THE AIETA MODEL BY EVERETTE ROGERS

The study of the behaviour of customers towards a product is very important to the advertiser; that is from the stage where a consumer hears about the product to purchase, preference and satisfaction is very crucial.

One popular model that deals with the Innovation adoption by consumers is the AIETA model. This model was propounded by Everett M. Rogers in 1962 in his book “Diffusion of Innovations”. Rogers identified that, before a new idea is accepted or before a desired change within a social system is achieved, members go through a five-step hierarchical process; Awareness, Interest, Evaluation, Trial and Adoption (AIETA).

 Awareness: consumers naturally perceive risk in using new products. They often times would not buy unless they are aware of a product’s existence. It is therefore necessary for an organization to create awareness on new products and existing brands. Current technological trends have made it easier for organizations to make their products known by adding social networking sites (facebook, twitter and the like.) to the traditional media.

Interest: After consumers  have been introduced to a product, there is the need to sustain the interest of the consumer to power him to take an action. Information advertisements such as “new Milo with Antigen E” tells the consumer what he/she stands to benefit from the product. This move helps generate interest.

Evaluation:  At this stage, the prospect consumer imagines him or herself using the product. Personal selling plays an important role here as a way of getting materials into the prospect consumer’s hands.

Trial: At the trial stage, the consumer experiments with the product on a small scale in an effort to become intimate with it and learn how to use it to his or her advantage. Sales promotion at this stage is very necessary. Advertisers must therefore create trial opportunities using samples in in demonstration. For instance, the “Omo door to door challenge”. 

Adoption: The consumer at this stage has accepted the product the product. He/she begins large scale use which hopefully leads to preference, satisfaction and repeat purchase. 

The AIETA model though widely used and seen as effective can progress rapidly or slowly Depending upon the product.

REFERENCE

Www. 5metacom.com

How the adoption model affects your sales and marketing efforts.

REASONS WHY BIG COMPANIES LIKE COCA COLA CONTINUE TO ADVERTISE

Advertising as defined by Belch and Belch is any paid form of non-personal communication about an organisation’s product, service or idea about an unidentified sponsor. Advertising in other words is defined as any form of non-personal presentation and promotion of ideas, goods and services through the mass media and with an identifiable sponsor (Bovee, 1992).

Advertising helps to create awareness, generates income, enhances sales promotion, sustain the interest of customers, establishes image of a product among other important factors for an organization. Advertising is a contributory factor to the success of most organisations.

Sometimes, one wonders why a big company like Coca Cola who has conquered the market with its products continues to advertise. Shawna Fennell referred to the book “Steal these ideas:  Marketing secrets that will make you a star” by Steve Cone on her blog page. The book discussed six reasons why a company needs to advertise.

A company continues to advertise to remind existing customers why they are customers. Sometimes, a company’s customers forget them and why they love them.  Advertising therefore serves as a reminder to old customers why the company is an amazing one and to make new customers.

Also, beyond the fact that you may have seen a lot of adverts of a particular product does not mean another has for instance on the creation of awareness of a company’s new product or change in price of a product.  Presumably, a twelve year old girl may not have heard of the company’s new product, hence the need to keep pondering their messages through advertisement.

Often times, such companies have typical commodities that can easily be replaced by another brand’s similar product hence the need to advertise to stay top of mind of consumers.

Again, loss of mind share results in loss of market share. Building brand awareness through continuous advertising is always very good way of sustaining the interest of the company’s customers.

There is also the case of building brand equality due to the brand recognition a company like coca cola gains in the event of selling the company. They would gain a better deal due the brand which has become popular due to advertisement.

Finally, big companies continue to advertise to appeal to a new market, inform and invite enquiries from consumers.

The above points clearly outline important reasons why big companies like Coca Cola must continue to advertise.

REFERENCES

·         Bovee (1992) How Advertising works.

 

Michael A. Belch and George E. Belch (2008) Advertising and Promotion: An Integrated        Marketing Communications Perspective

Shawna Fennel (April 2009) Essential Reasons To Advertise.www.practicalecommerce.com/blogs/post

THE KNOWLEDGE SOCIETY

In a knowledge society, knowledge forms a major component of any human activity. Economic, social, cultural, and all other human activities become dependent on a huge volume of  knowledge and information.

wikipedia.com

A knowledge society is one that creates, shares and uses knowledge for the prosperity and well being of its people.
www.tanedu.org

It has to do with a society in which the conditions for generating knowledge and processing information have been substantially changed by a technological revolution focused on information processing, knowledge generation, and information technologies.”
Manuel Castells vecam.org

 The concept of ‘knowledge societies’ is preferable to that of the ‘information society’ because it better captures the complexity and dynamism of the changes taking place. The knowledge in question is important not only for economic growth but also for empowering and developing all sectors of society.” 

