A Strategic Framework for Assessing Advertising

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A Strategic Framework for Assessing Advertising THOMAS J. REYNOLDS A STRATEGIC AND CHARLES GENGLER FRAMEWORK FOR ASSESSING ADVERTISING: THE ANIMATIC vs. FINISHED ISSUE dvertising expenditures process, at the animatic stage of for individual firms, par- copy development. Aticularly consumer goods firms, continue to increase, rep- Background resenting a significant portion of revenues. For example, in 1988 Many methods of assessing Philip Morris became the first the effectiveness (or quality) of single company to crack the 2 advertising have been advocated billion dollar mark for annual and implemented. Yuspeh advertising expenditures (Endi- {PACT, 1982) presented the cott, 1989). The immensity of views of a group of the leading these annual commitments to THOMAS J. REYNOLDS o advertising agencies on the topic professor of marketing and advertising expenditures reflect of advertising copy testing. Of direcior of Ihe Morris Hile the importance which industry Center for Marketing Science the nine principles which were al the University of Texas at places upon the role of advertis- the consensus of these views, Dalias Dr Reynolds also ing in the marketing process. serves as chairman of Strate- the preeminent, first principle gic Assessment, Inc and as The management of this critical cited is that "A good copy test- managing director of Rich- marketing function demands mont Partners, a private mer- ing system provides measure- chant bank that the maximal efficiency, or ments which are relevant to the strategic quahty, be sought. objectives of the advertising" Current trends indicate that (PACT, 1982). Along this vein, one area in which firms are ag- Seggev (1982) suggests that gressively seeking to better man- ". the primary goal of adver- age their television advertising tising is to effect positioning." expenditures is by evaluation of Thus, if positioning is the pri- ads at earlier stages of the pro- mary goal of advertising, then a duction process through the use major component of the evalua- of rough prototypes of the fin- tion of copy should therefore be ished advertisements, termed the assessment of the strategic animatics, photomatics, or steal- positioning message communi- a-matics (Bunish, 1987). Since cated, reflecting its strategic the average production cost of a quality. television commercial usually At present, a majority of copy CHARLES GENGLER is an ranges from $250,000 to $500,000 is assessed after the final stage assistant professor of market- ing at Clarkson University. He (compared to less than $10,000 of production. Obviously, sev- received his Ph D in man- for the animatic production), the eral aspects of the communica- agement science from the University ot Texas at Dallas. reduction of expenditures on tion process are all at question ineffective advertisements repre- simultaneously at this point. The sents a goal, early on in the cre- advertisement must gain an au- ative process, by which the goal dience's attention and must of maximal efficiency can be for- communicate the desired mes- mally investigated. Of primary sage to the consumers which interest, then, is how the com- they will remember. Measures of plex concept of advertising effi- whether or not a particular as- ciency, or strategic quality, can pect of the message was deliv- be assessed early in the creative ered or whether the ad was re- Journal of ADVERTISING RESEARCH—OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 1991 61 STRATEGIC FKAMKWORK judgment of quality of the con- linked to individuals' percep- . advertisements should tent of the communication, re- tions of the type of people they flecting the extent to which a feel use those products. Another be assessed to monitor the desired positioning was ob- related model of meaning was degree to which they tained. Dual research issues presented by Cohen (1979), who emerge: (1) specify a theoretical- linked product attributes to communicate the desired ly sound framework for the as- "valued outcomes." Similarly, positioning, . sessment of advertising strategy; Chattopadhyay and Alba (1988) and (2) assess the correspon- studied levels of abstraction in dence of the analysis of the stra- cognitions generated from adver- membered typify traditional tegic message represented in an- tising, ranging from "Factual copy testing research methodolo- imatics with respect to analysis Details" through "Single-Fact gies. However, these types of of the message communicated in Interpretations," "Abstractions/' research methods often ignore the final production. to "Global Evaluations." Seeking the specific, strategically-based a more comprehensive research positioning content of the mes- Defining paradigm, means-end theory sage. The fact that no a priori (Gutman, 1982) proposes a struc- framework of strategic position- Advertising