Determinants of successful sports advertisements: The effects of advertisement type, product type and sports model

The first objective of this study is to investigate whether consumers' advertisement preference is influenced by their degree of participation in, as well as their attitudes towards, sport. The relationships among preferences for advertisements and products and consumers' desire to purchase are also explored. Secondly, the study seeks to determine the role of product involvement in favouring particular advertisement types and increasing purchase intention. Thirdly, the practical implications for the use of athletes as models in advertisements in order to increase the effectiveness of sports advertisements are addressed. A survey was conducted of 200 college students from three universities in Seoul and Kyonggi-do. Pre-testing was used to validate the survey instrument and then experimental stimuli were prepared and tested against subjects. Sports participation, sports preference and lifestyle were found to affect advertisement preference. People with active lifestyles were more interested in sports advertisements than people with non-active lifestyles. Secondly, advertisement preference was found to influence product preference. Advertisements featuring products and athletes were found to be preferred to advertisements featuring products only. Thirdly, the product purchase intention was found to be influenced more when the advertisement featured both the product and an athlete, compared to when it featured the product only.