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Learning to improve: Advertising research that guides practice
La publicité sociale, que plusieurs inscrivent dans le domaine plus large du marketing social, occupe une part importante de l’industrie de la communication marketing au Québec : des dizaines de millions de dollars sont investis chaque année dans des campagnes publicitaires promouvant des causes sociales et environnementales multiples. Si les annonceurs sociaux choisissent cette forme de communication persuasive, c’est parce qu’ils sont animés de la conviction qu’elle est efficace pour susciter l’adoption de « bons » comportements ou l’abandon de « mauvais » comportements chez le public visé. Or, cette assertion soulève inévitablement des questions : l’efficacité des campagnes de publicité sociale est-elle évaluée? Le cas échéant, sur quels indicateurs et méthodes s’appuient ces évaluations? Sont-ils arrimés aux plus récentes connaissances issues de la recherche scientifique? Dans les écrits scientifiques, deux constats émergent : l’absence de consensus sur ce qui constitue une campagne efficace et sur la manière d’évaluer cette efficacité, ainsi que le manque de données empiriques sur les pratiques d’évaluation des professionnels. De tels constats conduisent naturellement à s’interroger sur la dynamique d’échange entre la recherche scientifique et les professionnels de la publicité sociale. Les données scientifiques sont-elles transférées aux professionnels? Dans l’affirmative, les intègrent-ils à leurs pratiques? Encore une fois, la revue de la littérature permet de constater que ces enjeux ont été peu documentés empiriquement jusqu’à présent. Dans ce contexte, l’étude s’est penchée sur l’enjeu général de l’arrimage entre les connaissances issues de la recherche scientifique (CIR) et les pratiques d’évaluation des campagnes de publicité sociale au Québec. S’appuyant sur un devis méthodologique mixte, un questionnaire a d’abord été soumis à soixante-deux professionnels de la publicité sociale oeuvrant au Québec, afin d’établir un portrait chiffré de leurs pratiques à l’égard de l’évaluation des campagnes ainsi que du transfert et de l’utilisation des connaissances scientifiques. Puis, vingt-trois professionnels ont participé à des entretiens individuels pour explorer plus en profondeur les raisons qui sous-tendent ces pratiques.
Complex phenomena such as advertising are difficult to understand. As a result, extensive and repeated testing of diverse alternative reasonable hypotheses is necessary in order to increase knowledge about advertising. Laboratory and field experiments, as well as quasi-experimental studies, are needed. Fortunately, much useful empirical research of this kind has already been conducted on how to create persuasive advertisements. A literature review, conducted over 16 years, summarized knowledge from 687 sources that covered more than 3,000 studies (Armstrong 2010 https://link.springer.com/book/10.1057/9780230285804 https://a.co/d/hqxj4Ij). The review led to 195 principles (condition-action statements) for advertising. We were unable to find any of them in a convenience sample of nine advertising textbooks. The textbooks tended to ignore evidence on persuasion. Of the more than 6,500 sources referenced in these textbooks, only 24 overlapped with the 687 used to develop the principles. By using the evidence-based principles, practitioners may be able to increase the persuasiveness of advertisements. Relevant evidence-based papers have been published at the rate of 20 per year from 2000 to 2010. The rate of knowledge accumulation could be increased if journal editors invited papers with evidence-based research findings.
Complex phenomena such as advertising are difficult to understand. As a result, extensive and repeated testing of diverse alternative reasonable hypotheses is necessary in order to increase knowledge about advertising. Laboratory and field experiments, as well as quasi-experimental studies, are needed. Fortunately, much useful empirical research of this kind has already been conducted on how to create persuasive advertisements. A literature review, conducted over 16 years, summarized knowledge from 687 sources that covered more than 3,000 studies (Armstrong 2010 https://link.springer.com/book/10.1057/9780230285804 https://a.co/d/hqxj4Ij). The review led to 195 principles (condition-action statements) for advertising. We were unable to find any of them in a convenience sample of nine advertising textbooks. The textbooks tended to ignore evidence on persuasion. Of the more than 6,500 sources referenced in these textbooks, only 24 overlapped with the 687 used to develop the principles. By using the evidence-based principles, practitioners may be able to increase the persuasiveness of advertisements. Relevant evidence-based papers have been published at the rate of 20 per year from 2000 to 2010. The rate of knowledge accumulation could be increased if journal editors invited papers with evidence-based research findings.
There is increasing scrutiny of marketing activities and a growing demand for greater accountability of the marketing function. This article asserts that such accountability cannot be achieved until generally accepted standards for the measurement of marketing outcomes are adopted. The article identifies three broad types of marketing outcomes and suggests that two of these are candidates for the development of standardized measures. The role of standards, essential characteristics of standards, and how they may be developed are addressed. Twelve general propositions related to standards for assessing marketing outcomes are offered.
This plenary address to the Society for Marketing Advances calls on the marketing discipline to be accountable, link its contributions to financial performance, and assert the value it contributes to the firm. The paper suggests a process for developing causal links among marketing activities, intermediate marketing outcomes, and financial performance metrics.