Marketing Communications

TYPES OF ADVERTISING 203

Introduction

Advertising is one of the oldest, most visible and most important instruments of the marketing

communications mix. Large sums of money are spent on advertising, and no other marketing

phenomenon is subject to so much public debate and controversy. Huge amounts of research

are devoted to the question of what makes advertising eff ective and to the role of advertising

characteristics on its eff ectiveness.

As is the case with other communications instruments, special attention has to be devoted

to the diff erent steps in advertising campaign development and to the fi t between the strategic

marketing plan and the advertising campaign. Th e most crucial step in this process is trans-

lating the creative idea in an advertising execution. To this end, it is important to devote a lot

of attention to diff erent formal and content techniques and their eff ectiveness in advertising.

But fi rst of all, an overview is given of the diff erent types of advertising.

Types of advertising

Advertising can be defi ned as any paid, non-personal communications through various media

by an identifi ed company, non-profi t organisation or individual.^1 Advertising is a good marketing

communications tool to inform and persuade people, irrespective of whether a product (Nestlé’s

Fitnesse keeps you slim), a service (Avis: We try harder) or an idea (Come up against cancer) is

promoted. Not surprisingly, advertising is a commonly used tool. Compared with early 2011,

in 2012 global advertising spending is on the rise in most parts of the world except Europe

( Figure 7.1 ). Compared with 2010, in which global ad spend was $475.7 billion, ad spends in

2012 were predicted to increase to $529.5 billion, and even to $603.1 billion in 2015.^2

Diff erent types of advertising can be distinguished on the basis of four criteria, as shown

in Table 7.1. First of all, advertising can be defi ned on the basis of the sender of the message.

Manufacturer advertising or product advertising is initiated by a manufacturing company that

Figure 7.1 Growth in global advertising spend across the world, first quarter 2012 vs first quarter 2011

Source : http://www.statista.com (accessed 9 July 2012).

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