The Relationship Between Advertising Factors

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

In the developments of industries and market expansion, advertising has become an important tool to communicate effectively with customers and society at large in order to maintain services and introduce new products. Advertising, also considered as a type of communication, that paid by individuals or organizations, with the aim of persuading people to buy products or services (Jen Green, 2011).

At the end of twentieth century companies and organizations have begun to market their products through advertising by using modern communication which includes (visible, audible and readable messages) to the society in order to persuade them to purchase a product or service. Hence, it will follow by organizations that aim to provide products, service and ideas to a target group of consumers. Furthermore, mobile advertising is considered one of the various channels which provide some unique characteristics such as presence, location and cell phone capabilities (MMA Global, 2008).

Gemma (2009) mentions that, the rapid development in the field of the mobile advertising industry has opened the door for a new field of academic research, in which studies have explored the different elements affecting the acceptance of mobile advertising from the perspective of consumers and organizations.

Moriarty et al, (2012) explains that targeting specific individuals might cost advertisers high budget in order to identify those who are most likely to purchase a product or an idea.

The present revolution in communication technology led to enhanced access to a larger society as well as a particular group of individuals, and this feature can be employed by marketers to target a specific group and one of groups might be in the educational sector in general and specifically university students.

The (IIUM) is ranked among the top 500 world universities in 2011/2012 (QS University Ranking 2011/2012). What puts the IIUM in this position is that focusing in linked the knowledge to Islamic values, and because of its reputation, students from all over the world start coming to the (IIUM). A large number of IIUM students’ may lead to different attitudes towards SMS advertising, so that makes the International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM) a good place to conduct a research on it, this is why the study has chosen the International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM) as a place to conduct the research.

Noor Hazilah et al., (2010) mention that the International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM) is a public university within the Malaysian higher education universities, it operates under the direction of a Board of Governors with representatives from eight sponsoring countries from the Organization of Islamic Conference. In 1983, the International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM) had begun with just 153 students; it has now attracted students from over 90 countries. Moreover, the latest updated information regarding the (IIUM) official website, shown that the total students who are enrolled in the International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM) is approximately 15,625 undergraduate students and 3,200 postgraduate students, including international students from around 125 countries (IIUM website).

PROBLEM STATEMENT

Due to the wider products and services choices in the 21st century, most of the marketers try to adopt new methods to market their products and services. In the past, advertising used to go through traditional channels such as newspapers, magazines, and television. Nowadays, because of rapid changes in the technology and revolution of wireless communication, marketers have started looking for new methods to advertise their products and services such as; online advertising and mobile advertising which includes multimedia message service (MMS) and short message service (SMS). Under short message service (SMS) advertising, an organization can achieve many advantages such as: low cost, specifying and covering huge areas for example universities, easier way to communicate with less efforts, etc.

Moreover, few research studies have been conducted in terms of examining the connection between the consumers’ attitudes and SMS advertising (Haghirian et al., 2005). However, this study will shed light on implementation of short message service (SMS) advertising in the International Islamic University Malaysia. The researcher believes that this study has the following features: (1) It is few in kind as to depicting the issue of short message service (SMS) advertising in the university sector in particular, (2) Some studies which focus on short message service (SMS) advertising did not observe the attitudes of students in university, while this study focuses on the international Islamic university Malaysia (IIUM) students’ attitudes.

Hence, this study tries to see the elements that carried by short message service (SMS) advertising and its effects on students’ attitudes.. The study also aims to fill a gap in the literature in that it is different from previous studies in two ways. Firstly, the study intends to examine the effects of short message service (SMS) advertising on the student of IIUM, because most of previous studies focus on different area such as (observing the attitudes toward web advertising and advertising in general). Secondly, previous studies did not observe the attitudes of students. Therefore, it will be very interesting to examine the relationship between short message service (SMS) advertising and students’ attitudes.

SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

This study is significant because the researcher tries to investigate the perceptions of short message service (SMS) advertising on the attitude of the IIUM students. The study also tries to determine the most effective factors of SMS advertising which affect the attitudes of IIUM students. Therefore, the results might be revealed by this study and serve marketers to maximize returns from their advertising through SMS by determining the most influential factors on the IIUM students.

The study will investigate the impact of the short message service (SMS) advertising on the student’s attitude in the International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM). Moreover, highlight other factors that may affect on students’ attitude through short message service SMS in the International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM). To the best of my knowledge, no prior study of this kind examines if there is any relation between short message service (SMS) advertising in the International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM) and the attitudes of the students.

