Communicus is an international advertising research firm that has contributed significantly to the field of advertising, and to the body of learning about advertising. Through its use of the longitudinal design for

advertising research Advertising research is a systematic process of marketing research conducted to improve the efficiency of advertising. Advertising research is a detailed study conducted to know how customers respond to a particular ad or advertising campaign. Hi ...

, the company produces evidence that advertising does, in fact, work and that its impact can be measured.

Longitudinal design

While the longitudinal design has long been used in the scientific community as a way of overcoming the problems inherent in cross-sectional or matched sample studies, Communicus has pioneered its use in the field of advertising research. The design allows researchers to study a targeted population and identify the changes that advertising produces among those with proved awareness of the advertising as compared to the changes that occur among those who are not aware of the advertising. For the analysis to be successful, the researcher must be able to accurately divide the longitudinal panel into those who have seen the advertising in-market versus those who have not. The methods used by Communicus to determine prior advertising awareness were originally developed based on experimental work done by the Advertising Research Foundation in the PARM studies and were later expanded by a consortium of advertisers organized by Seymour Smith and Associates that included

AT&T AT&T Inc., an abbreviation for its predecessor's former name, the American Telephone and Telegraph Company, is an American multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered at Whitacre Tower in Downtown Dallas, Texas. It is the w ...

DuPont Dupont, DuPont, Du Pont, duPont, or du Pont may refer to: People * Dupont (surname) Dupont, also spelled as DuPont, duPont, Du Pont, or du Pont is a French surname meaning "of the bridge", historically indicating that the holder of the surname re ...

and

Coca-Cola Coca-Cola, or Coke, is a cola soft drink manufactured by the Coca-Cola Company. In 2013, Coke products were sold in over 200 countries and territories worldwide, with consumers drinking more than 1.8 billion company beverage servings ...

. The measurement technique involves limited recognition cues that access one's

long-term memory Long-term memory (LTM) is the stage of the Atkinson–Shiffrin memory model in which informative knowledge is held indefinitely. It is defined in contrast to sensory memory, the initial stage, and short-term or working memory, the second stage ...

. The cues are matched to the way memories for that particular medium are stored— for example, cues that trigger one’s

episodic memory Episodic memory is the memory of everyday events (such as times, location geography, associated emotions, and other contextual information) that can be explicitly stated or conjured. It is the collection of past personal experiences that occurred ...

are used to access memories of TV commercials, while visual cues are used to access memories of magazine ads. The results of these studies can be used by the advertiser to estimate the

Return on Investment Return on investment (ROI) or return on costs (ROC) is the ratio between net income (over a period) and investment (costs resulting from an investment of some resources at a point in time). A high ROI means the investment's gains compare favorab ...

(ROI) generated by the advertising, and to make changes to the campaign that are designed to improve future effectiveness and ROI.

Communicus Case Studies

BMW Case Study
Fallon, Pat, and Senn, Fred. Juicing the Orange: How to Turn Creativity into a Powerful Business Advantage. Boston: Pat Fallon and Fred Senn, 2006: p. 139.
Chevron Case Studies
Winters, Lewis C. “Does it Pay to Advertise to Hostile Audiences with Corporate Advertising?” Journal of Advertising Research. June/July 1988.
Rydholm, Joseph. “Campaigning for the outdoors.” Quirk’s Market Research Review. March 2000.

References

{{reflist Companies based in Tucson, Arizona Market research companies of the United States Advertising agencies of the United States Marketing companies established in 1992 1992 establishments in Arizona