In the context of the UK’s total ban on tobacco advertising and the potential future restrictions on alcohol advertising, critically review the debate between the strong or weak theories with regard to the effectiveness of advertising bans.

The effectiveness of advertising bans has been a debated for many years. There are two dominant theories of the debate regarding the nature of how advertising works: the strong theory and the weak theory. The strong theory coined by John Philip Jones holds the belief that advertising exerts a powerful persuasive influence on consumer’s behaviour (Jones, 1990). In Contrast Andrew Ehrenberg developed the view of the weak theory of advertising. This view suggests that advertising reinforces rather than initiates consumer behaviour (Ehrenberg, 1992). These two theories have been discussed thoroughly by many theorists to understand how advertising works. Many countries have implemented restrictions in advertising for tobacco and have issued potential future restrictions for alcohol, with the objective that introducing an adverting ban would lower overall consumption. However, Studies analysing the effects of advertising being linked to consumption has led to two separate views on how advertising works and have led some to believe that advertising bans have no effect on overall consumption.
The strong theory of advertising supports the belief that advertising has the power to persuade people who may not know of a brand or bought a product before to buy it. Also, that advertising in terms of the strong theory increases consumers knowledge and can change people’s behaviour patterns. It can also in the view of the strong theory of how advertising works increase sales and manipulate consumers through psychological techniques to make them buy a product (Jones, 1998).
However in contrast, the views of the weak theory believes that advertising does not have the power to change people’s attitudes or behaviour patterns and can’t persuade or manipulate someone into buying something. The weak theory argues that advertisings main purpose is not to persuade but to reinforce already existing behaviour patterns (Barnard, Ehrenberg, 1997). The “Awareness, Trial and Reinforcement” model developed by Ehrenberg is used to describe consumer behaviours according to the view of the weak theory. The idea is that advertising plays a small role in creating awareness, a small role in stimulating trial and an important role in reinforcing existing behaviour patterns (Weilbacher, 2001). The main idea of the weak theory is that advertisings main purpose is to create brand awareness knowledge and familiarity. That advertising can effect consumer habit and make them choose one brand over another that already exists in their mind (Yeshin, 2006).

