Entertain Entertainment’s Mobile Ad Value

Mobile phone advertising has been around for two decades, certainly long enough for an abundance of research about what’s most important for marketing success. Unfortunately, there’s no abundance of clear-cut conclusions. The credibility, informativeness, and entertainment in the ad make a difference, but to different degrees. And what would seem to be an advantage of mobile phone advertising when compared to media like TV or newspaper ads—the ability to personalize the ad to the recipient—doesn’t always help and could even end up irritating the consumer.
     Researchers at Griffith University and University of Minnesota suspected some inconsistencies would be resolved by analyzing results of past studies in terms of the ages and genders of the consumers in the different samples, the level of economic development in the country the ad was used, and whether the ad was text-based or graphic-based. The researchers’ indices of success were the audiences’ positive attitudes toward the ad and the intention to receive mobile ads.
     As expected, the results showed that a positive attitude produces a greater intention to accept the ad. Ad credibility was instrumental in establishing a positive attitude and greater intention. Credibility was defined as the audience’s perception of believability. Also important was informativeness, defined as the amount of useful information provided.
     It might seem that informativeness and credibility would each have the largest single influence of any of the characteristics studied. The marketing function of an ad is to influence behavior, and credible information is an influential tool. But an even more substantial influence came from the entertainment value of the ad. Entertainment value was defined as the ability of the ad to satisfy a recipient’s desire to escape reality, have fun, and release emotions.
     As an overall recommendation, the researchers suggest that, while providing credible information, marketers using mobile ads incorporate music and videos for entertainment value. Their analyses by audience characteristics also allowed them to give some more specific advice: 

• The evidence is that entertainment value is more important for female than for male audiences and for consumers in economically developed countries than for those in developing countries. 
• Informativeness of the ad appears to be especially influential with older consumers and with general adult audiences compared to the college-age audiences often used in marketing research. 
• Credibility in mobile ads is assessed carefully by audiences in developed countries. Graphic-based ads are considered more credible than text-based ones.

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