Language adaptation and advertising effectiveness: a study in a multi-cultural advertising context

Abstract

The Indian television Advertising appears to predominantly standardize its creative strategy and a large part of the creative execution, allowing only localization of the language of the message to regional tastes. Systematic research to understand the effectiveness of language adaptation is missing in advertising literature. The language of the adapted television commercial (now on TVC) may interact with the other executional elements in the TVC, and this study analyzes the overall effectiveness of the TVC in the light of such interactions. Four kinds of TVCs are considered: celebrity endorsement, non-celebrity (typical) endorsement, music-based, and humorous. The direction and strength of the relationship between language adaptation and the effectiveness of these elements (celebrity, noncelebrity, music and humor) are hypothesized. These hypotheses are tested using experimental design methodology.