Keywords

1 Introduction

Advertising and internal communication are two sides of the same coin. The two areas, separated until about ten years ago, are now much more interpenetrated in intents and formulations. More often figures of speech, themes and arguments and how to handle them, plus the creativity, are coming out from advertising style, both through old media but also through new media, since they are equally useful in internal communication (see, Artuso and Mason 2008; Barone and Fontana 2005 and Pastore and Vernuccio 2008).

After all, the intended effect is the same for internal and external communication, to sell a product, the company itself and its internal audiences, thus fulfilling a task fundamentally equal to that performed by classical advertising. Definitions are different but the semantic substances are not, such as the good corporate climate i.e. the goodwill of classic advertising. The two streams of communication are more and more interpenetrating each other.

2 The Methodology of the Research

This paper is based on a questionnaire on advertising and communication given in January 2019 to about 700 respondents, 50% men and 50% women, distributed throughout the country. The percentage subdivision for macro areas was as follows: 26% in the north-west, almost 19% in the north-east, about 20% in the center and the remaining 35% in the south and in the islands. The graduates were almost 15%, the rest graduates, or women and men who had discontinued their studies after compulsory schooling.

As for the socioeconomic class to which they belong, 36% declared an income under 18,000 euro, 48% an income between 18,000 and 70,000 euro and only 2% declared an income of over 70,000 euro. The remaining ones preferred not to answer.

3 Findings

The questionnaire immediately shows what were, and still today are, the main functions of advertising, at least in the people’s perception. The two main functions are creativity and hammering. Figure 1 in fact shows that respondents identify as its main characteristics of advertising its great inventive power together with the insistent ability to speak continuously to its public and not only to that; for the sake of truth, let’s add that this last feature is allowed more than anything else by the results of a good (pounding and hammering) media planning.

Fig. 1.
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Advertising perception.

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The advertising speech, in fact, continually elaborates themes, figures, forms and narratives often derived from the present times and inevitably enriched with inventiveness, in language, in storytelling, and also with regard to the visual power and impact. On the other hand, every new inventive, but generally speaking every new advertising communication, is obliged to repeat the message until the exhaustion, continually proposing the same message again and again, following the media planning.

If we had to identify two historical adv guru, whose creative styles are somehow recognized by the people perception as it emerges in Fig. 1, we should certainly name William (Bill) Bernbach with his negative approach and the his exquisite irony (Ferraresi 2017, 143) and the theory of the unique selling proposition and the hammering, carried out by Rosser Reeves (ibid., 141). Bernbach is recognized as the most important advertising figure, the innovator and the creator who was the first to succeed in bending the creative need of advertising communication to the business logic, thus giving life to the modern advertising agency. He was also the first to invent the creative couple, believing that advertising was a verbo-visual communication and that therefore copywriters and art directors had to work together, in concert, to produce the perfect fusion of words and images able to surprise, entertain, make people feel, think, act, and experience about the brands.

Rosser Reeves, instead, a man of linear character and simple culture, with a straightforward personality, managed to translate those aspects of character into a business idea. In fact, every new advertisement was based on a single concept, which had to be simple, clear and direct. No frills, no turnaround in Reeves commercials. For him creativity had to be ancillary, that is to say, following the will to communicate more on that particular product or service. Moreover, not satisfied, Reeves theorized the need to repeat several times that simple and straightforward idea present in the advertising release, until the current or potential consumer had well implanted it in the brain. A sort of mental hammering.

Reeves’s approach seems to collect an important percentage of responses in our questionnaire. At least, this seems what Fig. 1 testify. In fact, Fig. 1 shows that more than 48% perceive advertising as a hammering. And annoying communication And it is important to note that 22% consider this characteristic to be strongly negative and boring. On the other hand, you can consider the answers that define advertising as fun and surprising, a total of almost 39%, as the result of the creativity in adv.

However, combining the results of Fig. 1 with those of Fig. 2 the Bernbach approach is still winning: actually people prefer the creativity and they enjoy creative, fun, surprising and also fantastic and unpredictable advertisements. These characteristics are loved by 53% of the answers, reflecting a creative appreciation that seems not to have failed over the years.

Fig. 2.
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Different types of advertising.