From this main purpose, the following detailed research objectives are developed:

RO 1: To examine the relationship between credibility of short message service (SMS) advertising and IIUM students’ attitudes toward SMS advertising.

RO 2: To examine the relationship between informativeness of short message service (SMS) advertising and the IIUM students’ attitudes toward SMS advertising.

RO 3: To examine the relationship between entertainment of short message service (SMS) advertising and the IIUM students’ attitudes toward SMS advertising.

RO 4: To examine the relationship between irritation of short message service (SMS) advertising and the IIUM students’ attitudes toward SMS advertising.

RESEARCH QUESTIONS

From the research objectives the study came up with the following research questions:

RQ1: Does the credibility of short message service (SMS) advertising affect the IIUM students’ attitudes toward SMS advertising?

RQ2: Does informativeness of short message service (SMS) advertising affect the IIUM students’ attitudes toward SMS advertising?

RQ3: Does the entertainment of short message service (SMS) advertising the IIUM students’ attitudes toward SMS advertising?

RQ4: Does irritation of of short message service (SMS) advertising affect the IIUM students’ attitudes toward SMS advertising?

LITERATURE REVIEW

ADVERTISING

Moriarty et al, 2012 defines advertising as "Advertising is paid form of persuasive communication that uses mass and interactive media to reach broad audiences in order to connect an identified sponsor with buyers (a target audience), provide information about products (goods, services, and ideas), and interpret the product features in terms of the consumer’s needs and wants" (Moriarty et al., 2012: 35)

Advertising over the product life style have been through four stages: During the time of introduction, the role of advertising to develop consciousness of audiences for a new product and encourage the consumers to try a new product experience. Second stage: During the growth period, this was at the time of competition among newly entering the competitors, third stage: During the time of maturity, marketers have used advertising to enhance the position of a product. The last stage: in the decline phase: advertising became defensive, tending to to use reminders in order to maintain their loyalty (Nylen 1993).

MOBILE MARKETING

In order to define short message service (SMS) advertising, we have to analyze the meaning of mobile marketing as this definition to reach some extent that applies to SMS advertising. According to the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA Global) mobile marketing is "a set of practices that enables organizations to communicate and engage with their audience in an interactive and relevant manner through any mobile device or network" (MMA Global, 2009).

Waldt et al., (2009) assumed that SMS advertising has a degree of mobile marketing in terms of communication and engagement between an organization and audiences (Waldt et al., 2009). Although Asligul have argued that short message service (SMS) and multimedia message service (MMS) are mainstream of mobile marketing (Asligul Aktas 2010). In addition, Prashant et al., (2011) show that SMS Advertising is a part of mobile marketing that uses the SMS technology. It allows marketers to send messages to their targeted consumers through the use of a mobile device (Prashant et al., 2011).

Haig (2002) has shown that (SMS) short message service has become popular and a source of a new idea in the markets field for consumers, while there is a feature of mobile advertising which can provide (video, audio, color picture, graphics, etc.) SMS advertising has basic factors in order to make SMS advertising success (simplicity, low cost, supported by all kinds of mobile phones, etc.) (Matt Haig 2002). Also, Jacques and Yasha (2008) have asserted that the increase of short message service (SMS) applications have made this technology an important marketing tool.

VARIABLES OF THE STUDY

On this part of the study the researcher will summarize and link the variables of the study in previous studies which relate to SMS advertising and the consumer attitude.

The Dependent Variable

Attitude toward SMS Advertising

Kotler (2000) stated that "an attitude is a person’s enduring favorable or unfavorable evaluations, emotional feelings, and action tendencies towards some object or idea" (Kotler, 2000 p. 96).

Smith and Taylor, (2004) have stated that "Attitudes can be broken down into three components, which are often explained as 'think, feel, do' or 'cognitive', 'affective' and 'conative'" (Smith and Taylor., 2004 p. 114).

Waldt et al., (2009) in his study focused on specifying the outcomes attitudes of the effectiveness of SMS towards SMS advertising and it is considered that the attitudes towards SMS advertising will influence the success of SMS advertising by consumers who receive SMS advertising (Waldt et al, 2009). Although, Chia et al, 2012, in their study found that the attitudes of the Japanese and Australians members toward advertising are positively affected by mobile advertising (Chia et al, 2012).

