Coffee, televisions and response advertising

John Foust

Dec 1, 2024

I asked Karine what made that billboard’s message so effective. She said, “It proved that strong advertising is specific and communicates clearly. It offered a reason to make a purchase right away.”

Karine, who once participated in a Zoom meeting with me, told a story about the impact of response advertising. A few days earlier, she had seen a billboard that caught her attention. It featured a large photograph of a tall coffee cup, which was obviously a latte. Droplets of condensation were visible on the side of the cup, and whipped cream towered over the top. The headline read, “Iced Latte $1.99.” The coffee shop’s logo appeared on the right side, along with the words “Next Exit.” All of the words were large enough to be easily read at highway speed. “As soon as I saw the sign,” she said, “I started thinking about that cool and refreshing drink. So I took the exit, and a few minutes later, I was enjoying an iced latte.”

I asked Karine what made that billboard’s message so effective. She said, “It proved that strong advertising is specific and communicates clearly. It offered a reason to make a purchase right away.”

The two types of advertising have been discussed in these columns before, but they bear repeating. Image advertising, sometimes called institutional advertising, is designed to portray the advertiser as dependable, caring, safety conscious — or any other description that is called for by the branding strategy. The effect is cumulative. Done properly, it works over time. They’re saying, “If we make ourselves (blank) enough, maybe you’ll decide to do business with us.”

On the other hand, response advertising strives to generate immediate action. There’s a sense of urgency. “Buy now,” an ad might say, “because we’re having a sale”... or “because this offer expires soon”...or “if you miss this exit, you’ll miss your chance for a cool, iced latte.”

Since our main interest is newspaper advertising, let’s look at another example. Gregory told me about the time he was going through a special section, which featured appliances and technology products. His family wanted a new, larger TV anyway, but he admitted that the pro football playoffs were on his mind. A particular wall-mounted TV caught his attention, so he discussed it with his family, drove to the store, bought it (at a discount), and installed it before the next day’s game. That’s response advertising.

Too many advertisers don’t understand the difference between these two types of advertising. You probably know merchants in your town who run one image ad after another — and expect consumers to buy now. The misunderstanding usually works in that direction: They run image ads and expect the results of response ads.

Most consumers are like Karine and Gregory — and you and me. We’re ready to buy certain products and services — if someone would just give us relevant information about those things and give us good reasons to buy now.

Maybe it’s time to have conversations with your advertisers about the two types of advertising. And maybe it’s time to talk about realistic expectations — especially when they say they want immediate results as they hand you a suggestion for an image campaign. © Copyright 2024 by John Foust. All rights reserved.

John Foust has conducted training programs for thousands of newspaper advertising professionals. Many ad departments are using his training videos to save time and get quick results from in-house training. Email for information: john@johnfoust.com