SCHEMA CONGRUITY – A BASIS FOR EVALUATING AMBIENT ADVERTISING EFFECTIVENESS

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to develop a theoretical basis for evaluating ambient advertising in relation to the schema. Ambient advertising, a creative form of out-of-home advertising that conveys direct and contextual messages by using and often altering existing elements of the environment in a way that surprises the target audience, appears to be a solution to the increasing clutter from the media. This study draws on the schema congruity theory to offer a better understanding of how consumers are processing information received from advertisements. Schemas are organized structures of knowledge and expectations that consumers develop in order to categorize the incoming information, and that they access every time they are experiencing a new situation. The schema-based approach is important in understanding consumer behavior because consumers are facing an environment filled with similar brands and products promoted by ads that sound and look alike. According to schema congruity theory information perceived as schema congruent offers a confortable feeling of familiarity and generates limited cognitive processing, whereas schema incongruent information generates surprise and triggers extensive cognitive processing in order to help individual make sense of the unusual situation. Taking into consideration the combination of the different levels of expectancy and relevancy there have been identified three congruency situations: extreme congruity, moderate incongruity and extreme incongruity. Existing research shows that moderate incongruent information offers the best results in recall and recognition and also the highest affect levels compared to extreme congruity and extreme incongruity. Based on evidence from literature this study attempts to position ambient advertising in the moderate incongruity category, thus theoretically proving the assumed effectiveness of this promotional tool. Therefore, this paper is a starting point in bringing the light in the under-researched field of ambient advertising and can offer a theoretical basis for future empirical research on the effectiveness of this promotional tool.

Keywords

• advertising, ambient advertising, schema, schema congruity theory, clutter, consumer behavior