The standard practice in commercials is to present high-energy, upbeat messages, but research by Nancy M. Puccinelli of Oxford University and two colleagues suggests that this tactic is likely to be less effective for ads placed in and around serious, somber TV shows and movies, which constitute 40pc of media offerings. In one experiment, people who had viewed seven minutes of ‘9/11: The Falling Man,’ a documentary about the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, on Hulu found subsequent high-energy ads to be difficult to watch, and they watched less of them than moderate-energy ads. Consumers saddened by TV shows and movies respond as much as 50pc more favourably to moderately energetic, compared with high-energy, commercials.

(Source: Journal of Marketing)

Published in Dawn, Economic & Business, April 27th, 2015

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