The dependent variable of this study is the attitudes of SMS advertising. This study will rely on Brackett and Carr (2001) model which was developed in 2001 to study of consumer attitudes towards SMS advertising and advertising in general, after modifying the model.

The Independent Variables

Entertainment

McQuail (in Ducoffe, 1996:23) defines entertainment as "…the ability to fulfill an audience’s needs for escapism, diversion, aesthetic enjoyment, or emotional enjoyment." (Waldt et al., 2009).

Sevtap et al (2011) have noted that entertainment is considered one of the important elements of mobile advertising in terms of its simplicity and a message within entertaining content. In this regard, there are different types of mobile advertising applications such as, games, music, etc. On the other hand, Wong and Tang (2008) have conducted their study on consumers’ attitudes and they found that general attitudes were negative except entertainment factor which had the strongest influence on attitude.

Furthermore, Bauer et al, (2005) argue that SMS advertising with aesthetics contain will meet the pleasure and emotional experience of the consumer and that will lead to a positive evaluated and acceptance by consumers (Bauer et al., 2005). Although Abdulraheem et al., (2012) argue that, in the mobile entertainment industry there are a lot of entertainment applications which are music, games, listening radio, watching TV, video and sport matches etc (Abdulraheem et al., 2012).

This study will try to explore if there is any relationship between the entertainment value of SMS advertising and student attitudes towards SMS advertising.

Informativeness

In the context of this study, Waldt (2009) stated that informativeness was defined in the the study of (Ducoffe, 1996: 22) as "…the ability of advertising to inform consumers of product alternatives so that purchases yielding the greatest possible satisfaction can be made" (Waldt 2009). Daugherty et al, (2008) have stated that informativeness "In commercial messages, informativeness is the ability of advertisements to convey beneficial information" (Daugherty et al., 2008). Informativeness through advertising messages might be provided by many channels, Wanmo (2010) suggests that websites and multimedia message service (MMS) advertising are more informative and entertaining than e-mail and SMS advertising (Wanmo, 2010).

The model of both Haghirian et al., (2005) and Brackett and Carr, (2001) studies explain that there is a positive relation between consumers’ perceptions of the informativeness of advertising and consumers’ attitudes towards advertising (Haghirian et al., 2005, Brackett and Carr, 2001).

Waldt et al., (2009) assumed that advertising might be favorably perceived by the consumer if an advertisement satisfies a consumer’s needs and wants for information and knowledge about a service or product. Moreover, Chia et al., (2012) indicate that information within the content of advertising is obviously one of most effective indicators of advertising (Chia et al., 2012).

Bauer et al., (2005) supports these assumptions and highlights that there is a positive relationship between consumers’ perceptions of the information about mobile marketing and consumers’ perceptions of the overall content of mobile marketing. This study will try to elaborate if there is any relationship between informativeness of SMS advertisements and students’ attitudes towards SMS advertising.

Irritation

Ducoffe (1996), in the context of advertising, defines irritation as: "When advertising employs tactics that annoy, offend, insult, or are overly manipulative". Bracket and Carr (2001) studied the relationship between consumers’ perceptions of the irritation of an advertisement and consumers’ attitudes towards an advertisement and their results supported the attitude model developed by them. While Tsang et al., (2004) tested the relationship between consumers’ perceptions of the irritation of an advertisement and consumers’ attitudes towards advertisements and he found that there is a negative relationship between consumer perception of the irritation of SMS advertising and consumer attitudes towards SMS advertising. On the other hand, Abdulraheem et al., (2012) and Chia et al., (2012) found that, the results indicate that irritation has negative influence the consumers’ attitude.

This study will test the relationship between student’s perception of the irritation of SMS advertising and students’ attitudes towards SMS advertising.

Credibility

Metzger  and Flanagin define source credibility as "the believability of a source or message, which is made up of two primary dimensions: trustworthiness and expertise" (Metzger  and Flanagin ., 2007: p8) From the definition we can assume that credibility influences attitude towards the consumers, which consider an important predictor of attitude toward the advertisement (Mackenzie and Lutz., 1989). Furthermore, message credibility examines how the attitudes can be affected by the characteristics of information that is provided by the elements of the message, major elements of message credibility include structure, language and content (Metzger  and Flanagin, 2007).

