Concentrating on the changes in the assortment of the clothes in the line for men, Old Navy developed a new promotion strategy in order to attract the male target audience and influence the men’s purchasing behavior. Old Navy’s new promotion strategy is based on providing the advertisements with the help of online videos which can be watched in the Internet, and they are also available with the help of the modern mobile devices.
The choice of the medium to promote the new line of the clothes for men depends on the development of the contemporary trends in marketing and advertising and on the recent researches in the fields. The marketers of Old Navy chose to attract the 25-35-year-old male audience with the help of the gender-oriented video advertisements based on the ironical content.
The target audience of the new advertising campaign provided by Old Navy is young adult males whose age is between 25 and 35 years. The marketers’ choice can be discussed as rather controversial because of the opinions that the target audience of the advertisements which present definite clothes brands is often women.
However, Old Navy has conducted the research which results support the idea that today men are inclined to purchase definite items without women’s help (Behind the campaign, 2011). That is why, the orientation to the potential customers can be discussed as more effective than the orientation to the other public which can be interested in the products. In this situation women cannot be discussed as the target audience of the products which are promoted with the help of the Old Navy’s advertising campaign.
Nevertheless, in spite of the fact the direct orientation to the potential users of the products can become a rather effective promotion strategy, the problem is in the fact the real target audience of the advertisements with the help of which the male clothes is promoted also includes women. Women are traditionally discussed as the target audience of the clothes brands in spite of the division into female and male lines.
Thus, the marketers of Old Navy chose the progressive variant to determine the target audience of the products, and attract men as the customers whose purchasing behavior should be formed, but it is also necessary to focus on the traditional vision of the target audience within the industry. From this point, it is also important to refer to the women’s expectations from the presented products and their advertising.
The mobile media were chosen by Old Navy for providing the video advertisements. The marketers have discussed the modern tendencies according to which the young people of the age between 25 and 35 years prefer to get the information with the help of their mobile devices than with the help of television as the source. The young people who are 25-35-year-old are discussed in contemporary marketing as Millennials (Digital marketing, 2012).
Thus, this group of potential consumers should be examined with references to their reaction to advertising and to their expectations from the products promoted. Millennials are considered as the audience which cannot be persuaded with the help of traditional advertising strategies. To attract the attention of these young people to the definite product, it is necessary to use the source of information which is actively utilized by these persons.
From this point, TV advertisements cannot be discussed as effective in relation to this target audience because Millennials do not watch TV a lot, and they do not rely on the information presented in TV advertisements (Digital marketing, 2012). Discussing the situation from this perspective, it is possible to note that the decision to use online video advertisements which can be accessed with the help of mobile devices can be considered as the successful variant to reach the necessary audience.
Young men often use mobile devices, and they pay more attention to the information presented with the help of online video. That is why, the marketers’ assumptions were based on the idea that today mobile or digital media are more effective for attracting the potential consumers and forming their purchasing behavior.
The orientation to the potential consumers’ interests and habits is important in product marketing. Thus, these aspects and the marketers’ assumptions can be discussed as valid. However, the orientation to one main source in promoting definite products is not as successful as the usage of different methods or media.
It is possible to recommend developing the advertisements for the other media, as it is stated about the products’ promotion in publications (Behind the campaign, 2011). In spite of the fact it is significant to meet the interests of the determined target audience and reach it with the media familiar for them, it is also possible to determine the larger circle of the potential consumers and their interests in relation to the used sources of information.
To attract the target male audience, Old Navy has developed the creative campaign the effectiveness of which can be discussed from several perspectives. Having analyzed the role of the gender-neutral and gender-specific advertisements, the company’s marketers concentrated on gender-specific advertisements developed for drawing the men’s attention to the brand (Want to reach male shoppers?, 2011).
However, the reaction to the creative campaign based on the humorous content can be different. The marketers attract the audience’s attention to the fact that they chose to influence the male purchasing behavior directly because men know what they want to buy, and it is possible to draw their attention to the brand using video advertisements accessible with the help of mobile devices.
Nevertheless, the accent should be made on the fact that men know what they want to buy, and extremely creative advertisements can prevent the audience from concentrating on a product itself. The positive feature of Old Navy’s advertisements the content of which depends on humor is in attractiveness of the video for the audience because of the interesting content which can evoke definite positive emotions.
Humor and irony are often used in advertisements in order to stimulate the consumers’ reaction to the product and form their purchasing behavior. Nevertheless, the usage of humor in advertisements can influence the process of promotion negatively because of the content misinterpretation, the developed social stereotypes and prejudice, and because of the negative associations.
It is possible to propose the modifications to the chosen concept in order to decrease the possibility of evoking negative emotions and associations. Thus, it is necessary to avoid the aspects which provoke the controversial discussions within the society. In this case, it is the extreme concentration on men with the female qualities. Moreover, the overuse of humor in the advertisement prevents people from focusing on the promoted product because this product is rather difficult to be determined.
References
Behind the campaign: Old Navy goes after men in new ad push. (2011). Web.
Digital marketing works better for millennials than TV. (2012). Web.
Want to reach male shoppers? Target their phones. (2011). Web.