互聯(lián)網(wǎng)用戶統(tǒng)計數(shù)據(jù)和用戶對網(wǎng)絡(luò)廣告的反應(yīng)畢業(yè)論文外文翻譯

1、ABSTRACTMany have speculated about the current state of Internet advertising(IA), how it compares to advertising in general (GA), and its implicationsfor traditional marketing models and practices. Although many estimatesexist regarding who uses the Internet as well as guidelines about how bestto de

2、sign IA, little is known about Internet usersattitudestoward IA,much less whatcharacterizes these attitudes. Totest this,a nationalsample of over400 participants with at least some exposure totheInternet was surveyed. The results revealed no majority opinion of IA:approximately a thirdof respondents

3、 liked, disliked, and felt neutrallytoward IA, respectively. A regression analysis indicated that enjoyment oflooking at Internet advertisements, its informativeness, and its utility formaking behavioral (purchasing) decisions contributed to participantsattitudes toward IA. Enjoyment of looking at I

4、A contributed the most toattitudes toward IA,yet at the same time appears to be one ofIA sweakest features. Inorder to assess whether attitudes towardandperceptions of IA might reflect attitudes toward advertising in general bythis demographic group, rather than attitudes toward IA per se, responses

5、were compared to those of a demographically weighted-to-match nationalsample of over 1,000 who answered similar questions inregard toadvertising in general. The results indicate that more respondents foundIA to be informativeand trustworthy than a demographically similarsample found GA. Even though

6、the attitudes and perceptions of IA andGA were significantly different, the structure of GA and IA attitudes wasthe same. Implications for the design of IA are discussed.The Internet as a marketing medium offers many unique challenges tomarketers. To assist marketers in their venture on-line, compar

7、isons andcontrasts to existingmarketingtheory have been used tobuild aconceptual understanding of thecurrent state ofthe Internetand itsimplications for consumer transactions (cf., Hoffman and Novak, 1996a;Hoffman, Novak and Chatterjee, 1995; Schlosser and Kanfer, forthcoming). To further understand

8、 the commercial possibilities of theInternet, several internet usage surveys have been conducted to document consumers behavior online (the most notable being GVU, 1999 and the HERMES project by Gupta, 1995; see Hoffman, Kalsbeek, and Novak,1996, for a review). Yet,in terms of assessing the commerci

9、aleffectiveness of the Internet and the value of Internet advertising, mostresearch has concentrated upon the companysrather than consumers point of view (Berthon, Pitt,and Watson, 1996). As a result, manydecisions regardingInternetadvertising(IA)arebeing made withrelatively little specificknowledge

10、 about consumers attitudes toward IAand how the structure of these IAattitudes compare to the structure ofattitudes toward advertising in traditional media. The aim of the currentresearch is to examine consumers perceptions and judgments of IA.Consumers attitudes towardadvertisinghave been considere

11、dimportant to track because they likely influence consumers exposure, attention, and reaction to individual ads (cf. Alwitt and Prabhakar, 1992)through a variety of cognitive and affective processes (Lutz, 1985). One fundamental difference between Internet and traditional advertising is the degree t

12、o which the consumer versus the company has control over advertising exposure. With traditional advertising, consumers play a relatively inactive role in exposure. Advertisements interrupt or intercept consumers attention to other information (e.g, a television program, aradio show, or traffic signs

13、). In essence, advertisements arethem. With many forms of IA, however, the consumer has a great deal ofcontrolover advertising exposure. The company may request theconsumers attention (e.g., through banner ads on others Web sites or“ puthrough hyperlinks), but it is up to the consumer to seek additi

14、onal commercial content. Consumers can select whether, when, and how much commercial content they wish to view. That is, consumers “pull for” electronic advertising content. Because IA exposure is largely under theconsumer s volition, it is particularly important to understand the valence and struct

15、ure of one important driver of advertising exposure: attitudes toward IA.WHAT IS IA?According to consumers, IA includes many forms of commercial content from electronic advertisements that are similar to traditional advertisements (e.g., billboards, banner ads) to formats that are different from tra