Mackenzie and Lutz (1989) found that credibility can affect the attitudes towards the advertisers, which implies that to a significant predictor of attitudes towards SMS advertising. MacKenzie and Lutz, (1989) have defined advertisers"Advertiser credibility has been defined as the perceived truthfulness or honesty of the sponsor of an ad" (MacKenzie & Lutz, 1989). Choi and Rifon (2002) in their study found a positive effect of credibility on attitudes towards the advertisements and the brand. However, credibility of SMS advertising is affected by several elements, in particular by the firm’s credibility and the carrier of the message (Smith et al., 2000).

This study will explore the relation between students’ perceptions of the credibility of the SMS advertisement and students’ attitudes towards the advertisement.

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

The study relies on the Bracket and Carr (2001) model. Bracket and Carr developed several attitude models of web advertising from two different models of web advertising the first model is Ducoffe’s model of three elements (entertainment, informativeness and irritation) and these elements have direct relation to advertising value. The second model is MacKenzie and Lutzs’ model (1989). On the other hand, the credibility was added by Bracket and Carr (2001) because they assumed that credibility has been used as an element of other models’ constructions (Bracket and Carr., 2001). They  built this assumption upon certain models such as; Eighmey (1997) in his study on response to commercial web sites, MacKenzie and Lutz (1989) in their study on attitude toward the Ad in an advertising pretesting context and Shavitt., et at (1998) in their study on Americans’ attitudes toward advertising in general. Relevant demographic variables is the second additional element which was added by Bracket and Carr (2001) justifying their claim by sufficient used of demographic variables in the literature and also the possibility of predicting inferences. However, Bracket and Carr (2001) had come up with tier model after adding two elements which are (credibility and relevant demographic variables) as shown in figure1.

Figure1. Bracket and Carr (2001) model of attitudes toward web advertising

Capture.PNG

. In order to study how SMS advertising affects the IIUM students' attitudes, this study will modify Barcket and Carr model (2001) by examining the IIUM students’ attitude toward SMS advertising and focus on their attitudes, besides that eliminate the advertising value. In order to fit the objectives of the study this model, as shown in Figure 2, is based on the perceived entertainment, informativeness, irritation and credibility of SMS advertising.

Figure2. Modified model of attitudes toward SMS advertising

Entertainment

Informativeness

Attitude toward SMS

Advertising

Irritation

Credibility

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

INTRODUCTION

This chapter deals with a description of the methods that will be used in this research study. The chapter will specifically deal with issues that describe the research purpose, approach, and techniques employed. This chapter also will discuss the chosen research method, data collection method, the sample selection, the data analysis method, and the limitations of the research will be discussed.

TYPES OF DATA COLLECTIONS

In any research during the process of planning to conduct a research should taking into consideration the types of data we want to be used. According to Kultar (2007) the data collected can be generally divided as: (i) qualitative data and (ii) quantitative data based on the objects they measure. Therefore, the research will rely on the quantitative methods.

Huysamen defines quantitative research as "descriptions of quantitative research typically discern a cycle of successive phases of hypothesis formulation, data collection, analysis and interpretation." Kultar (2007) define qualitative data as "a numerical record that results from a process of measurement and on which basic mathematical operations can be done" (Kultar, p. 132). Punch (2005) views that quantitative research involves numerical data obtained from the real world in number forms. Furthermore, researchers are responsible for converting these real world actions (data) into numbers through the process of measurement.

SAMPLE SELECTION AND DATA COLLECTION PROCEDURES

The research will be conducted in the International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM). A total list of (18800) students were registered with the University in 2011, a sample of this population will be used as the source of data for this research.

SAMPLING SIZE

Dattalo., (2008) suggest that a large number of sampling size is more likely to represent the population, because the sampling error decrease with increased sample size. Therefore The sample of the IIUM students will be (276) and selected carefully based on probability convenience sampling technique.

The students were used because not much of prior research covered students as their sample on this kind of research relating to the SMS advertising. Also to the best of my knowledge, no similar study has been done on the IIUM.

The questionnaires will be distributed by using different ways. Later on, the questionnaires will be collected by the researcher. It will take approximately one month to receive the data. The survey will be designed by the researcher depending on previous studies which are (Sevtap et al, 2011, Lih and Xu, 2003, and Abdulraheem et al., 2012). Moreover, the researcher will try to conserve the option to respondents whether or not to identify themselves, where that will encourage them to answer the questionnaire.

