Nature of Advertising from Traditional Print to Interactive and Web Based - Research Paper Example

Changing Nature of Advertising from Traditional Print and Broadcast to Interactive and Web based Advertising is a form of communication that is meant to encourage persuade or manipulate an audience which may include viewers, readers or listeners to take or continue some action. Over the years fundamental changes have been happening in the advertising industry where audiences are moving from mass media to niche media which have indisputable trends towards disintermediation, fragmentation and greater consumer control which are affecting the media. Advertising in the recent years has been changing according to consumer preferences for more personalized and relevant forms of media that speaks of their needs and interest. Advertising has changed from one way communication to two way communication where the audience is free to interact. Traditional mass media involve advertising through the newspaper, books, magazines, radio and television. This type of advertising is one- to- many type of communication that does not allow direct feedback from the audiences. For instance when people read the magazines or turn on the television ,there is no way to directly respond to advertisements unless they write to or call the company themselves but this way they will be using another form of advertising. Radio Advertising Radio advertising cost is very attractive advertising vehicle for many small business owners. Radio advertising has a wide scale appeal to consumers and it reaches thousand of target audience at the right time and right message. However, radio was primarily an entertainment medium and advertising is considered an interruption. This has resulted in an industry called satellite which provides entertainment without commercials because consumers are willing to pay for them. With the emergence of satellite radios the popularity of radio advertising is slowly decreasing. Radios have also evolved into entertainment source for background noise at work and for primarily driving. (Stafford & Ronald, 2005, 45). At homes, there has been a drop in radio use because people can play their CDs where they have the freedom to choose their music and programmes free of commercial interruption. This has led to low popularity in radio advertising. Television Advertising Television is a form of entertainment that brings the family together to enjoy public amusement without leaving home. Research has shown that an average person spends more time with the television than with newspaper and radio combined. This shows that television has a very huge audience making it the most powerful advertising choice for many manufacturers and retailers. This has been so for a very long time but all the same the television advertising is slowly dying. The television audience has been fragmented into few local channels where major companies would choose their advertiser but with the introduction of cable and satellite television the audience has further been fragmented into over 200 channels. This fragmentation has led to dramatic reduction of audience in the local channels. Television advertising has limited lifespan for any advertisement this makes the advertisers to not do their advertising on television because once the advertisement has aired its gone for good hence a viewer may not remember the advertisement after all. The television audience as well has a way of avoiding commercial interruption because there has been an introduction of TIVO, pay per view, public broadcasting stations and the multitude of satellite. This has seen a great number of audiences paying for those services because they are avoiding the commercial interruptions (Stafford, & Ronald, 2001,65). At homes, families are opting to watch a common movie as a form of entertainment since they are free of interruption. Although television advertising has decreased for the small business for the big businesses it is now possible to make world -wide advertisement this show that television advertisement has developed and has is yielding more benefits for large business. Newspaper Advertising Newspaper is the one of the oldest form of advertising. Newspaper has had their ups and downs as well but regardless of the challenges it is still among the most preferred form of advertising. One of the reason people buy newspaper is because they want to read a certain advertisement. Research has shown that 15%-23% of those who buy newspaper do so for reading the advertisement this could be because newspaper do not have interruption unlike the television and radio. ( Petley, 2003, 33). Newspaper also delivers well over 50% of community household products everyday of the year, this make them to have great marketing power hence may be preferred by advertisers. (Peters, 2013, 12) In newspaper consumers read the advert because they want hence they are able to engage the consumer at the time they are making a decision of whether to buy it or not? The consumer can also decide to keep or cut out the advertisement for future reference. Although newspaper subscription and readership has been decreasing in the recent past, the online version of the newspaper has been growing faster which means that there are no losses in subscriptions. More people are able to read the online newspaper because they are cheaper and affordable. These traditional forms of advertising are non interactive and consumers opinion on interest is not considered. This has lead to more innovative and interactive ways of advertising. Interactive and Web-based Advertising Interactive advertising is where the audience the audience is fully involved in the marketing of a product. The web-based is the advertising that makes use of the internet and is fully interactive as well. Interactive advertising can be online or offline. Interactive advertising is not new but its scope and immediacy has increased with the diffusion of new technologies that are web based. This diffusion of technology has seen significant rise in interactive advertising. Interactivity is a characteristic of a consumer, consumer can therefore decide to respond or not hence it is not such a new thing. The speed, scope and the scale of interactivity is what is new. The internet is a new technology that makes things cheaper, simpler and easier. Most of the interactive media uses internet for online advertising. Platforms where online advertising is used include: banner ads, text ads, social networking advertising, e-mail marketing and mobile advertising. Interactive advertising enables more interaction between the consumers and the marketers and is becoming more pronounced (West, 2000, 24). It allows consumers to provide and collect information by searching and navigating through the commercial websites where they can post and customize their preferences as well as other consumers and the service providers. With this, marketers are able to customize their advertisement and segment their audience in-order to facilitate consumer effectiveness. Internet advertising has come a long way from where it was used by scientists and in academics to becoming accessible to regular consumers. Originally internet advertising was very simple from the advertisement to how it was sold, this was before ad serving and technology took off (Yeshin,2006,53). Marketers would pay for a small banner ad place on a website for a given period of time. Over the years internet advertising has settled in a number of standard ad dimensions that are benefiting both the publishers and marketers Niche marketing is a type of internet marketing that deals with a niche market by using niche or targeted ads. In this kind of marketing marketers have an increasing ability to reach specific audiences. Niche marketing involve marketers tracking customer profiles brought about by everything from blogs and social networking sites like face book, twitter, my space and many others. This provides them with audiences that are smaller and better defined hence leading to ads that are relevant to consumers and are also effective for the companies. The advertisement from such companies are not limited to that specific group and can be viewed by any person interested to find out more about the product(Porter,2011,65). This shows that the nature of advertising has evolved from mass media advertising where consumers had no option to more sophisticated method like niche marketing where products are advertised according to consumer preference. In conclusion, technology has given consumer more control of the type of advertisement they can pay attention to with time. The traditional forms of advertising have also the interactive technologies like the internet which is experiencing increase on demands. It is however very clear that the response of any particular advertisement must be interpreted within the context constrained imposed by a particular medium. The nature of advertising has been and will continue to change with the changes in technology. Work Cited Durham," The North Carolina Historical Review 47.1 (2011): 54-90. Print. Petley, Julian. Advertising. North Mankato, Minn: Smart Apple Media, 2003. Print. Peters, Paul "The Changing Nature of Advertising." The Changing Nature of Advertising. 16 Oct. 2009 EzineArticles.com. 2 Dec. 2013 . Porter, Patrick "Advertising in the Early Cigarette Industry: W. Duke, Sons & Company in Stafford, Marla R, and Ronald J. Faber. Advertising, Promotion, and New Media. Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 2005. Print. West, Nancy M. Kodak and the Lens of Nostalgia. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2000. Yeshin, Tony. Advertising. London: Thomson Learning, 2006. Print. Read More