products purchased spontaneously.
The advertising appeals will be identified and the findings will be
analyzed in the context of earlier research undertaken by Albers-Miller
et al (1996), where advertising appeals were correlated with
Hofstede's cultural dimensions.
Objectives
The objectives of this content study are :
1. To identify the key appeals being used in Indian print
advertising.
2. To assess the appeals that dominate different product categories
based on the products having high involvement and low involvement in
consumer decision-making, and purchases that are done on rational and
emotional buying behavior, and associate this with earlier studies of
Hofstede's cultural dimensions.
3. To develop a framework that reinforces the role of cultural
appeals in creating effective advertising.
Literature Review
The literature on this subject is vast because it deals with four
important fields of study: content analysis, culture, advertising and
consumer involvement. Research undertaken by Hofstede and Pollay have
been the basis of the content study. Though both these studies were
undertaken in the 1980's, these have been continuously referred to
by researchers in the areas of culture and advertising respectively.
Hofstede's cultural dimensions though originating in behavioral
sciences have also been used in studies relating advertising appeals to
culture. Pollay's identification of forty-two advertising appeals
has been the most comprehensive listing of advertising appeals, and has
been referred to in many research papers on advertising.
Content Analysis: Content studies focus on the content of verbal,
written and visual communications in stimuli like advertising.
Krippendorff (2004) defined content analysis as a research technique for
making replicable and valid inferences from texts (or other meaningful
matter) to the contexts of their use. He referred to Gerbner (1994), who
looked at content analysis for mass media in terms of frequency with
which a system's components occur, or 'what is', the
order of priorities or 'what is important', the affective
qualities or 'what is right' and the proximal or logical
associations between components of 'what is related to what'.
Naccarato et al (1998) undertook a content analysis on B2B advertising
and found that the design, style and substance of an advertisement are
important variables to achieve advertising goals. Madden et al (1986) in
their study of information content of US and Japanese advertising have
reinforced that in content analysis of advertising, training of coders
and coder reliability is very important. This is because study of
advertising is also perceptual in nature, where information can be
presented with impact (like a large visual) or as small-print
information. The need for the guidance of experts in the domain of
advertising becomes important. They also studied the appeals used in US
and Japanese advertising and found that the latter was more informative.
The information cues studied were price value, quality, performance,
components, availability, taste, nutrition, packaging, warranties,
safety, competitive information and benefits conveyed in the advertising
idea.
Culture: Hofstede (1980) identified the dimensions of culture
across different countries and created an area of intense research.
Hofstede's study (1998) also found that the perceptions and
behavior of people in collectivist cultures are different from the
perceptions and behavior of people in individualistic cultures. When
Hoppe (2004) interviewed Hofstede, he appreciated the applications of
'Culture's Consequences' to various phenomena in
societies, such as language structure, in savings rates, consumer
behavior, in corporate governance, in medical practice and other fields.
While the cultural dimensions defined by Hofstede are comprehensive, one
must remember that these were developed in an organizational context,
and not social or individual. India has a score of 48, 40, 77 and 56 for
the dimensions of Individualism, Uncertainty Avoidance, Power Distance
and Masculinity (visa-vis the USA scores of 91, 46, 40 and 62).
Culture is also conveyed in advertising through the use of symbols
and logos. Watson (1997) in his book, Golden Arches noted that
McDonald's golden arches are viewed as symbolizing American
culture, and associations of individualism. Drumwright and Murphy (2009)
interviewed industry and academic leaders to study their perspectives on
the current state of advertising ethics. The ethics of the advertising
was distinguished in the context of the advertising message from the
ethics of the advertising agency business. Pallab, Roy and Mukhopadhyay
(2006) studied how a person's interpretation of ethics is also
influenced by the cultural background. Culture, therefore, affects what
is perceived as right or wrong. The differences in interpretation of
ethics across cultures was studied and associated with Hofstede's
cultural dimensions.
Bing (2004) has given examples of practical applications of
Hofstede's dimensions in consulting and business practices, with
special reference to the areas of employee orientation, leadership
training and development, cross border mergers and acquisitions,
development of global competencies and the impact of culture on change
strategy. Orr and Hauser (2008) recommended that Hofstede's
cross-cultural dimensions need to be redefined within contemporary
cross-cultural and business environments.