16、ditional advertisements, such as corporate Web sites (Ducoffe, 1996). Thus, it appears that there are idiosyncratic differences in consumers perceptions of what constitutes IA such that any specific definition of IA is likely to be a bad fit for measuring IA perceptions. Because the goal of the pres

17、ent research is to assess consumer perceptions of IA, IA is described broadly as any form of commercial content available on the Internet that is designed by businesses to inform consumers about a product or service. Hence, IA can be delivered via any channel (e.g., video clip, print or audio), in a

18、ny form (e.g., an e-mail message or an interactive game), and provide information at any degree of depth (e.g, a corporate logo or an official Web site).BACKGROUND ON IADespite the limited understanding of how consumers judge IA, there has been substantial commercial growth on the Internet of many f

19、orms of advertising, resulting in an estimated 1996 revenue of $301 million, with a projected growth to $7.7 billion by 2002 (Jupiter Communications, 1997). Indeed, spending on IA totaled an estimated $129 million in the first quarter of 1997 (Cyberatlas, 1997), with an estimated 92% increase in IA

20、spending for top 25 industries during the first quarter of 1998 (Cyberatlas, 1998). In addition to anticipating the monetary growth of the Internet, the majority of on-line businesses believe the Internet is here to stay and will generate sales in the future (Grant Thorton, 1997).Furthermore, the ad

21、option curve for the Internet is quite steep, especially in comparison to other media introduced in this century (radio, television, cable; Morgan Stanley Technology research cited in Internet Advertising Bureau, 1997). Thus, as many have predicted, investment in IA is likely to escalate into the bi

22、llions as we enter the next millennium (cf.Cyberatlas, 1997).Studies of consumers reactions to IAtypicallyhave quantifiedcustomers judgments of Web sites in terms of consumers behavioral traces at the site (i.e., counting the number of “ clicks and” “ hits cf”.Berthon, Pitt, and Watson, 1996). These

23、 measures have been shown toboth overestimate and underestimate the number of visitors and exposures, however (cf. Internet Advertising Bureau, 1997; Riphagen and Kanfer, 1997). Moreover, the indirect nature of these methods makes it difficult to ascertain the meaning behind the results (e.g., wheth

24、er clicking on a link was an accident or intended behavior, and whether the loaded site satisfied the consumer expectations). Coinciding with the growth in IA, there has been a plethora of guidelines about how to bestreach and persuade the consumer market with the Internet (see, for review, Schlosse

25、r and Kanfer, 1999a). Many of these recommendations have beenbased upon assumptions (rather than actual assessments) of how consumers react to IA relative to GA. Relatively little is known about how consumers judge Internet advertising and which components make up these attitudes.ATTITUDESTOWARDS AD

26、VERTISING IN GENERALPublic attitudes toward advertising in general have long been a focusof research (see Mittal, 1994; O Donohoe, 1995; Pollay and Mittal, 1993;Zanot, 1984; Zanot, 1984 for reviews). According to Zanot (1981, 1984), the first large scale, national surveys of public opinion about adv

27、ertising date back to the 1950s and 1960s (Bauer and Greyser, 1968; Gallup, 1959). Many recent studies have also been conducted (e.g., Alwitt and Prabhakar, 1992; Alwitt and Prabhaker, 1994; Andrews, 1989; Mittal,1994; Muehling, 1987; O Donohoe, 1995; Reidey,and1982;Sol Sandageand Leckenby, 1980; Sh

28、avittLowrey and Haefner, 1998) but most of these have been more focused upon investigating the structure of advertising attitudes rather than the general ability of overall attitude favorability.Although the studies on advertising attitudes have varied widely inthe types of samples used and the data

29、 collection methods employed, theyhave focused upon many of the same dimensions of judgment. Respondents typically have been asked not only about their overall attitudes toward advertisememts but also their perceptions of advertising trustworthiness, offensiveness, informativeness,entertainment valu

