Persuasive Advertising - J. Scott Armstrong [138]
Ogilvy suggested that the ad writer should pretend to be writing a personal letter on behalf of a client. He suggested that the ad should answer questions in a conversational tone by using the present tense or second person, as in this ad: “You can create more persuasive ads if you use Persuasive Advertising.”
Advances in technology have enabled advertisers to also use the names of people in the target market. I was unable to find evidence that it is persuasive. When I receive phone calls and letters from people I don’t know, I become resistant when they address me by my first name. I think it is unethical for them to pretend that we have a relationship. This level of personalization might not lead to good long-term relationships with customers.
Evidence on the effects of personal pronouns
A lab experiment used an ad for razor blades. When the ad had strong arguments, and used a personal pronoun—“You may remember feeling that razor technology can never be improved”—subjects had a more positive view of the product (5.6 vs. 3.7 on a 7-point scale) than did subjects who received an ad with an impersonal pronoun—“One might have felt that …” However, when the arguments were weak, a personal tone was less persuasive than the impersonal tone: 3.8 versus 4.5 (Burnkrant and Unnava 1989).
Our analysis of quasi-experimental data supports this principle:
Personal pronouns improved recall only for ads with strong arguments. Our WAPB analysis found 37 pairs of print ads with strong arguments in which one ad used a personal pronoun and the other did not. Recall for ads with personal pronouns was 1.11 times better.
Nine pairs of ads contained personal pronouns but used weak arguments. Recall for these ads was about half that of the other ads.
What about advertisements that use people’s names? A survey of 231 college students in the United States revealed that most were upset and uncomfortable by use of their name in e-mails, regular mail, and especially telephone calls (Yu and Cude 2009).
7.6. Word selection
Select words that support meaning or enhance the purchasing and consuming experience.
Which car do you think would be larger and more powerful, a Bromley or a Brimley?
7.6.1. Use words with sounds that support the message
Tipper et al. (1921), in their advertising textbook, said that advertisers should use words whose sounds support the message.
About that larger and more powerful car mentioned in the lead-in: The vast majority of subjects said that the Bromley would be larger and more powerful. This is because the name sounds large and powerful (Yorkston and Menon 2004).
The idea that sounds carry meanings has been around a long time. Plato said, “The letter ‘r’ appears to me to be the general instrument expressing all motion.” In 1690, John Locke said the sound of words can connote color. Studies since then have shown that red and blue are associated with the vowel a, white and yellow with e and i, and blue, brown, and black with o and u.
Here are guidelines for the selection of proper sounds:
• Words such as “Brimley,” spoken with the tongue high in the front of the mouth—as opposed to back-of-the-mouth sounds such as “Bromley”—are perceived as smaller, lighter (relative to darker), milder, thinner, softer, faster, colder, more bitter, more feminine, friendlier, weaker, lighter (relative to heavier), and prettier.
• Words containing fricatives—where there is not complete closure of the air stream from the mouth such as for f, s, v, and z)—as opposed to stops (complete closure of air stream from mouth as in p, t, b, g, d, and k or hard c) are perceived as smaller, faster, lighter (relative to heavier), and more feminine.
• Words containing voiceless fricatives (f and s), as opposed to voiced fricatives (v and z) are perceived as smaller, lighter (relative to heavier), softer, and more feminine.
• Words with hard consonants (e.g., Kodak and Pepsi) are easier to recall.