Academic Disciplines that Affect Advertising
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Introduction
Research in advertising is very important as organizations market their services amid stiff competitions. There are academic disciplines that play very significant roles in the research. In this paper, I will discuss three of the disciplines. The three disciplines are Information Technology, Marketing and psychology.
Information Technology
The discipline of information plays a very crucial role in research in advertising in the contemporary society. There are advances in information and communication technologies every passing day. The field of advertising is very diverse and requires diverse information and communication technology tools to succeed (Okazaki, 2012). Organizations engage in advertising to retain their real customers and attract new ones. They cannot stay with the conventional advertising methods. They have to conduct more research to determine the changes in terms of consumer needs and tastes. Application of hardware and software resources plays significant roles with regards to finding new methods of attracting the consumers.
A lot of information is available through the internet. Some of the information is crucial for the conduct of advertisement research. Organizations are likely to find adverts of their competitors displayed on the internet. On the basis of the information, they are able to design adverts that are superior to those of the competitors. It is possible to look at the shortcomings of the competitor’s adverts and design better ones to ensure relevance in terms of the competitive contemporary environment. It is worth noting that these are only possible with the use of technology.
There are a lot of software tools that organizations can use to design quality and attention seeking adverts to attract more consumers and realize more sales. Moreover, management information systems exist to help researchers in the field of advertising make informed and quick decisions on the processes of undertaking research. The advances in information and communication technologies have redefined advertising research. Now, more than ever before, the researchers can visualize the products and services of the world’s big companies and their advertising tactics and trends. All these aspects were impossible in the past. The role of information technology cannot be underestimated.
Psychology
In doing advertisement research, the researchers need to have a strong psychological background. This is because they have to study the cognitions and personalities of the customers. Advertisement targets the mind of the consumers and aims at influencing them to think and act in a particular manner. As such, this mindset should be studied and known clearly in order to focus on it and achieve positive results.
Advertisement researchers must know the perceptions of the customers and their belief systems. They have to study their cultures and religions as this has the potential to affect the manner in which they will perceive the adverts. There are conservative societies that will strongly condemn certain adverts. The researchers need to understand the community clearly to avoid detrimental effects on the advert. For instance, the perception of morality to the society plays a fundamental role with regards to the acceptance of the advert and the products and services it promotes (Shimp, 2010). There are societies that will condemn adverts that display naked or half naked pictures of men and women and brand them immoral. On the other hand, there are societies that will have no problem with such images. Immorality means different things to different societies.
Psychology will also help the researchers to understand the emotions and personalities of the society(Shimp, 2010). As such, they will design adverts that arouse positive emotions on part of the consumers and give them reasons to buy a product. They have to look at the thought patterns of the consumers and use the images and information that manipulates their mindset and influences them to think about the product in a particular way. The researchers must get into the community, learn their desires and needs and design adverts that seek to meet those needs.
From the foregoing, psychology plays a major role in advertising. The design of adverts is meant to influence the consumer to use a product or service. Organizations cannot create designs to solve the needs that they hardly understand. Psychology helps in creating this understanding, thus helping to meet the needs and achieving a huge customer base. In conducting advertising research, psychologists should be invited to participate actively (Okazaki, 2012). Without their involvement, the advert may be interpreted wrongly by the consumers, thus creating resentment on the advert.
Literary Studies
Literary studies are very important in researching about an advert. They include aspects of language and literature. It is very important to understand the language dynamics of the customers. Different communities may speak a similar language with different accents. Sometimes, using the familiar accent can grant very effective results as it makes the advert quite natural and native.
Literary studies will also help in establishing the communication patterns among the consumers in the community under research. This understanding is important in designing the advert in terms of audio, video and texts (Shimp, 2010). It is important to note that different communities have different non verbal communication methods. There are also certain body languages that may be similar, but convey different meanings in different communities. The adverts must convey the intended meaning so that it attracts the attention of the consumers. If these studies are not conducted, there are high chances that the wrong message will be conveyed and the advert will not serve its purpose.
Literary studies will also help in enhancing clarity of the advert with regards to the community’s literacy levels. It is important to know the community’s level of education and literacy to design an advert that they can easily follow and understand. It would make no sense to use difficult animations and graphics for communities with low literacy levels. Besides, literary studies will help in determining the jargons to use in creating the adverts. Advanced communities with high literacy levels can response to technical jargons positively (Okazaki, 2012). On the other hand, communities with low education levels may need simple language and a lot of images to understand the purpose of the advert.
Adverts are meant to communicate with the real and potential consumers. It will beat logic to embark on the design of adverts without understanding the language and communication patterns of these consumers. As a result, literary studies cannot be ignored when conducting advertising research.
Conclusion
Advertising lies at the heart of the functioning of every organization. It is the oil that greases the wheels of a contemporary organization’s success. As such, it must be well researched to ensure that it gets to the target audience and achieve their loyalty. Various academic disciplines play a role in the conduct of the research. Key among these disciplines are Information Technology, Psychology and Literary Studies as described above.
References
Okazaki, S. (2012). Handbook of Research on International Advertising. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Pub.
Shimp, T. A. (2010). Advertising, Promotion, and Other Aspects of Integrated Marketing Communications. Mason, Ohio: South-Western Cengage Learning.