30、e, and effect on product prices and value, as well as attitudes toward regulatory issues.Early surveys of advertising attitudes yielded somewhat favorable, albeit mixed, results. Gallup (1959) found that a majority of their respondents generally liked advertising and that most of those respondents l

31、iked it because they felt it was informative. They also found that a majority of respondents preferred advertised products over unadvertised products, although most also felt that advertising increased the cost of things they buy. Bauer and Greyser (1968) found that more people held favorable attitu

32、des toward advertising than unfavorable attitudes and that a majority of respondents felt advertising was essential. Still, a majority of their respondents felt that advertisements were misleading and that they resulted in higher prices.Zanot (1981, 1984) argued that, beginning in the 1970s, attitud

33、es toward advertising were becoming increasingly negative. For example, Harris and Associates (1976) found that a majority of respondents felt that most or all of television advertising was seriously misleading and favored a new federal government agency for consumer advocacy. More recent studies ha

34、ve generally focused on attitude structure and, thus, have used smaller and less nationally representative sampling frames to investigate specific hypotheses. These results have typically provided arather unfavorable assessment of public attitudes toward advertising (e.g., Alwitt and Prabhaker, 1992

35、; Alwitt and Prabhaker, 1994; Andrews, 1989; Mittal, 1994; but see Shavitt et al., 1998, for a more favorable picture of public sentiment from a large, national sample).Although some of these studies have provided information about attitudes toward advertising in a particular medium (e.g., televisio

36、n: Alwitt and Prabhaker, 1992; Alwitt and Prabhaker, 1994; Mittal, 1994), none of them specifically addressesattitudes toward advertising on the Internet.CONSUMER RESPONSE TO INTERNET ADVERTISINGMost of the direct-response measures administered to consumers have assessed consumers perceptions and us

37、age of the Internetservicesandits. For instance, research has explored consumers attitudes toward on-line services (Miller, 1996) and purchasing online (Gupta, 1995; GVU, 1999); Web usage (Gupta, 1995; GVU, 1999; Hammonds, 1997; Hoffman,Kalsbeek and Novak, 1996) and recall of the sites visited (Diaz

38、, Hammond and McWilliam, 1996); actions taken toward intrustive advertising or SPAM (GVU, 1999); effect of banner ads on brandjudgments (Briggs and Hollis, 1997); attitudes toward Internet advertising policies (Gordon and De Lima-Turner, forthcoming); and awareness of the Internet itself (Fawcett, 1

39、995). Yet, relatively less is known about consumers evaluations of IA specifically.In an important exception, Mehta and Sivadas (1995) assessedInternet user attitudes toward advertising on newsgroups and through e-mail. They found that consumers held negative attitudes toward newsgroup and e-mail ad

40、vertising, even when the message was directlyrelevant to the special interests of the group. However, their sample was limited to those who posted messagesto the group. Those who merely read messages were not included in the sample. As a result, it is possible that these unfavorable attitudes are du

41、e to this vocal sample s pethat they are competing with electronic advertisements for the group s attention. In addition, attitudes toward newsgroup/e-mail advertising maynot generalize to all forms of IA, including less intrusive ads (such as Web sites). Consequently, it is unclear whether the resu

42、lts would generalize to the entire Internet population attitudes toward IA in its many forms.Another notable exception is research conducted by Ducoffe (1996)studying the antecedents of consumer s attitudes toward Web advertising.It was found that a sample of 318 business executives in New York City

43、perceived Web advertising to be generally informative and entertaining,although more informative than entertaining. This is consistent withfindings regarding people s perceptions of the Web in general (Diaz et al.,1996). Furthermore, in contrast to attitudinal findings toward e-mailadvertising (Meht

44、a and Sivadas, 1995), the interviewed executives found Web advertising to be useful, valuable and important. Although these previous findings on attitudes toward e-mail and Web advertising shed light upon the Internet population ttitudes towards specific types of IA,a larger and more representative