 

THE INFORMATION SOCIETY

Information society is a term for a society in which the creation, distribution,and manipulation of infroamtion has become the most significant economic and cultural activity. It may be constrated with societies in which the economic underpinning is primarily industrial or Agrarian.
SOURCE: whatis.techtarget.com

Information society is a Post industrial society in which information technology (IT) is transfoming every aspect of cultural, political and social life and which is based on the production and distribution of information.
SOURCE: Business dictionary.

A society where communication and information technology influence the every day lives of most of its members. it is helped by the advance of the internet and technology; exchange and recieving of digital data rapidly between places despite great distances does not come with difficulty.
SOURCE: redgoldfish.co.uk

DISCOURSE

Discourse has several defnitions. In the study of language, discourse often refers to the speech patterns and usage of language, dialects, and acceptable statements, within a community.In its simplest form, a discourse is defined as the continous stretch of language to express a complete thought or an idea.
Discourse types may include: Exemplification, Naration, Description, cause and effect analysis, compare and contrast, among others.

NARRATION
Narration is retelling an incident or event. For instance; stories or commentary of a football match etc.Narration comes in two forms; Fiction and Non-fiction. Fiction deals with imaginary things e.g. fairy tales, a legend, fables, novel etc.Non fiction on the other hand deals with reporting what has happened or observable things proved in the real world. e.g. biography, journals, reviews, reports etc.

DESCRIPTION
Description aims at presenting a vivid picture or impressions of a person, object, place or even an event, etc.The purpose of description is to re-create or visually present a person, place, event, or action so that the reader may picture that which is being described.Description comes in three forms; by order of impression (how you notice them, importance (its significance), and spatial (according to location). Strong observation skills, precise informative choice, effective organization of details are factors that contribute a good descriptive piece.

EXEMPLIFICATION
Exemplification is another type of discourse that involves backing ones ideas in a piece of writing with examples or illustrating them in the form of examples.
Examples could be through personal experiences, a case study, research etc. It has a clear topic sentence and includes the writer’s opinion.

COMPARISON AND CONTRAST
In this type of discourse, details are made to show similarities and difference that exist between two or more subjects.
These subjects are always present in this case to be compared or contrasted (which is the topic). The opinion is the object of comparison or contrast.

CAUSE AND EFFECT ANALYSIS
In the cause and effect, details are given to explain why something happens (cause) or what its consequences are (effect).
Ideas are presented with facts from research about the phenomenon in question.
Like many discourse types, it has a clear topic and the writer’s opinion.

Refrence: wisegeek.com

SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE SOCIAL REPONSIBILITY AND LIBERTARIAN THEORIES.

"Social responsibility" represents an ethical responsibility that an entity or individual has towards the society. It can be negative where there is a responsibility to refrain from acting or positive where there is a responsibility to act.

Social responsibility theory refers to the expectations of the media (press) by the society. In other words how the society expects the media to perform in dispathching its duties. The media can perform in a free environment but must bear in mind the responsibility it owes to the society.

The libertarian theory arose in opposition to the authoritarian theory - an idea that placed all forms of comunication under the control of a governing elite or authority (Siebert, Peterson and Shram, 1956).
Under this theory, there is freedom of the press to the extent that no government, community or group can infringe upon the rights of the press.

A similarity can be drawn between the social reponsibility and the libertarian theories. This is that, both theories allocate some amount of freedom to the press. Thus they both have an amount of freedom in terms of expression of views.

A vast difference can also be drawn between the two theories. In the social responsibility theory, the press can remain fully free but this freedom can sometimes be controlled by the government. The media though free, is governed by some standard codes and ethics of its profession and has also got an obligation to fulfil in the society. With the libertarian theory, the media has no rules guiding its profession and is therefore has total freedom in the expression of its views and expression.

Under both theories, the media is privately owned but under the social responsibility, there is a level of governmental influence.

The media censors the type of information it presents to the public making sure it fosters national development under the social responsibility theory. Contrary to this, the libertaian thoery does not regard information censorship.

Sources:
*STANLEY J. BARAN & DENNIS K. DAVIES ( Mass communication Theory)
*WIKIPEDIA