Fear Appeal in Advertising

LaTour et al (1996, p 2) say a fear appeal is a “psychoactive” ad that highlights an aspect of our “suboptimal lifestyles.” Their study shows a positive correlation between fear appeal and audience attitude towards an ad, and also that there are no ethical issues (p 6). They use (p 8) “deodorant failure” advertisements as an example of how fear appelas can be helpful communication.

Hawkins, et al (p 416) say that fear appeals use the threat of unpleasant consequences if a behavior is not altered. They single out bad breath. I am going to Platonify and say plaque falls into the same category of unpleasantness. Fear reduction is an effective agent to change attitudes, according to Hawkins, et al (2007, p 386, 408).

Several theories are in play, including the Theory of Reasoned Action (see Hawkins, et al, 2007, p 404). According to TRA, normative social beliefs are a major determinant in an individual about the appropriateness of a behavior. Social beliefs about bad breath, germs and plaque are leveraged in the Listerine ads. According to Gire (2003, p 1), the man who created Listerine, Gerald Lambert also developed the word "halitosis" to provide an advertising basis for discouraging bad breath.

With Listerine a consistent fear attribute is germs. Below is a Listerine ad from 1969. (click on image to enlarge)

And the following from 2009.

In both decades it is in the body copy. The headline further informs us of the manifest consequence of following a suboptimal lifestyle: back then we would have bad breath, today plaque. In both decades, the ads are what LaTour, et al (p 3) would characterize as “mild.”

Another theory is the Elaboration Likelihood Model (see Hawkins, p 409-10). It lines-up two consumer approaches to processing advertisements. One, central route processing is very cognitive and involves extensive information exchange between consumer and marketer. The other, peripheral processing uses more emotional cues and little or no cognitive processing.

In their paper "The Elaboration Likelihood Model of Persuasion", Cacioppo and Petty (1986, pp 1-2) clarify that they do not propose two mutually exclusive and exhaustive types but that central and peripheral represent positions on a continuous dimension ranging from high to low elaboration. I believe that along the elaboration continuum, the Listerine ads are on the peripheral side of the mean.

In the 1969 ad and also in the interesting TV commercial below, I think Listerine was trying a change belief tactic (see Hawkins, 2007, p 406) regarding the taste. They change the belief about the pungent taste of the product from bad to good, reasoning it would not be an effective germ fighter otherwise.

Here is an interesting look back to Morgan Freeman’s start in showbiz – he did TV commercials before movies. He is in a Listerine ad, explaining why the bad taste is good: Early Freeman Today, dealing with the taste is apparently not a need, or they don’t want to raise a red flag themselves about it.

Is it all ethical? Hawkins, et al (p 416) cite ethical concerns about "fear appeals based on social anxieties about bad breath...." LaTour, et al (1996, p 7) found no one in their studies considered fear appeals unethical. They even go so far to say such advertising can be helpful communications (p 8), and give as an example - deodorant failure, similar to bad breath. The Listerine ads, to me, fall on the LaTour side of the line and I do not think them unethical.

References
Cacioppo, John and Richard Petty (1986.) The Elaboration Likelihood Model of Persuasion. Retrieved on March 28, 2009 from the EBSCOHost database.

Gire, JT (2/10/2003). Attitudes & Attitude Change: Influencing Thoughts and Feelings. Retrieved on March 28, 2009 from http://academics.vmi.edu/psy/jg/chpt7-attitudes.htm

Hawkins, Del, David Mothersbaugh and Roger Best (2007). Consumer Behavior. McGraw-Hill/Irwin.

LaTour, M, R Snipes and S Bliss (03/01/1996). Don’t be afraid to use fear appeals: an experimental study. Journal of Advertising Research.

Camouflage the ordinary with glamour, or at least history

My favorite magazine is the Smithsonian, published by the distinguished Smithsonian Institution. History, geography and anthropology are all article topics, all written with attractive eloquence. Interestingly, most of the advertisements are direct response, and from companies with superlative quality.

The magazine has seven million monthly readers (see Smithsonian Magazine ) so has quite a reach and began production in 1970 with Edward K Thompson, who left his post as editor at Life magazine. The creative strategy for the magazine is to “stir curiosity in already receptive minds.” The clientele are already interested in history, travel, geography, anthropology, archeology and the other fun sciences and subjects. The advertisements, not surprisingly are about these themes also.

The Stauer company places direct response advertisements in the Smithsonian magazine. They have been doing so for at least three years. My wife throws away old magazines so I only have issues back to 2006. But there is the Stauer ad, 2006, 2007, and 2008. The ad must be working to keep it for nearly three years.

Stauer is a watchmaker (see their Web site) that specializes in historic designs from the golden age of watchmaking. They are also jewelers and sell coins and other collectibles but the ad in question is for a watch. Not just any watch though, they are remaking long forgotten designs using modern materials.

Spiller and Baier say (2005, p 125) that the headline is “possibly the most important element of a direct response print advertisement.” The headline for Stauer’s ad is “World’s most valuable timepiece disappears.” There are other headlines in different issues but they capture this theme: We are losing part of our history when a culture’s plastic arts disappear, including metal work, leather work and watch design. Stauer includes lengthy copy in the full-page ad describing the history of the watch they are now remaking.