Triandis (2004) has noted that individuals in societies rated high
on individualism or collectivism, can think in an
'idiocentric' manner (similar to those in individualistic
cultures) or 'allocentric' (like those in a collectivist
culture).
Singh (2004) studied the 4 schools of cultural anthropology. The
'structuralists', according to him are rigid in their approach
with a focus on signs and texts rather than behavior. The
'interpretivists' on the other hand focus on the observable,
expressive role of symbols (example, a cock-fight in some culture),
while the 'cognitivists' claim that the individuals
interpretation and meaning especially in a cross cultural society is
important. The fourth school is the 'post-structuralists' who
are concerned with the performance aspects of popular culture. He
recommends another approach termed as the 'synthetic'
approach, which is a combination of the 'interpretivist' and
'cognitivist' approaches and proposed a three dimensional
framework, where culture is analyzed at three levels : perceptual,
behavioral and symbolic, to study and analyze culture in totality and
get a meaning over time. Phillips and McQuarrie (2009) found that the
use of figurative metaphors in advertising results in modifying consumer
beliefs. The study recommends to advertisers to develop metaphors that
are incongruous and unique, in order to bring about desirable levels of
persuasion and belief.
Guzman and Paswan (2006), reinforced how brands are symbols in
popular culture, and studied how in emerging markets, cultural roots and
lifestyle (for example the popularity of Bollywood, Indian weddings)
play an important role in the building of brand image.
Singh, Srinivasan, Sista and Parashar (2008) made a case for
multiple national cultures in India. Based on a cluster analysis, they
identified 10 different clusters of states similar in culture. The study
argues for five antecedents to culture viz., Social Identity (mass
public culture, language, religion, literacy, sex ratio and territorial
mobility for members),historical context (myths, historical memory,
historical territory or homeland, colonization, external influences),
economic parameters, institutional factors and geography.
Mooij and Hofstede (2010) have pointed out that many of
Hofstede's dimensions when applied to global branding and
advertising strategy and research must take into consideration that it
is not easy to recognize values in advertising as advertising appeals
may reflect both the desired and desirable. In individualistic cultures,
advertising must persuade target consumers, whereas in collectivistic
cultures, the focus must be on relationship building between buyer and
seller. The latter appeals focus on in-group benefits, family and
harmony, whereas the former on individual benefits, preferences and
personal success and independence. Lam, Lee, and Mizerski (2009) applied
Hofstede's four cultural dimensions on word-of-mouth behavior and
found that marketers should monitor the cultural values of their markets
to bring about appropriate word-of-mouth brand communication strategies.
Indeed, Hofstede's Cultural dimensions are used extensively for
cross cultural research of advertising appeals.
Advertising Appeals: Pollay (1983) identified a comprehensive list
of 42 advertising appeals. These appeals have been used for many further
studies, especially on cross cultural aspects of advertising. Pollay
described advertising as a 'carrier of cultural values' and as
a "distorted mirror." He proposed a set of 42 appeals relevant
to advertising viz., adventure, affiliation, casual, cheap, community,
convenient, dear, distinctive, durable, effective, enjoyment, family,
frail, freedom, healthy, humility, independence, magic, maturity,
modern, modest, morality, natural, neat, nurturance, ornamental, plain,
popular, productivity, relaxation, safety, security, sexuality, status,
succorance, tamed, technological, traditional, untamed, vain, wisdom and
youth. Pollay(1986) further assessed that advertising appeals used
causes conformity, social competitiveness, envy, false pride, anxieties,
insecurities, disrespect for age, experience, tradition and history,
reduced family authority and sexual pre-occupation. Advertising,
therefore, becomes a "mirror" that reflects the mosaic
cultural values and behaviours of consumers.
Pollay et al (1990) studied print advertising between 1900 to 1980
and television commercials between 1970 to 1980 and found that the key
cultural value manifested was 'practical', connoting the
advertising appeals, effective, durable and convenient. The study
reinforced that content studies as a research methodology can be used to
assess cultural values reflected in advertising.
