From entertainment to persuasion: how attitudes toward advertising shape responses to brand placement and television advertising.

INTRODUCTION

Embedded brand communication is increasingly encountered alongside explicit advertising, yet audience-level differences may determine which format is more persuasive.

METHODS

In a randomized online experiment, adults recruited from a United States consumer panel were assigned across seven cells representing brand placement, 30-s television advertising, combined exposure, or control for Heinz and Snapple. Participants viewed full-length sitcom content and completed multi-item measures of attitude toward advertising (AttADV), brand attitude, and purchase intention.

RESULTS

General attitudes toward brand placement were more favorable than attitudes toward conventional television advertising. Exposure format interacted with AttADV for both focal brands: at low AttADV, placement produced more favorable brand attitudes than a 30-s advertisement, whereas no statistically significant difference between formats was detected at mean or high AttADV; the study was not designed to establish equivalence at these levels. Combined exposure produced no statistically significant improvement in brand attitude or purchase intention relative to either single-exposure condition, though the study was insufficiently powered to rule out small incremental effects.

DISCUSSION: The findings support an audience-by-format account of persuasion in which embedded brand communication is most advantageous among viewers who are less receptive to conventional advertising. They also indicate that additional cross-format exposure does not necessarily yield incremental benefit. Testing the same psychological pattern across two familiar brands within full-program viewing provides a comparatively naturalistic basis for examining persuasion in increasingly integrated media environments.