RESEARCH INSTRUMENT

The questionnaire for this study will be designed through adopting and modifying different questionnaire used in prior studies. The questionnaire will be contained close-ended questions and Likert scale questions. The questionnaire will be divided into two sections. The first section will cover the four independent variables entertainments, informativeness, irritation, credibility, and demographic information in order to simplify the description and the result. Furthermore, one dependent variable (Attitude toward SMS advertising) this study will use five Likert scale questions (1= way below average, 2= below average, 3=average, 4= above average, and 5=way above average).

The second section will deal with the demographic details of the respondents. After designing the questionnaire and before distributing it, a pilot test will be conducted. According to Alison and Susan (2005) "a pilot study is generally considered to be a small-scale trial of the proposed procedures, materials, and methods, and sometimes also includes coding sheets and analytic choices" (Alison and Susan, 2005 p: 36). The pilot test will be conducted to make sure that the questionnaire is understandable and the respondents will answer it smoothly.

ANALYSIS TECHNIQUES EMPLOYED

In any research data analysis is a very important for any research. Because without analysis, the data obtained via research techniques is meaningless. Ellwood (2002) defines primary research as "primary research involves collecting original data for a specifically defined problem within a context and consumer group" (p.249).

Several quantitative analytical techniques will be used to analyze the data that will be obtained from the questionnaire. The analysis of the data will be done by using SPSS (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences) 19.0 for Windows. Some of expected techniques which are descriptive technique such as, frequencies, percentages, mean, median, mode, and standard deviation. Furthermore, conducting advanced techniques such as multiple regression test to explore the relationship between the variables of the study (Dependent variable: the IIUM students' attitudes toward SMS Advertising, independent variables which are; informativeness, credibility, irritation, entertainment. In order to conduct these advance analysis the researcher will test the reliability and normality of the questionnaire to ensure the validity of the result.

HYPOTHESES TESTING

H 1: Credibility of short message services (SMS) advertising positively influences the IIUM students’ attitudes toward SMS advertising

H 2: Informativeness of short message services (SMS) advertising positively influences the IIUM students’ attitudes toward SMS advertising

H 3: Entertainment of short message services (SMS) advertising positively influences the IIUM students’ attitudes toward SMS advertising

H 4: Irritation of short message services (SMS) advertising negatively influences the IIUM students’ attitudes toward SMS advertising

Five hypotheses that will be challenged and subsequently demonstrated as being supportable or not by the analysis undertaken as proposed. For testing the five hypotheses the researcher will use the multi regression and one way ANNOVA test and its explain why in section 3.4.

LIMITATIONS

In any research, we should expect some limitations. The researcher expecting many limitations of this type of this study because of many factors such as, the scope of the study is limited only to one university and the time, where the researcher needs to spend in order to distribute the questionnaire.

As a result, taking into consideration limitation of any research is important because its effect on the quality, credibility, and validity of the result, that in turn will effect on interpretation of the result.

CONCLUSION

this chapter provided discussion about the data sources, sampling size of population, research instrument, and method of data analysis. the study will adapt quantitative methodology to obtain the data needed for the research. Furthermore, SPSS (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences) 19.0 for Windows. A statistical analysis software package will be used to analysis the data obtained.

STRUCTURE OF THE RESEARCH STUDY

The contents of this study will be organized into five chapters. This section discusses the contents of the thesis:

Chapter one introduces the research by way of an overview of SMS advertising, the chapter will cover the following points; introduction, followed by problem statement, objectives of the study, research questions, research hypothesis, significance of the study.

Chapter two consists of the review of relevant literature on SMS advertising, the chapter will show a background of SMS advertising, define and determine the elements of effectiveness which are; credibility, informativeness, irritation and entertainment. Also the chapter will focus on the linkage among the variables, finally chapter conclusion.

Chapter three will deal with the research methodology. The chapter will discuss the methods the researcher used to obtain the data and the way has been used to develop the questionnaire of the research.

Chapter four discusses the data analysis and findings. The method that the researcher plans to analyze the data obtained from the questionnaire and also explain the different types of test the study will use to analysis the data.

Chapter five will go for the conclusion and recommendation of this study, includes and discusses the finding and limitations of the study, and thus, necessary recommendations were made from the findings that were channelled towards achieving the study’s aim and objectives.