Albers-Miller et al (1996) designed a study that highlighted how
systematic differences in advertising content mirror predictable
differences in the culture across countries themselves. Advertising
appeals vary predictably across countries and there is an association
with a country's work culture to a wide range of appeals employed
in the country's advertising in business publications. The study
looked at the relationship of Pollay's 42 appeals with
Hofstede's cultural dimensions, and narrowed the appeals to 30
appeals. The advertising appeals of independence, distinctive and
self-respect were positively co-related with the cultural dimension of
individualism while popular, affiliation, family, succorance and
community were negatively correlated. For the cultural dimension of
power distance, the appeals that were positively correlated were
ornamental, vain, dear and status, while cheap, humility, nurturance and
plain were negatively correlated. The cultural dimension of uncertainty
avoidance was positively correlated with safety, tamed and durable, and
negatively with adventure, untamed, magic, youth and casual. With the
masculinity index, effective, convenient and productivity were
positively correlated, while natural, frail and modest were negatively
correlated. The research indicates how certain appeals are related with
Hofstede's Cultural dimensions. Millers (1997) researched
Pollay's 42 appeals to find that the 'Value' appeal goes
across cultures and that appeals vary according to product category.
Okazaki et al (2010) has studied the concepts of rational appeals and
emotional appeals and has proposed that the former has characteristics
of 'thinking', 'explicitness' and 'fact',
while the latter of 'feeling', 'implicitness' and
'image' and researched that both appeals had a positive effect
on consumer attitude towards an advertisement.
Ramesh Kumar (2009) has identified the core values of Indian
society as being family oriented and savings oriented. He has described
the culture of Indians to be focused on festivities and mythology. The
changing cultural trends in urban markets include being materialistic,
achievement oriented, use of high technology products, high on impulse
gratification and not being so traditional. He has identified
"cultural interface values" in advertisements as being
celebrity and family oriented, and being family hierarchy oriented,
utilitarianism and group affiliated.
Involvement: Kotler et al, 2013 have said how consumers take
decisions on products based on the perceived risk and the price of the
product. Products are therefore high involvement products, where the
risks and costs are high, and low involvement products, where these are
low. Kapferer et al (1985) developed a measure of consumer involvement
that was multi-dimensional including the importance of risk, risk
probability, sign value and pleasure value. Zaichkowsky, 1985 also
defined a involvement as "a person's perceived relevance of
the object based on inherent needs, values and interests", and
developed a scale of involvement. Mittal, 1989 questioned whether high
consumer involvement products must always imply more information search
to recommend that information search is high only when products are
utilitarian or rational, and are not so high for products that serve
psychosocial needs .
Research Methodology
The study studied 200 English advertisements in leading print
publications. English advertisements were selected because, according to
the 3 experts used in this study, most Indian advertising is created in
English. English is the official language in India, with all leading
cities having well circulated English dailies. According to a 2010
release from the Census data analysis of 2001 on bilingualism and
trilingual's in India, more Indians speak English than any other
language, with the sole exception of Hindi.
Fifty advertisements of top advertisers were selected in each
category- high involvement rational products, high involvement emotional
products, low involvement rational products and low involvement
emotional products. The rational of selection was based on the price of
the product and the judgment of 3 advertising experts. The brands
selected for each category were listed as one of the Top 100 brands in
AdEx India 2010 and 2011 or Power Brands 2010-11 in exchange4media.com.
The rationale used by the experts for High Involvement Rational products
was that it should be high priced and should involve information search,
for High Involvement Emotional products that the price should be high
and decision-making based on brand loyalty or image. Low involvement
rational products were higher priced than low involvement emotional
products. The latter involved greater spontaneity in purchase.
Three experts from the advertising profession looked at each ad to
give a weightage to the key appeals being used in each of the elements
of the advertisements, like headline, main visual etc .. Six pairs of
trained coders were administered the 200 press ads based on the four
types of product categories and involvement. The coders coded the
different elements of the advertisement viz. headline, sub headline,
visual, sub visual, baseline, body copy, flash, logo and others against
the 42 appeals developed by Pollay. Coders were asked to rate the
elements from 1 to 5. Where 1-very weak, 2-weak, 3-average 4-strong,
5-very strong (very weak to very strong) against the appeals they find
to be most appropriate. The coders were provided with the set of ads,
list of Pollay's 42 advertising appeals with their description and
the chart sheet on which they had to rate the elements.
The average of each element for all six coders was calculated and
then the average percentage marked against each element was computed.
Thereafter the computed percentage in each element was summed to get the
final weightage of each appeal in an advertisement. This way all 200 ads
with all six coders were analyzed and computed. This computed data was
then entered into the SPSS Statistical tool for further Statistical
Analysis using non parametric tests (example, chi square, binomial,
k-related samples).
