Lesson 15 — Activity 4: Analyzing Advertising Content in the Online World

You have now looked at both print and audiovisual media and the kind of advertising shown on these mediums. Let’s look at one more medium.

This medium is unlike any other in its ability to target and engage consumers. This is the Internet.

Let's look specifically at how advertisers target children and young people on the Internet. How is the Internet different from television? Look at the chart below for some differences regarding advertising to children.

Image courtesy of www.pixabay.com

Television:

• The Canadian television industry has standards for advertising to children. Advertisers must not pressure or mislead children; they are not allowed to exaggerate product characteristics; they can't directly urge children to buy a product or service, or ask their parents to buy it for them; and advertising alcohol and tobacco products to minors is forbidden.
• Television advertising engages children only as passive consumers who just watch and listen.
• Advertising on television has a certain "look and feel," which children quickly learn to recognize. The sound level even goes up when a commercial comes on.
• Traditional marketing tools such as Nielsen surveys may give advertisers a general idea of their audience profile, in terms of age and maybe gender. But individual children are anonymous.

Internet:

• Advertising is largely unregulated, and knows no national boundaries. In other words, almost anything goes!
• The Internet engages children interactively, allowing them to react to the content provided by the marketer and participate in online environments.
• Internet marketing is so blended into the content of a website that the lines are blurred between advertising, entertainment, and information.
• Internet marketers are able to collect data about specific users, through the use of online registration forms, quizzes, and surveys — or through computer "cookies," electronic tattletales that track where kids surf, how long they stay there, and what they download.

You can see the differences between the two mediums.

As well, researchers have noted that online users enter what is called a "flow-state," a mental state that people enter when they become totally absorbed in an activity, such as surfing the Internet or playing a video game. When in this state of mind, it has been shown that people become extremely receptive to messages and images. It is no wonder that advertisers want to use this medium!

Image courtesy of GettyImages

Other factors that make the Internet attractive to advertisers who wish to target young people include:

• kids spend large amounts of time going online
• kids are often online without parental supervision
• kids today have tremendous spending power
• kids tend to accept much of the information they see online

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