6. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS
6.2. Conclusions
According to Carrillat & d´Astous (2013) the official partners, who buy property rights” benefit from the presence of their name or logo on the event site. Their objectives in these cases are mainly image (or reputation) improvement and increased awareness. This has been utilized well in this new concept of branded content. In the case of Brändärit, the brand gets a lot of visibility throughout the whole episode and at the end the broadcaster shows the advertisement that is connected to the episode. As it was argued earlier, the most successful branded content programs are able to blend the advertising message… and make it a part of the storytelling. Also mentioned before, studies has shown that over one-third of people are skeptical about traditional ads and only one-tenth trust the companies producing such adverts. According to the study "in the overwhelming majority of cases consumers preferred the more innovative approach compared with traditional advertising. (Branded Content Marketing Association 2008.) It can be noted that that some the brands, such as Fazer and Instrumentarium did very brave choices. Instrumentarium stood out from the other opticians with their bold and unique advertisement and Fazer surprised people with their exceptionally funny advertisement about sweets. Both of them caused a stir in the media. It was mentioned at the introduction part that feelings have a significant role for remembering the advertisements people have seen. For example Instrumentarium´s Naisen katse and Pantteri´s Gigolo were the two advertisements that evoke a lot of feelings and conversations, and also media attention. They were also the most seen advertisements. (Table 9). Laakso (2003:111) said, “It would be hard to imagine that a Finnish Fazer might diverge from its heritage which is highlighting the taste of the product.” That is exactly what Fazer did with its Gigolo advertisement and it got a great reception among consumers. It was the most liked advertisement. (Table 10.)
Based on the theoretical framework the hypothesis one was that if Finnish people tend to like humorous TV shows they are also likely to feel positive about Brändärit because it is based on humor and is targeted to Finnish consumers.
This would also mean that if American people tend to like humorous TV shows they are also likely to feel positive about Crazy Ones because it is based on humor and is targeted to American consumers. This would also mean that Finnish consumers would not feel positive about Crazy Ones. This hypotheses proved to be right on chapter five, because most of the Finnish respondents liked humorous TV shows and Brändärit, and most of the American respondents liked humorous TV shows and Crazy Ones. Though only approximately one out three of the Finnish respondents liked the humor used on Crazy Ones. So it can be argued that culture indeed has an effect on consumers´ sense of humor, as it was presented in chapter three according to some previous studies. Culture of the target country should always take into account when planning on humorous advertising. If the target countries have significant differences in the preferred styles of humor, adaptation is highly recommended. (Wang 2014). Also this study supports this argument.
Because the American culture is individualistic, the use of aggressive humor is not avoided in the United States. In individualistic cultures ”…when a character on television is mocked through aggressive humor, people laugh at the disparagement from the disparaging party's standpoint.” (Martin 2003; Leins &
Müller 2013; Wang 2014). Though according to Wang (2014) “the use of positive humor styles, such as the self-enhancing humor style and the affiliative humor style, may be more likely found in older and more educated individuals than in younger and less educated people. This argument cannot be proved with these results because the sample was too small to be generalized and compared with each other. Also the education of the respondents was not taken into account.
There is one idea for the future research.
Based on the theoretical framework the hypothesis two was that the youthfulness and desirability of a brand has a meaningful role on a brand image and these associations correlate positively with each other. So by becoming more youthful or desirable on consumers´ minds brands are able to improve consumers´
attitudes towards them and change their brand´s image. This hypotheses proved to be right on chapter five, because when people answered that their brand image
about certain brands had changed positively they also answered that they saw the brands more youthful and/or desirable.
Based on the theoretical framework the hypothesis three was that the advertisements that attracted the most attention in media, evoked a lot of feelings among consumers and successfully utilized humor were also the most watched and liked ones. This hypotheses proved to be right on chapter five, because Gigolo, Naisen katse, Michael Monroe´s advice and Nissan QQ ft. David Hasselhoff were the most liked and watched ones. All of them evoked feelings, stimulated discussion and entertained the viewers. As it was mentioned in chapter one emotions are a big part of remembering the received information.
People are most likely to remember the information, when there have been enough emotions attached to it. As it was suggested earlier, according to the resulst of this study and previous studies humor really is a good way to change people´s attitudes and perceptions about brands that seem old-fashioned and boring. It is good and an effective way to differentiate from the competitors by making bold decisions By being innovative companies are able to change their image, evoke emotions and conversation, and then appear to be more up-to-date.
It was presented that if a brand seems to be out-of-date on consumers´ minds and be less humorous than the competitors it may decrease also its desirability.
Based on the theoretical framework by utilizing branded content brand are able to affect on an affective level of the consumers. As it was presented earlier, on an affective level people have certain attitudes, opinions and beliefs towards a certain brand, product or company. When a company is trying to affect on an affective level, some of its goals could be to change or strengthen people´s attitudes and beliefs about the product, brand or the company. (Vuokko 1997:35&93). The interest and desire, from the previously presented AIDA-model, are representing the affective level.
As it presented earlier several previous studies (e.g. Sternthal & Craig 1973; Glb
& Pickett 1983; Belch & Belch 1984; Duncan & Nelson 1985; Lammers 1991) have shown that the use of humor enhances and improves the consumers´ attitudes towards the marketing communication message and the brand. This study also supports this argument. Several studies have also shown that consumers prefer humorous advertisements over serious advertisements. (Pornpitakpan & Tan
2000). This study supports also this argument; the funnier the advertisement was the more liked one it was.
The findings are based on a relatively small sample however this topic and the findings provide several different opportunities and ideas for future research. It can be argued that branded content will be one of the biggest topics for the next several years. If brands are not standing on their own way humorous branded content can give their endless amount of possibilities if they pay on attention how they end up utilizing humor on their target markets.
Through humorous branded content companies are able to change their brand image more youthful and desirable. Through humorous branded content companies are able to improve their brand image.