Strategy tural viewpoint of meaning ing is utilized for the assessment Reynolds and Gutman (1984) based upon consumer cognitive forestalls any direct assessment describe advertising communica- categorization processes, which of the relative effectiveness of tion as "the set of meanings and are the essence of product differ- the execution or any systematic associations that serve to differ- entiation. contrasting of the quality of al- entiate a product or service from Means-end theory is based ternative executions. Clearly, its competition." With this in upon a persona! values orienta- advertisements should be as- mind, advertising strategy is tion (Rosenberg, 1956; Vinson, sessed to monitor the degree to simply defined as "the specifica- Scott, and Lamont, 1977; How- which they communicate the tion of the manner by which the ard, 1977), where personal val- desired positioning, or in other brand will be meaningfully dif- ues are the motivating "end- words, to assess how well these ferentiated by the target states of existence" which indi- messages deliver the intended consumer" (Reynolds and viduals strive for in their lives strategy. Following this argu- Rochon, 1991). A specific strat- (Rokeach, 1973). The core of an ment, Reynolds and Rochon egy, then, is the particular set of individual's self-concept can be (1991) state; meanings and associations viewed as a bundle of values linked to the brand, or cognitive (Homer and Kahle, 1988), which Standard copy testing meth- structure, which is being com- govern perception, memory, and ods adequately measure intru- municated. ultimately behavior. Products are siveness, be it known as re- Several structural viewpoints viewed as a schema of physical call, recognition or simple of communications, with respect attributes (see Peter and Olson, memorability of key copy to how meaning or cognitive 1987, for a comprehensive re- points. Standard copy testing structure is derived, have been view of this concept). Means- fails to measure, however, the proposed. Cartwright (1949) pro- end theory simply suggests that degree to which the desired posed a goal orientation in un- the way in which these physical strategy was communicated. derstanding motivational struc- attributes of products are linked It is proposed that the most ture communicated in advertis- to personal values of individuals consistent, and most important, ing. Young and Feigin (1975) is the manner by which products aspect of an advertisement presented the Grey Benefit gain personal relevance, essen- across all stages of production is Chain, which links physical tially, the manner in which the particular strategy-related traits of products to more per- meaning is established. Thus, a positioning message it contains. sonal "emotional payoffs," physical attribute of a product is Obviously, standard intrusive- which represent, similarly, the important only to the extent to ness measures, though impor- motives of the consumer. Con- which this attribute delivers a tant in their own right, are inap- sistent with the motivational ap- benefit or consequence to the plicable for animatics, as is any proach. Levy (1981) presented a consumer through the percep- related form of recall or recogni- structural perspective of product tion of product usage. The per- tion research. The strategic eval- meaning based on social struc- ceived consequence of product uation of animatics is primarily a ture in which products are 62 Journal of ADVERTISING RESEARCH—OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 1991 STRATEGIC FRAMEWORK strategy specification. It is im- Table 1 portant to note that not all ads MECCAS Specification and Example are required to communicate at specification Example each of the strategic levels; rather, MECCAS represents a Driving Force (DF) framework which is broad The value orientation of the strategy; the Peace of Mind enough to deal with all types of end-level to be focused on in the Personal Security advertising. advertising strategic specification and assessment. Leverage Point (LP) The manner by which the advertising will "tap Care To illustrate how strategy can into, ' reach, or activate the value or Commitment to Positive Change be specified with MECCAS, a end-level of focus; the specific key way in Trust summary derived from an as- which the value is linked to the specific features of the product. sessment of telecommunications ads (Gengler and Reynolds, in Consumer Benefit (CB) press) is presented in Table 1. The major positive consequences for the Can Count on to Work consumer that are explicitly communicated, Make My Life Easier Note that the key strategic ele- verbally or visually, in the advertising. Save Time ments corresponding to the MECCAS definitions are speci- Message Element (ME) fied in the appropriate boxes. The specific attributes, consequences, or Uses New Technology
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