All
Talk. They’ll Listen. television ads were researched among parents through a number of qualitative and quantitative studies in order to ensure that they were clearly communicating the intended main message and that they were effective in motivating parents to talk with their children about not smoking.
1 During the development of
Talk. They’ll Listen. television advertisements, qualitative and quantitative research was also conducted with adolescents aged 10-17 with their parent’s permission. While not the intended audience of the
Talk. They’ll Listen. TV advertisements, Philip Morris USA’s Youth Smoking Prevention department recognizes that there is the potential for adolescents to be exposed to the ads on TV. As a result, research was conducted with adolescents in order to confirm that the message and intended audience of each ad was clear and that there were no unintended take-away messages.
1Our research strongly indicates that the
Talk. They’ll Listen. TV ads were effective at communicating clearly that parents should talk to their kids about not smoking and, in turn, that they were effective at generating these parent-child conversations about not smoking. Additionally, our research indicates that youth understood the main message and intended audience of these ads and unintended take-away messages were generally not present.
1
During the development of new
Talk. They’ll Listen. TV advertisements, qualitative research was conducted with parents at several stages of development and production. At the concepts phase of qualitative research, groups of parents were exposed to a number of potential new ad concepts in order to aid in the selection of the most effective and engaging concepts and to further refine the selected ad concepts for filming and production. Once the ads were filmed, they were presented to parents as “rough cuts” during a second phase of qualitative research.
1Final qualitative research conducted for
Talk. They’ll Listen. TV ads that aired indicated that the ads clearly communicated the main message that parents should talk to their kids about not smoking, and that the ads were motivating for parents and served as effective reminders for them to talk or talk again to their children about not smoking cigarettes.
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Prior to releasing an ad to be aired on TV, pre-market quantitative research was conducted via one-on-one interviews with a larger, more representative sample of parents in order to confirm the findings from the qualitative research. The objective of this research was to measure the clarity of the ad’s message, the call to action (influence the ad has on initiation of conversation about not smoking), and likes/dislikes. Pre-market quantitative research studies conducted for all
Talk. They’ll Listen. TV ads that were tested and aired since the inception of the campaign indicated that:
1,3- Between 99 percent and 100 percent of all parent respondents correctly identified the main message of each general market Talk. They’ll Listen. TV ad that aired (e.g., parents and children should talk about not smoking, encourages parent-child communications, kids should not smoke, and/or other positive non-smoking or parental influence messaging).
- Parent respondents also recalled additional positive messages specific to the executions. Some examples include:
- Future Dreams – Kids will grow up healthier if they don’t smoke
- Makeup – Set a good example; kids copy parents
- Advice – Parents should (also) listen when their kids talk to them
- A minimum of 85 percent of parents responded that as a result of seeing each ad, they would be likely to have a conversation about not smoking with their children.4
- A minimum of 85 percent of parents responded that they liked the ad “very much” or “somewhat” (top two box on a four-point scale). In addition to the main message, each ad was appreciated for different aspects specific to the execution. Some examples include:
- 10 O’clock – Shows family communicating and interacting and having a good close relationship
- Reactions – The kids’ reactions are true to life/typical
- Baseball – Shows dad bonding/spending time with his kids, helping his kids
In order to evaluate the impact of
Talk. They’ll Listen. TV ads that aired, post-market quantitative research was conducted. These ad tracking studies were conducted immediately following each flight of
Talk. They’ll Listen TV ads via a random-digit-dial telephone survey among parents in the intended audience. Results from these studies indicated that:
1,5- Awareness of any Talk. They’ll Listen. TV ad was at least 50 percent and reached a peak of 61 percent in December 2005 and June 2006.
- Among those parent respondents who were aware of a Talk. They’ll Listen. TV ad, up to 61 percent of parents reported having talked to their children about not smoking as a result of seeing the ad. This conversation level was at least 41 percent (December 2003) but has never been lower than 54 percent for the last campaign (“Best Times” and “Reflections”).
Qualitative research with 11- to 17-year-olds with their parent’s permission conducted for the last
Talk. They’ll Listen. TV ads “Best Times” and “Reflections” revealed that youth respondents clearly understood the main message that parents should talk to their kids about not smoking.
2Pre-market quantitative research with 10- to 17-year-olds has revealed that:
3- 100% percent and 99 percent of youth respondents correctly identified the main message of “Best Times” and “Reflections” (respectively) by responding that the ad is telling parents they should talk to their kids about not smoking, or that the ad is conveying some other positive non-smoking message (e.g., kids should not smoke). Across all Talk. They’ll Listen. TV ads that were tested and aired, between 96 percent and 100 percent of youth respondents who correctly identified parents as the intended audience of the ads also correctly identified each ad’s main message.
- The vast majority of youth respondents identified parents (either “parents only” or “parents and kids”) as the intended audience of “Best Times” and “Reflections” (91 percent and 93 percent respectively). Across all Talk. They’ll Listen. TV ads that were tested and aired, between 75 percent and 93 percent of all youth respondents identified parents as the intended audience of each ad.