Findings
The experts looked at the advertising and observed that 25 percent
of the advertisements had an appeal that is 'value for money'.
This may be because India is essentially an emerging economy where
consumers are conscious of price. Few ads showed women dressed in
traditional clothes like the sari. In fact the modern woman was shown in
22 percent of the advertising. Family, use of Bollywood celebrities and
technology were some prominent appeals. Appeals that were not popular
were, stimuli like the environment, romance, friends, humor, Hinduism
and patriotism (each being seen in 5 percent and less of the
advertisements).
The findings of the content study undertaken by the coders gave
further light on the advertising appeals of Indian print advertising.
The appeals used in advertising are manifestations of culture. The top 4
appeals contributing to every advertisement in the four product types
were studied and given an index depending on the degree of contribution.
This table indicates the top 4 appeals selected by the coders of the 200
advertisements where a weightage is given to high, medium and low
ratings, and subsequently, an Index was given to the appeals. The
appeals that were scored as the top 4 appeals were Effective,
Distinctive, Modern, Status, Technological, Healthy, Wisdom, Enjoyment,
and varied according to whether the advertisements were from High
Involvement Rational, High Involvement Emotional, Low Involvement
Rational or Low Involvement Emotional types of products. This however
gives an idea of the key appeals that have been used in the advertising
that were selected. The following table gives the details.
Effective as an advertising appeal, according to Pollay, indicates
feasible, workable, useful, pragmatic, appropriate, functional,
consistent, efficient, helpful, comfortable, tasty, strength, and
longevity of effect. It is a very functional appeal, and is not
surprising that this is used in advertising aimed at consumers in India,
who are known to be price conscious, and therefore needs a strong
'reason why' to purchase a product. This is the strongest
appeal in all the product types including high involvement emotional
products.
Distinctive refers to appeals that are rare, unique, unusual,
scarce, infrequent, exclusive, tasteful, elegant, subtle, esoteric, and
handcrafted. This appeal is strong especially in high involvement
products, but is also used in low involvement products. Status however
is strong only in high involvement emotional products.
Modern is an appeal that goes across all product types, while
status is used primarily in high involvement emotional products.
Technological appeal is used for rational products, especially those
that have high involvement, while healthy and enjoyment are used in low
involvement products. Wisdom is a strong appeal for low involvement
rational products like cooking oil, kitchenware, shoes, baby food and
engine oil.
Hofstede looks at culture as an onion, where the outer visible
layer is the manifestation of symbols, and as one looks inward, are
Heroes, Rituals and Values. While Indian advertising uses each layer, is
it reflective of Hofstede's cultural dimensions in India? The
content study of the 200 samples of advertising selected, gave a a
weightage between 1 to 5 for each ad, depending on the strength of the
appeal. Only those appeals have been selected that have been given a
weightage greater than equal than 3. A binomial of significance was
conducted and the significant appeals were superimposed on the earlier
study conducted by Albers-Miller et al (1996) showing the relationship
of Pollay's appeals to Hofstede's cultural dimensions. The 42
appeals were reduced to 30 appeals, where 'Modern' and
'Technological' were dropped in their study. The significant
appeals of the ads selected were incorporated as per the Cultural
dimensions of Hofstede. This provides a macro picture of advertising
appeals that seem to emerge in the selected list of press advertising in
the 4 categories and is depicted in Table II.
The content study reinforces the observational study and the
findings of the Top 4 appeals, because the appeals that are very
dominant are 'Distinctive' and 'Effective', and
these go across all the product categories. 'Status' and
'Convenient' also emerge as important appeals that are being
used by advertisers. Indian print advertising therefore has a greater
emphasis of 'Status' in High Involvement Emotional products,
and the appeal of 'Convenient' in High Involvement Rational
Products.
The advertising appeal of 'distinctive' appears across
all product cells, implying the use of advertising appeals that project
an individualistic society. India is a country known for strong family
ties, joint families and community living. Yet advertisers are
recognizing a highly individualistic appeal across advertising. Not
surprising when one studies the research done by Hofstede where while
India is not seen as an individualistic society, India still is not as
collectivistic as countries like Pakistan. USA had a score of 91,
Pakistan a score of 14 and India a score of 48. India is therefore is a
bit middle of the path. This may be influenced by the fact that the
majority religion in India, Hinduism, is a highly individualistic
religion, which is a way of life in a social structure revolving around
the family. As may be expected, High Involvement Emotional products have
advertising appeals connoting 'status'. This reflects the high
levels of Power Distance prevalent in Indian culture. This dimension
however may be looked at differently in the advertising context,
vis-a-vis the research undertaken by Hofstede. Advertising after all
gets developed with an intention to appeal to the aspirations of the
target audience.