According to the Elaboration Likelihood Model this is central route processing. The greater our communication engagement with the other party the more likely that party will use what the model calls central route processing, which is to say a great deal of message related thinking. Media appropriate for in-depth thinking and evaluation of the message is used in such a case. Cacioppo and Petty (1986, p 673) state that when:

“the elaboration likelihood is said to be high. This means that people are likely to: (a) attend to the appeal; (b) attempt to access relevant associations, images, and experiences from memory; (c) scrutinize and elaborate upon the externally provided message arguments in light of the associations available from memory: (d) draw inferences about the merits of the arguments for a recommendation based upon their analyses of the data extracted from the appeal and accessed from memory; and (e) consequently derive an overall evaluation of, or attitude toward, the recommendation.”

This bodes well for the selling of these watches. The body copy can tell the story completely and Spiller and Baier (p 124) note that is an essential aspect of successful print advertising for direct response. Stauer has complete text copy describing the Graves watch, which recently auctioned for $11,000,000, including its interesting history. Finally, Spiller and Baier (p 126) note that the time eventually comes to “ask for action.” Stauer does this after the interesting body copy. Here are the offer details:

• 2 year warranty
• 30 day free trial period
• Not available in stores
• Three payments of $33
• 
• 800-859-1736
• Promotional code GRV378-04
• Address of company if you wish to order by postal mail

There is a rational deftness to the offer, the product and the medium. A receptive audience is given detail of a glamorous history about the original watch. So Stauer engages them in central route processing. “Free trial” is used as recommended by Spiller and Baier (2005, p 126). The offer should showcase the benefit. Here the headline and copy emphasize the historical interest and exacting craftsmanship to what is really an ordinary replication of the original work of art. This whole direct response ad is characterized by facility and skill.

References

Cacioppo, John and Richard Petty (1986.) THE ELABORATION LIKELIHOOD MODEL OF PERSUASION. Retrieved on September 19, 2008 from the EBSCOHost database.

Spiller, L and M Baier (2005). Contemporary Direct Marketing. Pearson/Prentice-Hall.

Applying the Elaboration Likelihood Model to Clif Bar

Duncan also discusses the Elaboration Likelihood Model (2005, p 144-5), and notes there are two possible routes to elaboration: central and peripheral. Clif Bar is a low involvement product choice, and so the peripheral elaboration route would be the mechanism explaining communication processing. He also cautions that most decision making involves both paths, but in the case of Clif Bar I would think it is primarily peripheral.

The peripheral route is more often passive messages that are responses to lifestyles. I think organic and environmental fits into a person’s lifestyle and so appeals to them for a low involvement product would be better as image messages with association cues, associating Clif Bar with health, social causes, and the environment.

References
Baskin, Merry (April 2001). What is Account Planning? Retrieved on September 10, 2008 from http://freespace.virgin.net/andrew.steventon/Content/Downloads/WhatIsAcPlanning2001.htm.

Duncan, Tom (2005). Principles of Advertising and IMC. New York: McGraw-Hill Irwin.

Elaboration Likelihood Model and Choice in Social Media

The Elaboration Likelihood Model can provide a framework for analyzing the most effective balance in the mix of social media you use for your communications. The best suited or least suited media for your communications depends on the individuals in the public to be influenced and the state of our communications with them. Since the receivers will be spread across a continuum of interest in your message, a mix of the media is appropriate, but what is the most appropriate mix.

Cacioppo and Petty define the primary relationships in persuasive communication as communication engagement and cognitive commitment. According to the model, the greater our communication engagement with the other party the more likely that party is to use what the model calls central route processing, which is to say a great deal of message related thinking. Media appropriate for in-depth thinking and evaluation of the message should be used in such a case.

When elaboration likelihood is high, topic-germane argument usually has the highest influence on the reactions to a recommendation. On the other hand, if communication engagement is low, what the model calls peripheral cues are best but only if they are crafted to allow the receiver to maintain a reasonable position without diligently thinking through the merits of the recommendation. In this case, more attention getting media that do not necessarily lend themselves to protracted analysis would be a better choice.

The 1986 date of the original work predates the wide-spread use of the Internet. However, a study at the University of Texas (see Cho) introduces a modified ELM that acknowledges key mediating variables. If they are considered, Cho concludes that ELM is adaptable to the Web. In addition to communication engagement and cognitive commitment, Cho also considers the correlation between the web site and category of communication, the attitude of a public towards a web site, and the attitude of a public towards web marketing communications. If we know enough about our publics, we can adapt ELM to the Web.

The social media I would place at the peripheral end of cognitive commitment, like sms ads, video short films and advergaming must have the message depth tested to see if the target public is ready to commit to processing it. On the other hand, the converse seems probable. When someone has reached the stage of seeking in-depth information about the topic, joining a blog, wiki or forum on the topic is a natural step.

Redmond Review has a comprehensive analysis, see Redmond Review Elaboration