Persuasive Advertising - J. Scott Armstrong [116]
Negative advertising is rarely used for commercial products, but there are exceptions. Apple’s “trust me” campaign where it criticized Microsoft’s Vista operating system is an example of an application that meets the conditions. In contrast, a KFC ad did not seem to meet the condition. It opened with a Ronald McDonald clown surrogate being interrogated by a Senate subcommittee. Allegations were raised about the defendant’s lack of expertise in providing quality chicken. When pressed about how he expected to sell chicken, “Ronald” responded, “Toys, lots of toys.” Ronald’s “legal counsel” then buried his head in his hands.
Negative advertising is upsetting to the brands being attacked, and they might respond in kind. This can lead to an expensive series of attacks and responses. In short, leave negative advertising to the politicians.
Evidence on the effects of negative advertising
A qualitative review of the literature led to the conclusion that negative information about choices carries more weight than positive information (Jasperson and Fan 2002). Properly used then, negative advertising can have strong effects.
A survey by 150 political consultants found strong agreement that, “Negative ads can exert a powerful impact on voters’ attitudes toward a candidate.” The political consultants also believed that negative ads are more powerful than positive ads, and that people remember negative information better than positive information (Perloff and Kinsey 1992).
During the 2004 campaign for the U.S. presidency, the Guardian newspaper in England portrayed George W. Bush as a semiliterate ape and tried to persuade voters in Ohio to vote for John Kerry. Was that an effective strategy?
6.9.2. Attack ads should employ objective information, not emotion
In the “Lemmings” ad for Apple, shown at the 1985 Super Bowl, a line of well-dressed blindfolded men and women (implying unimaginative employees from IBM) marched up a hill. When they reached the top, they followed the leader off the edge of a cliff. This ad was said by some to be one of the reasons that Chiat/Day lost the Apple account the next year.
Attack ads seldom change those with strong beliefs. So they should aim at the undecided people. And when people are undecided, they are more likely to be persuaded by objective information than by emotion. To persuade these people, the attacker should adopt an objective and helpful stance, avoiding harsh language, personal attacks, or insults.
Evidence on the effects of using objective information, not emotion
Laboratory experiments were used to examine the effects of insults in a political campaign. Some subjects heard the messages with insults and some without. Three insults were used in one experiment: “a) I can’t believe anyone could make such dumb proposals. My opponent’s policies are like a menace to society; b) I don’t know what’s worse, deceit or ignorance, but my opponent has got both covered; c) My opponent’s record as a public servant is like a ‘how to’ book on bungling, botching, and screwing up.” The insults had an enormous impact on character ratings and voting intentions. In one experiment, the insults reduced the vote share for the source from 58 percent to 42 percent, with a corresponding gain for the opponent who was attacked. Character ratings dropped for the attacker and improved for the opponent who was attacked. Similar results were obtained in a second experiment on voting, and also in an experiment regarding French language rights in Canada (Roese and Sande 1993).
In another lab experiment, 54 subjects were given an actual TV commercial for a U.S. Senate seat in Montana in 1982. TV attack ads from the opponent (“Paid for by the Williams for Senate Committee”) were shown to 54 subjects saw, while 58 saw ads from an