Examining advertorials : an application of the elaboration likelihood model

Abstract

The reduced effectiveness of advertising has caused advertisers to turn to new promotional techniques such as advertorials. Advertorials are print advertisements which are formatted in the style of the host publication and hence may resemble publicity or editorial. There is considerable debate about whether advertorials should be used. Potential benefits of the technique include the ability to deliver more information, increased attention levels and enhanced perceptions of believability over standard format advertisements. Advertorials are criticised for potentially deceiving consumers into believing that they are independent editorial, crossing the line between advertising and editorial and damaging media credibility. However, knowledge about consumer response to advertorials is based on anecdotal and intuitive evidence and there is little research which provides support for either side of the advertorial debate.

This research attempts to fill this gap by exploring consumer response to advertorials. Petty and Cacioppo's (1981) Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM) is used as a framework to examine how consumers process advertorials to form their perceptions of advertorial believability. This research also extends the ELM to model consumer processing leading to attention to advertorials. The role of source credibility on consumer perceptions of believability is also examined.

This research found that consumer perceptions of advertorials are dependent on how similar the advertorials is to an article or an advertisement. Advertorials which were perceived as articles were more believable than those perceived as advertisements. While the ELM was supported overall, this research did show that the identification of the source as an advertiser or the media and the perceived credibility of this source influenced respondent perceptions of advertorial believability in both high and low involvement situations. This research did not show that advertorials gain more attention than advertisements.

These results suggest that advertorials with high quality executions may be perceived as articles and hence have higher believability than advertisements. Further, source credibility was the key aspect leading to advertorial believability in all situations. Future research should examine consumer response to advertorials in different situations. Research is also needed to further examine the role of the advertiser or media as source in consumer processing.