There is no single recipe for success in advertising, but there are several elements that can help getting closer to a set goal. One of them is a persuasive and creative advertising message. What else should it be marked by? How to create an effective advertising communication?
What is the advertising message? The crucial components of the advertising message
The basic elements of the advertising message are the slogan, content, and graphics. However, storytelling is just as effective. They are all the more memorable, if they are summarised at the end with a persuasive and emotional slogan.
As for slogans, the strongest impact has the possibly shortest, simple content that a potential customer will easily remember. One of the examples to mention here is IKEA’s slogan “IKEA – My kingdom my rule”, which refers to the possibility of practically any furnishing of the apartment thanks to the rich store offering. The slogan seems to compare one’s home to kingdom, perhaps making some reference to a saying “my home is my castle”.
Read more: How do advertising communications affect the brand perception online?
The message should evoke certain emotions, engaging the recipient, and create the right motivation to purchase. Then the content refers to the sphere of feelings, dreams, or attitudes. Depending on your campaign objective and target audience, the message may show specific benefits that a potential customer will gain when purchasing a product. By providing information about it, we refer to the rational sphere based on logical thinking and information processing. We also distinguish the so-called moral appeal designed to highlight the moral and ethical values shared by the recipient. These include, first of all, patriotism, tradition, family ties, or a certain lifestyle that the brand wants to emphasise.
Advertising message – structure of the advertising communication
Not every advertising message will have the desired effect on the recipient. Sometimes the use of inappropriate phrases or context can discourage the brand and cause some image losses. However, most frequently a poorly worded advertising message may go unnoticed and not be remembered by potential buyers. Therefore, before creating a slogan, it is worth answering the following questions:
- What do we want to advertise?
- Who is our ad targeted at?
- What image of our company do we want to convey?
- Where will the ad be placed?
- Do you want your ad to promote a product or a new service that the audience should be aware of, or to inform about a special offer or sale of given products?
Creating persuasive and effective messages requires the marketer to know a lot about the audience requirements, their interests, expectations, and lifestyles. The consumer must feel that the product will meet his or her individual needs, which is emphasised by a well-composed advertising slogan. The development of the advertising message also requires tracking trends, market monitoring, and competitors’ activities on an ongoing basis.
Read more: How to plan modern campaigns?
Nature and characteristics of the advertising message
When answering the above-mentioned questions, one should consider the nature of the message. It should both define brand values and be embedded in a given context. Depending on the strategy adopted and the target group, the message can be humorous (easier to remember), questioning (prompting reflection), imperative (indicating the desired behaviour), declarative (presenting arguments), or informative (e.g. informing about news or promotions).
There are many more characteristics of the advertising message, but such a communication must be distinguished primarily by attractive content, suggestiveness, intelligibility, memorisation, brevity, and originality. In addition to the slogan itself, the use of rhymes, melodies or rhythmic patterns of the ad increases the chance of remembering the brand.
These elements of the advertising message should be used wisely, so as not to alienate the recipient, not to cause unnecessary confusion, or worst of all – not to offend with a daring joke.
Read more: From brand awareness to brand advocacy. What about a customer after sales?