45、sample as well as an examination of IA in general would be useful. Indeed, both Ducoffe (1996) and Mehta andSivadas (1995) call for broader sampling framesUnderstanding the factors that underlie IAattitudes would also beimportant for both theory development andappliedgoals. Ducoffedemonstratedthaten

46、tertainment,informativeness,andirritationinfluenced attitudes toward Web advertising. The idea that affective(entertainment, irritation)and cognitive (informativeness) experienceswith Web advertising contribute to people s judgments of Web advertisinis consistent with other attitudinal models such a

47、s the tripartite theory ofattitudes. Yetthe tripartite theory proposes athird factor, behavioralexperiences, whichmaycontributeto people attitudes(Katz andStotland, 1959; Rosenberg and Hovland, 1960; see Eagly and Chaiken, 1993, for a theoretical and historical overview of this model). Hence, theuti

48、lity of IA for making decisions (a behavioral experience) may also drive people s attitudes toward IA.Some have assumed that the underlying structure of IA attitudes reflects the structure of attitudes toward advertising in general (Ducoffe, 1995; Eighmey, 1997). Yet it is also plausible that the un

49、ique characteristics of the Internet might cause the underlying structure of attitudes toward IA and GA to differ. For instance, because it is used primarily as an information- providing medium (see Schlosser and Kanfer, 1999), IA might elicit attitudes that are mostly comprised of cognitive factors

50、especially in comparison with attitudes toward advertising in general. Such variations have implications for how practitioners alter Internet ads (as opposed to traditional advertising) in order to improve IA attitudes. Thus, one goal of the present research is to determine which dimensions underlie

51、 (and to what degree they explain variance in) attitudes toward IA.INTERNET USER DEMOGRAPHICS AND CONSUMER RESPONSE TOWARD IADespite the lack of consistency across reports of the Internet population s demographic profile, there appears to be consensus that the Internet population is predominantly ma

52、le, young, well educated, and affluent (for a longitudinal study of Internet user demographics beginningin 1994, see GVU, 1999). Such demographic characteristics also appear to affect attitudes toward advertising. That is, previous research has demonstrated that gender, age (Shavitt, et al., 1998),

53、education and income (Alwitt and Prabhaker, 1992; Shavitt et al., 1998) impact consumers judgments of and beliefs about advertising. For instance, according to a recent survey, better-educated, wealthier consumers hold less favorable attitudes toward advertising than less-educated, lower-income cons

54、umers do (Shavitt, et al., 1998). Based on demographics alone, this would suggest that the Internet population would judge advertising (in general andon the Internet) relativelyunfavorably.In order to gauge whether attitudes toward IA can be attributed to the unique demographic profile of Internet u

55、sers rather than advertising on the Internet per se, IA judgments will be compared to the GA judgments of a sample weighted to match the demographics of the Internet respondents. If the results are due to the demographic composition of Internet users rather than how IA is uniquely perceived relative

56、 to traditional advertising, then the judgments and perceptions of IA and GA should be similar across these demographically matched samples.RESEARCH OBJECTIVESThe objectives of the present research are to address three questions:What are consumers attitudes toward IA? (2) How does this compare to a

57、demographically similar samples perceptions of advertising in general? and (3) Which dimensions underlie and to what degree do they contribute to IA attitudes? We address these issues with a large and representative (of an Internet population) national sampleMETHODOLOGYSampling ProceduresThe survey

58、was conducted in the summer of 1996. Two nationally representative samples were drawn from a list balanced by estimated telephone households. The survey was conducted via a computer-assisted telephone interviewing (CATI) system. Prospective respondents were called back up to three times if they coul

59、d not be reached initially. CATI technology provides a number of advantages in survey data collection, enabling the use of randomly ordered questions and complex skip patterns in the survey protocol (Sudman and Bradburn, 1982).Prospective respondents were screened for age and for media usage. Only t

60、hose between the ages of 18 and 64 were surveyed. The samples were screened for their Internet access and usage. Prospectiverespondents in Sample 1 (N =201) were included if they indicated that they personally had access to and used the Internet or World Wide Web. In order to assure a substantial re