The Tobacco advertising ban was introduced because it was being linked to people developing fatal diseases and classed as unhealthy. However, the ban has caused a debate into how advertising really works and whether the ban is actually effective in accomplishing its aims. The ban was introduced by the government in the aim that it would reduce overall consumption of tobacco and it would limit the amount of people taking up smoking as a habit. It was argued that tobacco advertising was one of the main influences in people taking up smoking especially amongst young people (Hoek, J. 1999). These views are related to the characteristics of the strong theory on how advertising works, and that advertising is powerful enough to persuade people to adopt smoking, increases peoples knowledge, increase sales and change consumer attitudes. This idea is closely related to the Aida model which demonstrates a view of consumer behaviour. The Aida model principals are to move peoples levels of unawareness to awareness and through this, develop interest, desire and then to buy a product (Yeshin, 2006). Criticism of this model is argued that there is no evidence that consumers behave in a rational linear way.
In relation to this, a view according to the strong theory is that advertising is often able to manipulate the consumer by the use of physiological techniques to persuade them to buy the brand and make people desire the product. An example of this before the ban was implemented was when the tobacco brand “Branson and Hedges” used commercials to promote their brand “Happiness is a cigar called Hamlet”. The cigar advert evoked the idea that if you were having a bad day and you smoked a Branson and Hedges cigar all your troubles would go away and you would be happy. The advert changed consumers behaviour towards the brand and gave the idea that the cigar would make you feel happy and manipulate you into buying it (Brierley, 2002).This is supported in Jones’s study on “Tobacco point of sale advertising increases positive brand user imagery”. In this study he concluded that advertising has an effect on people’s behaviours of a brand. People involved in the study were split into two groups and the group that viewed the Benson and Hedges advert instead of the people who just looked at the packaging were more likely to describe the brand as “relaxed, cool, and classy”. This supports the strong theory that advertising has the ability to manipulate you into believing that smoking will make everything feel better. Therefore, this promotes the idea that without advertising changing people attitudes and behaviour patterns towards a product or brand people would not be persuaded to buy a product and therefore result in lowering overall consumption (Donovan, et al 2002).
There is the argument of the strong theory that the most influential thing advertising could do is to make young people knowledgeable about the brands before they become consumers (Hoek, J. 1999).The task of advertising is to increase brand awareness which has the ability to change people’s attitudes towards smoking and make it seem socially acceptable in society due to its overpowering visibility. Therefore the ban should in relation to the strong theory of thinking decrease the amount of young people’s awareness of tobacco brands which would overall stop people being persuaded to smoke and decrease in consumption (Donovan et al, 2002).
However, many studies have shown that there has been no noticeable change in the consumption or sales of tobacco since the ban which promotes the idea of the weak theory. This relates to the “Awareness, Trial and reinforcement” model of consumer behaviour that advertising reinforces to people who already smoke and have taken up the habit and plays a small role in actual persuading people to smoke but is capable of increasing brand awareness and can stimulating trial of a brand (Ehrenberg,1992).
Therefore, the view of the weak theory on how advertising works is aimed at encouraging their existing consumers to consume more of the goods and increase brand awareness among non-users especially the young (Hoek, J. 1999). An argument of the weak theory of advertising is that advertising alone does not persuade or influence people to buy a product, but other parts of the marketing mix contribute to consumer behaviour. For example, tobacco companies have succeeded in increasing point of sale exposure of their brands by developing new alternatives of existing brands. Since 1998 brand families have grown in size by more than 50%, with popular brands such as Benson & Hedges increasing brand variants from 4 in 1998 to 23 in 2012. The increase in brand variants is designed to increase a brands visual impact on shop shelves which could stimulate trial to try a new variant of a brand you already smoke (ASH Briefing 2012).
Sponsorship was another advertising tool that was used to reinforce smoking and build awareness amongst youths. One main tactic of tobacco companies was to sponsor major sporting events such as motor racing. Research by academics has shown that children have greater brand awareness of those cigarette brands that sponsor sporting events (Young, 1990). This supports the view of the weak theory that advertising can increases brand awareness among youths. Therefore if the ban was effective it would lower youth awareness of the brands which would reduce the amount of young people developing the habit. Studies show from the “ASH” website that after the “Tobacco Advertising and promotions Act” young people’s awareness of tobacco marketing and brand awareness has declined since the ban. However, there is still no evidence that tobacco promotion influences consumer behaviour of the child (ASH Briefing,2012).

In conclusion the reasons for tobacco ban rely heavily on the ideas of the strong theory on how advertising works. If Advertising wasn’t a persuasive tool and did in fact work through the weak theory that advertising reinforced people who already smoked, decreases in consumption would not be obvious in the short term and may not be obvious in the long term since tobacco is so addictive (Hoek, 1999).