Both the appeals of 'distinctive' and 'status'
used in the advertising reflects the 'high-context' nature of
Indian society, where 'sensory' cues dominate and which
embodies some of the following characteristics: importance of hierarchy,
rank, status and elders and formality. Indian advertising uses such cues
to appeal to consumers.
'Effective' is again an appeal that would be used in a
market that is high value-driven like that of India. India is an
emerging economy where disposable incomes are still limited, and the
middle-income groups are just emerging. The functional aspects of the
products are therefore given importance by advertisers, especially in
the print medium. This appeal therefore, just like
'Distinctive' is used across all product categories.
'Convenience' as an appeal is dominant in high involvement
rational products, may be because of the value proposition that needs to
be clearly described for such expensive products.
An independent samples T test was conducted to check if the appeals
were significantly different for each pair of product categories: high
involvement rational and emotional product advertising, and low
involvement rational and emotional product advertising. Table III and IV
depicts the appeals that were significantly different when with high
involvement and low involvement categories, the appeals were compared
for rational and emotional decision making. In High Involvement
Emotional and High Involvement Rational advertising, there were many
more appeals that were significantly different than in Low Involvement
Rational and Low Involvement Emotional product advertising.
From Tables III and IV, it is interesting to note that in the case
of Low Involvement Rational and Low Involvement Emotional product
advertising, there is significant difference in the key appeal that has
shown in the analysis, Effective. The other appeal, Distinctive, has no
significant difference between emotional or rational product
advertising, for both High Involvement and Low Involvement products.
Ornamental and Productivity appeals are significantly different for the
pairs of product categories. In Low Involvement products, Technological
also stands out as significantly different between Low Involvement
Rational and Low Involvement Emotional product advertising.
Recommendations
The findings of the study indicates that the content in Indian
advertisements reflect the cultural dimensions of consumers both for
high involvement and low involvement products. Some commonalities and
variations are seen for each of these categories, for rational and
emotional type of products. Some recommendations taken from these
findings are given below:
1. Indian advertising needs to work beyond being hard working and
build brands.
'Effective' was a key appeal that was being used in the
advertising of all the four product categories. This is reflective of
Indian advertising having a 'hard-working' character that
tends to use a value-for-money proposition, rooted in rational thinking.
This tends to take away from using an emotional or ethical appeal that
is important for contemporary advertising. The character and personality
of a brand tends to get diluted when the primary focus is a
value-for-money proposition. This appeal seems to be the most obvious in
a society like India where disposable incomes tend to be low and
'Price' plays a relatively more important role in marketing
strategy. Advertisers need to remember that advertising is a strategic
tool that builds brands and brand equity, rather than work on tactical
appeals of economy.
2. High involvement product advertising have a need to be more
engaging.
Each product category varies in terms of a significant secondary
appeal. In High Involvement products, the appeal,
'Distinction' is a strong appeal for emotional products, while
'Technology' is strong for rational products. Because of the
high price of the products in this category, advertisers have a
challenge of creating advertising that is more engaging. For example a
socially responsible appeal could make the advertising more effective.
3. Differentiation needs to be reinforced for low involvement
product advertising.
Low involvement emotional and rational product advertising tend to
be more similar with appeals of 'Healthy',
'Enjoyment' and 'Modern' becoming important.
Advertising needs to be different to be noticeable. The challenge of
brand differentiation of such product advertising becomes important.
4. Cultural dimensions in Indian advertising needs to be more
enlightened.
The study indicates that the cultural dimensions of
'Individualism' and 'Masculinity' are reflected in
the advertising of all categories. For High Involvement Emotional
products, the dimension of 'Power Distance' is also reflected.