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It should also be noted that more than 7% of respondents today appreciate those advertisements that deal with social issues and use those themes to promote a product or service. Among various theories and models that analyze advertising, we can choose those according to which the messages of advertising are leaning on the dominant value system, which is somehow conveyed and translated into the various adv. releases. (see Polesana 2016) Thus we can define adv. as a funhouse mirror that reflect, nevertheless, dominant social ideas together with costumes, habits and the way we consume.

That 7% turns out to be a precious indicator of a socio-cultural trend according to which we, as a consumers, want to have knowledge of traceability, and we want to know the social impact, and the ecological footprint for each product. And we, as consumers like to find all those information in a narrative form, so that inside the advertising message those values, those themes, those information can be turned in storytelling.

The third figure that we report appears explicit in underlining and reiterating that advertising is also and above all a source of information. This theme has long been a pet subject for the Italian sociologist like Fabris who, in his writings on advertising, believed that information was an asset, bringing to a large number of people the knowledge of products, goods, services, technological innovations and in general the whole process of innovation brought about by progress and consumption, in a simple and direct way, sometimes even fun and fascinating. (Fabris 1992, 2003) Such a concept seems today to be clearly perceived by the majority of those interviewed who, despite the annoyance deriving from a communication that is often too insistent, still seem to appreciate its informative side.

However, the appreciation shown in Fig. 3 by respondents should not make us forget that advertising is loved and hated at the same time: accepted, though badly tolerated. This is what emerges from the topic discussed in Fig. 4, which explains to us that we do not have fun with advertising.

Fig. 3.
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Information in advertising.

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Fig. 4.
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Advertising: lightness and fun.

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Why such a statement in Fig. 4 is clearly opposite to what was previously discussed? In our opinion, it is necessary to separate the comprehension of advertising as a whole from the advertising intended as individual ads and single commercials. In fact, the question in Fig. 4 refers to the entire advertising discourse, and doesn’t go deep into the specific adv. discourses, nor discusses the various adv. types and the different ways themes and figures can be handled. In the latter case the answers are apparently more flattering, because they give to advertising an important share of creativity, entertainment, fascination. On the other side, taken as a whole, the advertising discourse produces an informative overload that, obviously, can not be tolerated any longer. Advertising enlarge and enriches the possibility of buying and consuming, and that’s could be fine or at least acceptable, but if this information becomes excessive, exaggerated and if during a normal day commercials are more frequents than waves in a rough sea, then we find ourselves facing a sort of a map (tips for the purchases) that has become immense, complex and articulated as the same territory (i.e. the occasions of consumption). This is the reason for that amount of 60% and more answers that deny lightness and fun to advertising. The reason is further confirmed by the answer to another statement reported in the questionnaire where advertising is considered too intrusive: more than 85% of respondents consider true this statement.

Perhaps the golden age of advertising is done. Is it so? Perhaps, the driving force of that way of communication that certainly sinks its roots into the very heart of Western civilization and developed together with the very beginnings of human commerce, is weakening.

Actually, we know that there are advertising communications dating back to the ancient Babylonian civilization, five thousand years before Christ. In Tebe an inscription dating back to the second millennium BC has been found. The inscription said: “The Hapù weaver’s shop, where the most beautiful canvases of the whole Tebe are woven, according to the taste of each one”. (see Pelloso, Stigliano, in Ferraresi 2017, 134) More recently there are important traces of advertising and visual communication depicted over the walls in the ruins of the roman town of Pompei (Ferraresi 2002).

However, despite those signs so far away, advertising as we know it today, men and women of the contemporary world, is differently structured and designed. The advertising communication of our times was born in Madison Avenue, New York, in the twenties. In those years William Bernbach started the organizational and creative staff; he invented the creative couple and in the thirties the media developed in such a way, ready to become an excellent advertising vehicle. In those days a nephew of Freud, Edward Bernays, gave birth to a new discipline, Public Relation, a discipline able to understand the sociological and psychological aspects of the masses in order to better grasp convictions and habits of consumption. Bernays was the inventor of modern propaganda. (Bernays 2008) In short, in those years we witness the dawn of a new and modern form of communication, endowed, for better and for worse, with new rules and high effectiveness. According to the answers gathered in Fig. 5, that propulsive drive seems to have been exhausted and advertising seems no longer able to improve. She is really ugly and suffers a fall in creativity.