Like tobacco, alcohol has also been an area where restrictions have been put in place. The government have implemented these restrictions to protect young people and help stop underage drinking. It is claimed through the strong theory of advertising that advertising alcohol creates a positive image of alcohol consumption and therefore increases consumption. Also that advertising increases competition which results in the reduction of price which makes alcohol more desirable because it is cheap. Therefore advertising bans are predicted to lower alcohol consumption. Again these views are based on the views of the strong theory of advertising that it has the power to persuade people to buy a product and increases sales (Nelson, Young 2001). For example when “Absolut Vodka” was first advertised it was never heard of before. However, they used advertising to make themselves look different from any other vodka brand. They advertised the brand to look classy and fashionable. This changed people’s attitudes towards the brand and made people want to be associated with the drink. Instantly the brand image and sales were increased through advertising as Absolut was known and still is known as one of the main vodka brands and sales increased by 10% and gathered 70% of market share (Lewis, 1996).
In contrast, according to the weak theory other types of marketing are a concern just as much as advertising. For example, Heineken sponsored the Olympics 2013. This was done through the views of the weak theory to create brand awareness and reinforce people who already drank beer to try the brand. By sponsoring the Olympics, Heineken got exclusive merchandising rights so that Heineken beer was one of the only beers that you could drink at the events which forced trial of the product with the hope that it would result in changing people attitudes towards the brand and result in repeated buying of that brand with further reinforcement from advertisement. However, Alcohol brands that sponsor sporting events are banned in France. For example, the main football cup competition used to be called the “Heineken cup” and is now called the “H cup” due to Frances restrictions on alcohol. However, studies by the French government have stated that the advertisement ban of alcohol has no effect on overall consumption and is related to other factors. (Berger,1999)
Therefore, advertising is not the only thing that influences alcohol consumption, there are other marketing tools such as sponsorship, sales promotions, direct marketing that all play an influence. Also other factors such as peer groups and social surroundings play a huge role in people starting drinking. It is argued that a complete ban on broadcast advertising of all beverages would have no effect on consumption (Nelson & Young, 2001).
In conclusion, there are criticisms and positives of both the strong and weak theory views on how advertising works. However in terms of alcohol and tobacco advertising ban, it is argued that they would have no effect on lowering consumption. It could be argued that advertising to an extent influences young people, however parental and peer approval could also be argued to be a main influence. Other recommendations which could lower consumption instead of an overall advertising ban could be to introduce more regulations such as an increase in price and age which could have an effect on people buying and taking up smoking and drinking habits especially from a young age. Another method could be to apply the weak theory of advertising by reinforcing the dangers of smoking and alcohol abuse through anti-smoking/drinking advertising campaigns (Hoek,1999). However, the debate on how advertising actually works still goes on, as well as the debate on the effectiveness advertising bans has on lowering overall consumption.

References

* Ambler, T. and Vakratsas, D. (1996), ‘The Pursuit of Advertising Theory’, Business Strategy Review, Vol. 7, No.1, pp14-23. * ASH Briefing. (2012). UK Tobacco Advertising and Promotion. Available: http://ash.org.uk/files/documents/ASH_124.pdf. Last accessed 23/10/2013. * Barnard, N. and Ehrenberg, A. (1997), ‘Advertising: Strongly Persuasive or Nudging?’, Journal of Advertising Research, Vol. 37, No. 1, Jan/Feb, pp21-32. * Berger, G. (1999) et al. La Loi relative à la lutte contre le tabagisme et l'alcoolisme: rapport d'évaluation. La Documentation Française, 106 * Ehrenberg, A. S. C. (1992), ‘Comments on How Advertising Works’, Marketing and Research Today, pp167-169. * Hoek, J. (1999), ‘Effects of Tobacco Advertising Restrictions: Weak Responses to Strong Measures’, International Journal of Advertising, February, Vol. 18, No. 1. * Jones, J. P. (1990), ‘Advertising: Strong Force or Weak Force? Two Views and Ocean Apart’, International Journal of Advertising, Vol. 9, pp233-246. * John Philip Jones (1998). How Advertising Works. London: SAGE Publications. 291-293. * Nelson, J.P. & Young, D.J. 2001. Do advertising bans work? An international comparison. International Journal of Advertising, 20(3), 273-296. * Richard W Lewis (1996). The Absolut Book : The Absolut vodka advertising story. Boston: Journey editions. 3-11. * R J Donovan, J Jancey, S Jones. (2002). Tobacco point of sale advertising increases positive brand user imagery. Tobacco Control. 11 (1), 191–194. * Sean Brierley (2002). The Advertising Handbook. London: Routledge. 229-232. * Yeshin, T. (2006), Advertising, Thomson Learning, Chapter 2. * Young, B, M. (1990) TV Advertising and children * Weilbacher, W. M. (2001), ‘Point of View: Does Advertising Cause a “Hierarchy of Effects”’, Journal of Advertising Research, November/December, pp19-26.

Jay-Jay Doolan
Advertising Strategy- Individual Essay
Module leader – Shirley Rate
Matriculation Number –S1014507