India is a country with an ancient civilization, known for a rich
culture, intellectual thinking and a philosophical way of life. It is
unfortunate that advertising reflects undesirable cultural dimensions
like gender inequality and social class distinctions. Indian advertising
seems to reflect a character of hypocrisy, where despite being a nation
that stands of family and community, the advertising tends to build an
aspiration of Individualism. It is time that Indian advertising builds
greater character for brands and create advertising that is not only
engaging to consumers, but also more enlightened in message strategy.
5. Creativity with differentiation to be a mantra for Indian
advertising.
All product categories use the appeal of 'Distinctive'
with no significant difference. However, the way advertisers use the
advertising appeal, 'ornamental' and 'productivity'
are significantly different across all four product categories being
studied. The use of the 'effective' and
'technological' appeal were significantly different for low
involvement rational and low involvement emotional product advertising.
Effective advertising uses creative techniques to fulfill advertising
objectives. The advertiser has the challenge of building a mantra for
greater creativity and differentiation in the advertising.
This content study looks at existing advertising appeals and
recommends that advertisers look beyond creating only hard-working
advertising for Indian consumers, but also look at advertising as a
strategic tool that builds brand differentiation and equity, creates
consumer engagement and brings new ideas in creativity. The study
cautions advertisers on reinforcing negative dimensions of Indian
culture, and advocates desirable cultural dimensions in Indian
advertising. This will make advertising not only an effective tool of
brand management in India but also create new milestones in the field of
advertising.
Limitations of Study
The study has the limitations that there are no advertisements in
the vernacular language that were used. English, however, is an official
language of India and is used for national advertising campaigns. The
advertising selected was from publications available from January 10,
2010, and those available on the internet. These are relevant to an
urban population in India. Since advertising is creative in nature, the
analysis was based on the perceptions of the coders.
Conclusion
Is there an uncommon sense in Indian press advertising ? Nonsense !
There is sense in the appeals used and the cultural dimensions that are
reflected. The question arises whether Indian print advertising reflects
the cultural dimensions of India, and whether it can be more effective
if it projects dimensions that are ethically more desirable. This may be
further taken forward to question whether effective advertising needs to
be stimuli to contribute to change in a society or perpetuate cultural
norms that may discriminate against certain sections of society.
Only then will advertising bring sense and change in this complex
and emerging world of India. Advertising will then not only be a
marketing tool for organizations but contribute to the change that is
the essence of Indian culture and tradition. As is stated in the ancient
scriptures of the Rig Veda(1.89.9),"Let noble thoughts come to us
from all directions" .
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Table I
Top 4 Advertising Appeal Index of Product Categories
Product Type High High Low Low
Appeal Involvement Involvement Involvement Involvement
Emotional Rational Rational Emotional
Effective 79 105 129 124
Distinctive 52 28 22 25
Modern 36 33 28 33
Status 30 10 8 2
Technological 15 57 24 6
Healthy 2 4 37 60
Wisdom 15 28 30 16
Enjoyment 5 12 35 35
Table II
Macro Appeals as per Hofstede's Dimensions
Product Categories IDV PD I UAI MAS
High Involvement Distinctive Effective
Rational Convenient
High Involvement Distinctive Status Effective
Emotional
Low Involvement Distinctive Effective
Rational
Low Involvement Distinctive Effective
Emotional
Note: IDV refers to Individualism, PDI to Power Distance,
UAI to Uncertainty Avoidance and MAS to Masculinity.
Table III
Weighted Means for High Involvement Product Categories
High Involvement
Appeals High High
Involvement Involvement
Emotional Rational
Ornamental 4.80 2.96
Distinctive 7.09 5.38
Dear 4.14 1.76
Youth 4.25 2.53
Productivity 2.43 2.11
Morality 0.51 0.31
Freedom 2.89 1.96
Vain 3.26 0.49
Sexuality 1.95 0.52
Family 3.99 2.21
Modesty 0.87 1.30
Casual 0.87 0.61
Healthy 1.46 0.70
Source : SPSS Test Results * with T
test significance <0.05
Table IV
Weighted Means for Low Involvement
Product Categories
Low Involvement
Appeals Low Low Involvement
Involvement Emotional
Rational
Orna mental 4.61 2.29
Productivity 4.53 4.25
Sexuality 1.20 0.63
Effective 4.15 6.74
Technological 4.80 2.06
Wisdom 4.53 4.25
Humility 0.14 0.44
Security 2.00 1.04
Status 2.13 1.34
Community 0.31 1.56
Source : SPSS Test Results * with
T test significance <0.05