Fig. 5.
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The worsening of the quality in advertising.

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Which subjects should take care of a new start in advertising? Who should improve it both on the rhetorical-aesthetic level and on effectiveness level? For Italian respondents the answer to these questions is clear: this difficult step towards new heights of creativity cannot be taken in account by creative director or by advertising agencies, instead the companies themselves should carry out a Copernican revolution and, courageously, they can open new possibilities and work for new advertising languages.

On the other side, advertising is something that companies can not do without, and this observation is considered true for more than 87% of respondents (Fig. 6).

Fig. 6.
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Companies and advertising.

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Figure 7 introduces the very important question of the context. In fact, the appreciation of an advertisement largely depends on the context. A simple reflection by Seth Godin can help us. The author, the theorist of permission marketing, says that selling a product to someone who wants to listen to you is much more effective than interrupting strangers who do not want to listen to you. (1999) Advertising, especially tv commercials, often performs an unsolicited interruption and breaks into our homes without asking for permission nor taking into account the question about the context of communication.

Fig. 7.
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Advertising is an unbearable interference in our free time.

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The context is a set of circumstances where a communicative act occurs, and consists of four main elements.

  1. 1.

    The physical, spatial or temporal situation where the communicative act takes place: in our case we can imagine the advertising spot that enters in our homes during the evening, interrupting a film, an interview, the evening news.

  2. 2.

    The socio-cultural situation that considers the status and the role of interlocutors, i.e. considers whether the communicative act takes place within a family belonging to a low, middle or high class, and also considers the formal or non-formal moment where the communicative act occurs. In our case, advertising tends to fall into a familiar and non-formal context.

  3. 3.

    The cognitive situation of the interlocutors, that is to say their knowledge about the topic of communication and the image that everyone has about product or good or service and about their performances.

  4. 4.

    The psycho-affective contextualization that considers if the communicative act is occurring during a silent or participated situation, if there is tension or tranquility in the family, if the day events has produced serenity or anxiety, etc. All these elements build the complete meaning that that advertising act produces. Simply speaking, the contest mark the difference between the utterer meaning and the receiver meaning. In “Kant and the Platypus” Eco deals with a series of semiotic questions concerning cognitive processes and consolidates the idea that meaning can be delineated only on the basis of continuous negotiations. Eco (1999) his point of view help us to understand that even in advertisement the context produces an important meaning negotiation, up to distort sense and communication effect. Figure 7 explains that the brute force modality really is not the best way to produce an advertising campaign. The latter can be distorted, or rejected following of the four elements of the context we discussed.

Reactions can be like that: “I do not want advertising here and now in my house; I do not want to see goods too far from my lifestyle; I do not want to receive advertising from that product because I know it doesn’t work, or because I hate the company that I consider reality a polluter, or an exploiter. I do not want to see advertising because I’m not in the ideal state of mind to enjoy it.”

These can be different explanations of that high percentage (64, 3%) that defines advertising as an unbearable intrusion.

In the followings, questionnaire specifically investigated the characteristics of advertising on television and the characteristics of internet advertising.

The result about television is illustrated in Fig. 8 and in Fig. 9.

Fig. 8.
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Positive and negative characteristics attributed to advertising on TV.

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Fig. 9.
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The main characteristics attributed to advertising on TV.

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Figure 8 shows likes and dislikes in television commercials. To explain it in a formula we will say that advertising generates negativity with regard to the circumstances of the enunciation but generates positivity with regard to the subjects of the utterances, which from time to time can be fun, surprising, spectacular.

Curiosity is the main spring that seems to keep the advertising afloat. Figure 9 suggests that, amid so many negative aspects, an advertising story, if he is able to intrigue, then he vigorously fights his battle.

To provide a more in-depth explanation of why curiosity and annoyance in television advertising have more or less the same percentage, we must take into account some considerations of applied psychology dedicated to the stories. According to a popular study whose main results are now traceable also on the web (http://www.psicologiaapplicata.com/leggere-fa-bene-al-cervello/) to read and be involved in a story is very effective in reducing stress. According to the researchers, reading, and participating as listeners to a narrative, is a method of effective relaxation that generates a sense of escape and participation, at the same time.

