THE EFFECT OF TELEVISION ADVERT ON THE BUYING HABIT OF CONSUMER

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background of the Study

One function of the mass media which is becoming increasingly important in the modern world is the economic functions of advertising. The mass media perform this function for the people by bringing together buyers and sellers through advertisements. Again, the world is fast becoming a common market place of ideas. Many multinational companies have come to realize that people have the same basic needs and desires. Consequently, they have heeded to calls for global marketing and can promote their goods and services using advertisements.

An advertisement is defined by the Advertising Practitioners Council of Nigeria (APCON) as a „communication in the media paid for by an identifiable sponsor and directed at a target audience with the aim of transferring information about a product, service, idea or cause.‟

According to Benson Eluwa (2005, p.5), „Advertising is a form of non-personal method of communicating information which is usually paid for by a sponsor through various media‟. These definitions can tell one that advertising is a persuasive communication, because it tries to persuade the reader, viewers or listeners to take to the sponsor‟s point of view and also take some appropriate actions towards an object of advertisement.

In an industrial and free competitive market economy, where the interplay of economic variables dictates the market, the problem of survival of business becomes a very nightmarish one for producers and manufacturers. The singular desire of manufacturers becomes how to create awareness and market for their goods. Advertising is then one strategy that fulfils the desire completely. The desire to be buoyant in business and to increase profit has given advertisement an irrevocable reputation.

Advertising is not undertaken by management just for fun or to keep products or services. It is principally involved in persuasion or advocacy even apparently just giving us information, using media that are paid for it to get through to the mass audience with the identity of the advertisers being clear. „Advertising has the mandate to sell the advertiser‟s goods and help the consumers to shop wisely‟- Okoro (1995, p.42). Advertising is to communicate information about a product, service or idea and thus stimulate demand.

A television advertisement or commercial is a form of advertisement in which goods, services, organizations, ideas etc. are promoted through the medium of television. Most advertisements are produced by an outside advertising agency. Advertisers spread commercials across a number of programmes reaching many more viewers. Networks now own different „spot‟ commercials for many products in the same show. A spot has to stand out and be remembered and this brought about creativity in television advertising owing to the large number of advertisements, and many products with the same quality and cost. The unique selling point and brand awareness became ever more important.

The first television advertisement was broadcast in the United States at 14:29pm on July 1, 1941, when the Bolivia Watch Company paid $9 to New York city NBC affiliate WNBT(now WNBC) for a 20 second spot shown before a baseball game between the Brooklyn Dodgers and Philadelphia Phillies.

Television advertisements have heralded an unprecedented increase in economic activities. For some, television advertisements are always one of the best things to look out for on television because of their highly captivating, dramatic, entertaining and humorous nature. For others, this form of advertisement is nothing but an interruption of a nice quiet evening at home, especially when the viewer is seriously engrossed in a highly informative news programme.

However, beyond these two extremes, the advertiser must gain access to the consumer‟s mind in order to win his purchasing loyalty. This is why the advertiser capitalizes on the glamour and potency of television to reach out to a wide spectrum of consumers in order to market his wares. Ideally, television commercials are based on the same principle as the old-time medicine show where a medicine dealer uses banjo player and magician to attract customer‟s attention to his product and market his wares. In television commercials, the advertiser uses talents (for dramatic spectacle) and music to put the audience in good humour, so that the sponsor (manufacturer of the product) who corresponds to the medicine man will have a receptive audience when he peddles his wares.