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The value of creativity is subject to longstanding debate and recent reports highlight how marketers are increasingly growing skeptical of advertising creativity and decreasing their investments in it. This paper outlines why doing so is a mistake and how marketers can get the most out of their investments in advertising creativity.
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Marketing Communications; Marketing Strategy
Full Citation:
Rosengreen, Sara, Martin Eisend, Scott Koslow, and Micael Dahlen (2020), “A Meta-Analysis of When and How Advertising Creativity Works” Journal of Marketing
Article Abstract:
Although creativity is often considered a key success factor in advertising, the marketing literature lacks a systematic empirical account of when and how advertising creativity works. The authors use a meta-analysis to synthesize the literature on advertising creativity and test different theoretical explanations for its effects. The analysis covers 93 data sets taken from 67 papers that provide 878 effect sizes. The results show robust positive effects but also highlight the importance of considering both originality and appropriateness when investing in advertising creativity. Moderation analyses show that the effects of advertising creativity are stronger for high- (vs. low-) involvement products, and that the effects on ad (but not brand) reactions are marginally stronger for unfamiliar brands. An empirical test of theoretical mechanisms shows that affect transfer, processing, and signaling jointly explain these effects, and that originality mainly leads to affect transfer, whereas appropriateness leads to signaling. The authors also call for further research connecting advertising creativity with sales and studying its effects in digital contexts..
Kelly Gullo and Holly Howe, Ph.D. candidates at Duke University supported the authors teams with submissions to this program.
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Sara Rosengren is Professor, Center for Retailing, Stockholm School of Economics, Sweden.
Martin Eisend is Professor, Marketing Department, European University Viadrina, Germany.
Scott Koslow is Professor, Department of Marketing, Macquarie University, Australia.
Micael Dahlen is Professor, Center for Consumer Marketing, Stockholm School of Economics, Sweden.