“… the total immersion and concentration in a book causes the body to concentrate less on its own muscles, and consequently relax them.” (Ibidem)

A study can also be found in Goleman’s “Emotional Intelligence”, especially as regards to the connections and intersections between our two minds, the emotional and the rational. (1995) In short, everything happens as if participation in a story “glues” the subject to the story itself, both chemically and emotionally. Therefore the “tearing” that can be produced by an abrupt interruption generates stress that inevitably flows negatively on the subsequent narration (in our case the advertising spot that breaks in). That why 38.7% of respondents are bothered with advertising. If the new storytelling arouses curiosity then allows us to “glue” to the narration that has taken over again.

A parallel analysis conducted on internet advertising, as shown in Fig. 10 and in Fig. 11, explains why the online advertisements are even more annoying. The reasons for this unpleasantness are many. Let’s focus on four elements of differentiation of the network. the elements (not all) through which the network works: proximity, networked public, socialcasting, and people relations.

Fig. 10.
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Positive and negative characteristics attributed on advertising on line.

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Fig. 11.
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The main characteristics attributed to advertising on line.

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As for the proximity of new media we must say that it is both physical and psychological. We continuously use electronic media such as tablets and smartphones, we always carry them with us by placing them before our eyes. Moreover, proximity is psychological in the sense that our sites, our profiles on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc., are experienced as private virtual spaces where the advertising interventions are badly tolerated.

Networked public explains that there is no longer on the network a difference between a passive public and a public content producer. (Boyd 2007, 2010 and Van Dijk 1999)

Socialcasting is the result of the technological innovation of the network and of web 2.0. With socialcasting everyone communicates with everyone, imposing that era of mass self-communication that Castells speaks about (2006, 2009).

People relations explain that the raw material, i.e. the content of the web are people with their passions, habits, customs, stories, lifestyles and worlds Bennato (2011). This is why the discipline of content marketing addresses and communicates with people, with employees, with their stories.

On the web it is no longer enough, in fact it is totally wrong to say: “We are the leading company in the market”, because the phrase sounds emptied of all information content and, above all, is not addressed to people but is only self-referential. What network wants from companies, generally speaking, is hearing the true company voice telling true stories without hiding behind the screen of promotional and self-referential communication Pasquali (2003).

Online the need for a new advertising communication is very strong. This need follows new forms of diffusion and, alongside the visibility acquired typical of old media, develops the visibility owned. Online everyone is now a small Berlusconi, a media owner of many mass self-communication media. Thus, thanks to the memes and virality of network communication, it happens that many other users can talk and amplify our releases and our news, for free. This is what is called visibility gained.

The new advertising communication is no longer direct and unidirectional. It has become a sort of contextual deepening into the consumer’s mind, not by forcing his thoughts but by accompanying them, as happens in the sponsored communication.

Online contents and people are back to the center of advertising and communication. This is the reason why storytelling importance is increasing. Storytelling puts people in the center catching their attention.

If these rules are not followed, if the advertising communication adheres to the old methods, then the people’s refusal of the network becomes almost total. Therefore the explanation of Fig. 11, that shows high percentages of annoyance and irritation regarding the classic advertising communication, is that on the web advertising becomes something else, it becomes a story, a narration of proximity: simple, direct and warm. Sometime ironic and sarcastic.

Figure 12 compares the popularity and non-acceptance of advertising on TV and online advertising. The percentages are important: indifferent and negatives advertising exceed 74%. But we have already noted that this is due to the fact that online advertising must be completely different.

Fig. 12.
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Tv vs online.

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Before concluding this outlook, we report the results of an extrapolation concerning the preferred media as advertising vehicles: television, newspapers, online, radio or outdoor advertising.

