Blog

There are many ways and different techniques to testing advertising effectiveness. This test will depend on the different aspects that will be evaluated. Measuring of advertising effectiveness is about the managerial task that aims to relate advertising results to the established standards of performance and objective of advertising performance.

If your advertising fails to achieve the desired goals the money spent on advertising goes waste. However, measuring the effectiveness of advertising is not an easy task, sometimes this will be complex. In this article we will discuss in detail about testing advertising effectiveness.

Main Reasons of Testing Advertising Effectiveness

There are six reasons for measuring or evaluating the effectiveness of advertising. When you understand the reason for advertising effectiveness then you will be able to test advertising effectiveness. Followings are the main reason for advertising effectiveness.

• To compare the results with the objective and goals
• Cost benefit of advertising
• Sales response
• Communication response
• Comparing two markets
• Justification of investment

To compare the result with the objective and goals :

Measurement of advertising effectiveness is necessary so as to compare the result with the objective and goals. Generally the terms of objective are used in advertising to increase in sales or increase in profit or market expansion. If these objectives are achieved in advertising then we said that advertising is effective.

Cost Benefit of advertising :

Measuring the effectiveness of advertising is important from the point of view of the cost benefit of advertising. The advertiser should be aware about where to spend money in advertising to get the most result in low investments. The cost of advertising must be linked to contribution received. If the contribution of any advertising campaign is higher that means the cost benefit is higher in this way the advertising is effective.

Sales Response :

According to the sales response, measuring advertising is very important. Sales response refers to the amount of sales which may be attributed to the advertising input. If the sales increase on the account of an advertising campaign, that means the advertising is effective.

Communication response :

Communication response on target consumers is important in the effectiveness of advertising. The main aim of this advertising is to communicate with the general public to inform them about their product and services company profile. In case the advertiser succeeds in communicating with the public and gives information about their company, it means that the advertisement is effective.

Comparing two markets :

According to comparing two markets the measurement of effectiveness of advertising is very important. Under this condition, advertisement is carried in two different markets  at a given time period. After a certain time period, results of both markets are measured according to their sales, revenue and leads.

Justification of investment :

Rightnow, the cost of advertising is treated as an investment. The rate and size of return on the investment is determined well in advance. If the expected rate of return is achieved in the way of additional profits, it means advertising is effective.

Meaning of Testing Advertising Effectiveness

The meaning of testing advertising effectiveness is to measure or evaluate the success or failure of the advertising campaign that is carried out in the market. Testing of advertising gives the answers of following question i.e,

• Whether the advertising will attract the attention of the customer in particular and the public in general.
• Whether the advertising campaign will be effective at achieving advertising objectives.
• Whether the advertisement will create the interest level, desires and image.

2 Methods of Testing Advertising Effectiveness 

There are two testing methods available for advertising effectiveness. These are,

1. Pre- testing methods
2. Post- testing methods

1. Pre- testing methods :

This is made prior to running the advertising copy, as the name suggests. It can be done in three steps. Following are the steps for pre- testing methods.

• This is the beginning of creation process
• This is also end of creation process
• This is the end of production stage

The main motive of pre- testing is to measure the effectiveness of different presentations of the message  including alternative presentations of the single copy. The following methods are used in pre- testing for testing advertising effectiveness.

1. Check- list method – The checklist test is the various elements of the advertising copy or the copy as a whole. This is another type of checklist concerned with readability and audibility. This is one of the simplest and speedy processes of measuring the effectiveness of an advertising copy with limited cost.

2. Consumer- jury survey method – Under this test, the advertising copy is shown to a group of people or a jury of prospects who may be considered typical buyers for securing their opinions and reactions to the advertising copy.

3. Portfolio test – This is the method of pre testing, in the portfolio tests there are different types of portfolio copies available with specific advertisements. Then the consumer sample will be seen in folio. The consumer is then asked about what he sees in all ads. The ad gives you minimum playback is considered the best time given. If there is found any dummy then the actual one is improved on the same lines.

4. Mock magazine test – This is also part of the pre-testing method. In this way all the experimental ads are live through a magazine cover so, this is the reason it is known as mock magazine test. Without any test ads the control group will be exposed by the same magazine.

5. Direct questioning – A consumer jury is formed and either the whole ads or its different elements are tested by direct questions. Sometimes there is one single question that will be elaborated and accessed with readability and behavior.

2. Post- testing methods :

Testing is also known as ad tracking; it can be customized by syndicated. The post testing studies provide different periodic ya continuous in market research to monitoring a brand performance with including brand awareness product uses in market and services query and their attitude. Advertising tracking can be also done by telephone medium and online medium. There are two approaches producing fundamentally different measures of consumer memories of advertising and second is recall versus recognition.

Purpose of post- testing methods

The purpose of AD tracking is usually to provide a measure of the combined effect of the media weight or spending level.  The effectiveness of the media by targeting and the quality of the advertising is creative. Some new year forms of online tracking separate the issue of quality and creative components from the quality of ads that are arising at the same time.

Sum of AD tracking studies are conducted by telephone medium Where others are connected on internet medium. The two approaches produce very different evaluations of advertising awareness because of this gap into consumer memories of advertising using fundamental different measures and recall versus recognition.

Followings are the data that post- testing methods provides

• Decision analyst – A decision analyst data will be provided through post testing advertising methods where you evaluate the key metrics such as engagement, conversions, and consumer response from a campaign. Tools like A/B testing, surveys, and analytics will help you to get clear intimation about your ads performance. These all data will help decision analysts to understand advertising strategies and more. 
• Top of mind brand awareness – These data will help you to understand how well consumers remember your brand after seeing an ad campaign. This type of data will help businesses to measure the campaign’s effectiveness and guides future marketing to perform well.
• Aided brand awareness – This data helps businesses to understand how well advertising will help the target audience to be brand recognizable. With the help of this data you can establish brand positioning and also help you to get a good strategy for brand awareness in future.
• Unaided brand awareness – By using these types of data you can create campaign effectiveness and you can grow your brand organically in future.
• Brand fit – A brand fit data gets through post testing advertising methods where you will evaluate how well your brand message will align with your brand identity and connect with the target audience.
• Brand image ratings – These data focus on surveys, consumer feedback, where responders rate how was your brand quality, innovation, and trustworthiness. With the help of brand image data you can evaluate where to improve your brand image.
• Repeat purchase – You will get repeat purchase behavior through sales analysis, customer service, and loyalty program metrics. When you track the purchase patterns then you will be able to expand your brand sales.

Conclusions

To grow your brand you have to test advertising effectiveness. In this article we have discussed different ways to evaluate marketing effectiveness so basically these two best proven methods that are discussed in detail in above. To Measure the marketing effectiveness is about the managerial task that aims to relate advertising results to the established standards of brand performance. These two methods play a crucial role in evaluating advertising performance for brands.