Effectiveness Of Online Advertisement
Literature Review
The global e-commerce sector in has been growing phenomenally for the last few years with the advent of fast internet connection and widespread internet usage. E-commerce refers to any economic activity, transaction that has economic value, that happens through electronic media. Though limited compared to other countries around the world, Bangladesh has greater potential in future as it has huge untapped market for promoting e-commerce. Marketers use different types of techniques to reach their targeted audiences. Growing number of firms now use online advertising, a marketing message that appear on screen with the help of internet connection, through web browsers, search engines etc. There are different types of online advertising techniques out there.
Of these, most appeared are: Display Ads: includes banner ads, text ads of different sizes and shapes which appear on websites, blogs, might relate to the web page content. Email ads: ads that are sent in digital form to the inbox of email user. Types of ads include catalog, newsletter etc. sometimes they remain in spam box for long time. Social media ads: these types of ads are targeted for social medias like Facebook, YouTube, Twitter etc. they pop up in the middle of or in the starting of a video or when click some links or when one opens a website.
Blog advertising: when bloggers promote any sponsored contents through storytelling or life experiences or any short stories. Mobile marketing: it includes advertising done through mobile SMS. They try to inform consumers about products or brand’s mobile app. E commerce offers consumers with the ease of shopping irrespective of their geographic locations. It may give the opportunity to view the products before purchasing, customize products electronically according to their preferences. Sometimes these sites also provide benefits like engaging in online community of similar buyers and exchange opinions or to get expert help regarding any product. Research suggests that among many others, three characteristics will prominently increase the effectiveness of online advertising. These are; interactivity, customer intimacy and shopping online. By interactivity, consumer can have the control on ad message receive, can interact with marketers and can preview and customize the product according to their will.
Advertising Effectiveness: Global perspective
A lot of researches have been done regarding this aspect, pointing out the significance of advertising strategies in e-commerce. Goldsmith study reveals that sometimes consumers are uncomfortable to deal with sales persons, sometimes annoyed by verbal suggestions. Williams, Bertsch, Wiele, Iwaarden and Dale states that while customers use traditional brick and mortar stores, they simultaneously use online shopping because they like to roam around where they can maintain privacy. Monsuwe states that consumers like to online shop when its comes to buying products for their personal use. Dewan Kanon, CEO of Solar Electro Bangladesh states that most of their ad budget is for digital media and that’s because young people are on social media all the time. Much studies have been directed toward avoidance and resulting ineffectiveness of online ads.
Factors that are prominently causing the avoidances are expectation of negative influences or experience – which can stem from previous experiences or word of mouth, perceptions about content relevancy, skepticism toward the ad message and claims. The research showed that excessive ads on their screen did not affect or distract them much nor reduced their particular site visits, as participants are used to clutter ads. Research conducted by Moor and Rodgers showed that credibility and trustworthiness of media can play a critical role in drawing consumer’s attention to the message that the ad is offering. Johnson and Kaye studies that online ads seem least credible among younger audiences. Lack of trust seems to be main reason, for which they are comfortable from buying known sources. Research done by Avi Goldfarb and Catherine E Tucker draws attention to that increasing privacy regulation regarding advertising and data mining such as EU Laws undermines the effectiveness of online marketing. It was more prominent for ad campaigns without video and other visual or interactive contents. C It is measured that the overall effectiveness of online ad campaigns decreased by 65% in Europe after enacting online privacy law. The effectiveness of banner ads depends largely on attracting the targeted audience, here consumers are being targeted according to analysis of past browsing data. Laws preventing marketers from mining data from online thus largely undermining this kind of ad’s effectiveness. It is assumed that a clear idea of why consumers use e commerce sites for product purchase than go to a physical store will shed light on the online advertising effectiveness. But researches are yet to be done on this particular topic.
Advertising Effectiveness: Asia Perspective
Developing countries have much bigger potentials to tap in online businesses and marketing. Despite of this, lack of modern communication tools in most area undermines to fully reap the benefit of online activities. On top of that, there is a few numbers of studies regarding this in developing economic structure. In India, slow internet and unavailability of credit cards played important role in barring e commerce diffusion. Another less uttered reason might be that businesses in Asia tend to be more personal relationship based, where e commerce is regarded as threatening to this interpersonal relationship. It is considered that in emerging economies, older, traditional advertising technologies are more effective than cutting edge technologies. In India, two major online advertising platforms are search engines and social media like Facebook. They are now considered top marketing platforms by both c commerce sites and traditional businesses.
Advertising effectiveness: Bangladesh perspective
A study conducted by Rahman (2015) focused on the attitude of young generation of Bangladesh aged between 16-25 years finds that there is surge in online retail businesses investment. With this move, there is a great opening for digital advertisement to assist growing number of ecommerce. Lower cost of internet packages and digital sets opens up increased use of internet, which sets new opportunities for businesses to tune their digital messages to mass users. The interactive nature of online advertisement attracts users to it and marketers can visualize their audiences’ preferences. One study revealed that (C that information flow regarding any product is more in online than offline, which can be assumed easily as younger generation is much more engaged in online virtual worlds than in offline activities. the participants responded that ads or information in other forms on Facebook or any other social media news feed are most used way to connect to those brands. Traditional local channels are not that effective media for this generation, even foreign channels are more preferable to those.
The study also showed that online attitude of Bangladeshi young people is not that different from global trend. They are more involved in social media than spending time on watching tv channels or reading newspapers. This indicates that they are open to new channels to receive information and like to customize their news feed so that they be informed according to their preference and necessity. Of the respondents, 1% said that they use internet for online shopping. This indicates that online shopping traffic in Bangladesh is not as heavy as other developed countries. This study also found that young population is frustrated with online pop up ads. Most of them download ad blockers to skip unwanted ads. These young population get more convinced with coupons and discount offer. Which should be a suggestion to the Bangladeshi marketers to attract these large population. Study done by Rahman (2015) finds that in online shopping, about 10% of the respondents said that they might be influenced by clicking on an ad containing discount offer, where 30% said that they might be influenced by links posted by their favored celebrities. Theoretical perspective of online advertising effectiveness: Some of the known techniques to measure advertising effectiveness is through increased brand value and brand awareness, purchase intention and actual purchase. Study conducted by Ducoffe finds out negative correlation between irritation and advertising value and positive correlation between quality like informativeness of the message and received ad value. Previous studies in this field showed that three factors are considered to increase the value of any ad. These are informativeness, irritation and entertainment. The negative effect like irritation can be reduced through the customize option like ad blocker, preventing cookie from websites etc.
These four critical factors assist consumers to increase their brand awareness while receiving ads through online like social media or search engines, which might result in purchase decision. Study revealed that customization of ads and information contained in ads are the strongest driver of effectiveness of online ads among users. Professional effort put into ad design and entertainment content have influence on user attraction toward the ads and their avoidance behavior. (cThis kind of study regarding effectiveness of online advertising strategies points out critical factors for ecommerce sites to achieve success while investing in social media advertisement.