The answers tell us that in Italy television advertising was ranked first by the largest number of respondents. Within the answers there is an obvious polarization between those who put it on the first step of the podium and who, instead, relegates it in the back of the fourth and fifth place. Online advertising is by far the least appreciated with 38.4% of respondents who do not hesitate to leave it at the bottom of the ranking. Radio advertising tends to be placed in the center of the ranking, without infamy and without praise. Newspaper advertising deserves, according to the most, the silver square, therefore is well accepted. Finally, outdoor advertising is on the first step of the podium with a more flattering score than all the others (over 32%). It is thus crowned with the gold medal of preference over all types of promotional communication conveyed by the various media analyzed.

Figure 13 is simply summarizing the perceived publicity with regard to “enough” and “very” answers. The figure contemplates and collects all means of communication, without distinction. The end result seems to be that of an advertisement perceived as very intrusive; however, it is essential and provides advice, but in any case, certainly to be improved.

Fig. 13.
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The perceived advertising.

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4 Open Questions and Suggestions for Italian Companies

Analyzing the answers to the open questions collected by the questionnaire it is interesting to note that the range of memorable advertisements are mostly linked to the big brands and that, on the other hand, those same big brands are often mentioned both in advertising more fun and appreciated both among those that like less.

So, for example, in the first choices both positive and negative, Mulino Bianco and Buondì collect many mentions. Nutella is massively present in the minds of the interviewees, especially in the positive, despite some of its nominations among the advertising products that do not like.

The brands, especially Tim and Wind, are also receiving considerable attention.

Finally, the online situation is even more fluid than what is observed for television advertising, in the sense that the level of memorability is decidedly lower and the cases mentioned are more heterogeneous.

As for the suggestions to Italian companies to improve the quality of their advertising, the suggestions provided by the respondents are not extremely numerous and varied and can be summarized in the following points we list here without order of importance:

  • Respondents ask for quality in advertising: “Do less but do it with quality”, “Spots more and more beautiful like films to improve the quality of the message”, “Do less but of higher quality”, “Decrease quantity, increase quality”, “Focus on quality, investing more money”;

  • Respondents are also looking for more creativity: “Advertiser must have more imagination and creativity”, “Being more creative and stimulating is really a plus”, “Why not proposing more creative and surprising ideas?”, “More creative and less repetitive”, “Less banal and repetitive”, “avoiding repetitiveness, devising a dedicated Carosello space”;

  • They look for diversification, courage and originality: “To find original ideas and out of the box”, “More creativity and originality; differentiate yourself “, “They must invest more in the originality of the spot but always keeping in mind that the important thing is to enhance the characteristics of the sponsored product/service”, “Less stereotypes, which would make the most original advertisements”, “Choose new situations, innovative subjects, original and engaging movies”, “It takes a bit of diversity”;

  • Advertising is too much. Respondents want short messages, brevity and sincerity: “Short and concise”, “Being shorter but more effective”, “Shorten sketches”, “Shorter sketches and more informative”, “Give brief information on the good quality of their production” verification”, “Advertising must be more sincere and less repetitive”;

  • They also like precision of information: “Shorter and less absurd”, “Shorter and informative”, “Indicative messages on products”, “Make them as short as possible, while keeping clear in the message you want to give”, “Being very essential, precise and direct, without wandering or being repetitive”;

  • They like truthfulness: “Communicating the truth”, “Making them more likely to normal life”, “Telling the truth and not deceiving the consumers”;

  • Respondents want irony and fun: “Be ironic and funny and at the same time give some information about the product”, “They should make them interesting and ironic, less obvious”, “More ironic and light”, “Cheerful and carefree advertising… very ironic”, “To focus more on irony and the values of the new generations: such as integration and curiosity towards what is not known. It seems to me that advertising in Italy speaks a language that is not the current one”, “Make it less heavy, more ironic and fun”, “Be ironic and funny and at the same time provide some information on the product”;

  • Advertising must be less intrusiveness and less repetitive: “Be less intrusive”, “Less intrusive especially with background music at very high volume”, “Less repetitiveness, more interesting content”, “Less repetitions of the same advertising”;

  • Finally, respondents ask for a less vulgar, stereotyped advertising and they dislike the commodification of women: “Avoiding to propose standardized content, not original or creative, just commercialization of the woman”, “Being creative and less stereotypical use of beautiful women”, “Make it less intrusive, less sexist and less stupid”, “Use less content associated with sexuality or ambiguity and focus only on the product’s quality”.