MS 68 IGNOU MBA Solved Assignment - Explain advertising pre-testing and post testing with two examples for each of these activities.

Explain advertising pre-testing and post testing with two examples for each of these

          activities.

In today's advertising world, every firm invests heavily on advertisement for making their products or services known to the target audience and to arouse the interest of  target audience in firm's products or services. Advertising is done with some predefined objectives- to generate awareness about product, to arouse interest in product, to change the attitude of audience towards product, to stimulate desire for product, or to make them buy the product. 

Advertising is of no use if the defined objectives of communication is not achieved. So, it is necessary to evaluate the effectiveness of advertisement at different level, starting from creation of ad-copy to running of ad on media, and also after execution of ad to know to what extent the objectives are achieved.

Types of Test

Following are the types of test applied in advertisement evaluation:

·         Pre-Testing

·         Concurrent Testing

·         Post Testing

1. Pre-Testing

Pre-Testing follows the universal law "Prevention is better than cure". Advertising can be pretested at several points in the creative development process. Pre-Testing helps the advertiser to make a final go or no go decision about finished or nearly finished advertisement. Pre-Testing method refer to testing the potentiality of a communication message or ad-copy before printing, broadcasting, or telecasting. Following are the types of pre-testing methods:

A. Qualitative Methods of Pre-Testing

·         Focus Group: Focus group involve exposing the ad to a group of 8 to 12 respondents. Focus groups are used with surprising frequency for making final go or no go decision. A moderator facilitates the discussion and walk s the group through a series of issues that are outlined in discussion guide.

·         In-depth Interview: In-depth interview involve one on one discussion with respondents. Interviews are very effective when a researcher has a good idea of critical issues but does not have a sense of  the kind of responses one will get. This method can be effectively used to generate new ad concepts and ideas.

·         Projective Techniques: In this technique the respondent is instructed to project himself into the situation and verbalise the thoughts. projective technique can be very effective for evaluating ad concepts and for generating new ad concepts. But, it cannot be used for making final decisions.

B. Quantitative Methods of Pre-Testing

·         Checklist Method: Checklist method is used to test the effectiveness of ad-copy. The purpose of this method is to ensure that all elements of the ad-copy are included with due importance in the advertisement. As it is a pre-test method any omitted element of ad can be included in the copy before release of the advertisement.

·         Consumer Jury Method: This method  involves the exposure of alternative advertisements to a sample of jury or prospects. This test is designed to learn from a typical group of prospective customers. Advertisements which are unpublished are presented before the consumer jury either in personal interviews or group interviews and their reactions are observed and responses are recorded.

·         Sales Area Test: Under this method advertising campaign is run in the markets selected for testing purposes. The impact of the campaign is evaluated by actual sales in the selected markets. The market with high sales is considered the best market for effective sales campaign. In other markets suitable changes are made in the advertising campaign. 

·         Questionnaire Method: It is a list of questions related to an experiment. The draft of an advertisement along with some relevant questions is to be sent to a group of target consumers or advertising experts. Their opinions are collected and analyzed to find out whether the proposed advertisement is satisfactory or not. 

·         Recall Test: Under this method, advertising copies are shown to a group of prospects. After few minutes they are asked to recall and reproduce them. This method is used to find out how far the advertisements are impressive. 

·         Reaction Test: The potential effect of an advertisement is judged with the help of certain instruments, which measure heartbeats, blood pressure, pupil dilution etc. Their reactions reveal the psychological or nervous effects of advertising. 

·         Readability Test: All the listeners of advertisements cannot read it equally. So respondents are drawn from different socio economic and geographical backgrounds. This method is used to find out the level of effectiveness when and advertisement is read. 

·         Eye Movement Test: The movements of eyes of the respondents are recorded by using eye observation camera when advertisements are shown to them in a screen. This helps to find out the attention value of advertisement.

3. Post Testing

Post testing is done to know- to what extent the advertising objectives are achieved. Following are the types of post testing methods:

·         Recognition Test: Recognition test involves the ability of viewers to correctly identify ad, brand, or message they previously exposed to. The types of recognition test are: 

·   Starch Test - The Starch test is applied only to print ads that have already run. The interviewer shows each respondent a magazine or newspaper containing the ads being tested. For each ad the interviewer asks the respondents to reply to ad related questions.

·   Bruzzone Test - The Bruzzone test is conducted through mail surveys. Questionnaires containing frames and audio scripts from television commercials are sent to respondents and respondents are asked whether they recognise the ad and brand.

·         Recall or Impact Test: The recall test is designed to measure the impression of readers or viewers of the advertisement. If a reader has a favorable impression of the advertisement, he will certainly retain something of the advertisement. The measures of interest would be obtained by interviewing the readers or viewers or listeners, days after the advertisement or commercial is appeared in the newspaper, or on T.V. Interviewer asks the readers or viewers to answer some ad related questions, and in response to the question asked, the reader reveals the accuracy and depth of his impression.

• MECHANICAL LABORATORY TESTS

• These are commonly used in US and other developed countries. These include:

• 1.  The “tachistoscope”: It is used to measure consumer perceptions to ads.  Using this device, the researcher can tell how long it takes for respondents to get the intended message and how they perceive it.

• This   way   two   alternative   layouts   may    be   tested   for   their effectiveness.

• 2.   The  “eye  camera”  photographs  the  movement  of  people’s  eyes while reading ads.

• 3.   The  “psychogalvanometer”  is  a  device  similar  to  lie-detector.  It records skin temperatures and  tension  resulting  from reading ads. The  theory  behind  this  concept  is  that  the  more  tension  an  ad creates, the more successful it is likely to be.

• 4.   The  “pupillometer” is a device that measures a person’s pupil size when  exposed to visual stimuli such as ads. The theory behind it is that  the  size  of the pupil increases  when  the person  finds  the ad visually interesting or emotionally appalling.