AN ASSESSMENT OF FACEBOOK AND RADIO ADVERTISEMENTS ON THE PURCHASING HABITS OF GODFREY OKOYE UNIVERSITY STUDENTS

AN ASSESSMENT OF FACEBOOK AND RADIO ADVERTISEMENTS ON THE PURCHASING HABITS OF GODFREY OKOYE UNIVERSITY STUDENTS

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this research study was an assessment of radio and facebook advertisements on the purchasing habits of godfrey okoye university students. Anchored on the uses and gratification theory, social relationship theory and source credibility theory, the objectives of the study was structured to determine the extent to which undergraduates youths are exposed to advertisements on Radio and Facebook, to ascertain the media channels preferred by undergraduate youths for advertising information and to determine the media channels which better influences the purchasing decision of undergraduate youths.  The study adopted the survey research method with a sample size of 317 to arrive at its findings. The findings reveal that Facebook advertisements has a higher influence on the purchasing habits of undergraduate youths. The study among others findings concludes that youths are more exposed to advertisements on Facebook more than Radio and that the diffusion and adoption of New media among youths is increasing at a fast pace.  The study recommends that broadcast media especially radio should increase their presence online in order to accommodate the new generation of digitalized youths. It also recommends the presence of gate keepers on Facebook to help filter information especially advertisement information that are not genuine

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1. 1. BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

Information is the oil that drives the wheel of socialization and human development. Human beings as integral components of the society depend on it, probably to know the government policies and how it affects them or it could as well revolve around some elementary issues such as sports and entertainment.  Like a popular aphorism will posit: “a person who is uninformed is deformed.”

Advertising is the publicizing of goods and services in order to achieve higher sales. According to Kennedy(2017) says that advertising is salesmanship in print and  Presbrey (2017)could not agree less, to him advertising is a printed ,oral and illustrated art of selling. Similarly Advertising Practitioners’ of Nigeria (1993),advertising is a form of communication through media about products ,services and ideas paid for by an identified sponsor. Advertisements could be carried through the traditional media which includes radio, television, billboards etc and the new media which includes Facebook , Instagram ,twitter etc which usually has a higher population of young users, we also have different categories of mass media audience but for the purpose of this research we will be looking at the active audience. According to Okunna (2012) an active audience chooses which medium they expose themselves to ,they are also active in deciding which

which sections and programmes of the selected medium to choose. This means that an active audience on radio could decide to tune for the sole purpose of listening to news programs ,while an active facebook user could decide to go online just or to meet new people and not see products being advertised, there are various modes of advertisements both on new and broadcast media ,it could be through   internet pop ups which appear while browsing and it usually advertises products that would be found appealing to that particular user or there could be o5ther cases of advertisements slid in between very interesting programmes as is the case with the broadcast media.

Purchasing habits in consumers have evolved from going to the conventional market and word of mouth. The conventional market having to do with the marketing campaign trying to find out where the target audience are and making their advertisements appear in these places through the use of the broadcast media. An example being in the past we bought things based on the advertisements made by either the radio or television stations. Practical examples include; indomie’s very popular advertisement which was aired on television stations and made catchy and entertaining to the extent indomie became the general name for all noodles in the country.

But in recent years, people buy things not based on what they see on Facebook but they buy also from Facebook. As media critique David Shaw said, the internet has the potential to be the best sales tool and the best advertisement and direct marketing tool ever devised. Our case study being Facebook, focuses on social networking ,and allows its users to express themselves, share emotions and as well publish their views on issues on the internet or happening around them .It also gives room for meeting new people, sharing and discussing ideas hence the tag “social media” .It gives advertisers the easy access to their target market thereby assisting in making sales easier. Ever since its inception, it has had a large followership.

Moriarty et al (2014) asserts that by 2007 the smaller but still popular Facebook had created a community of 24 million members, comprising mainly of young adults and adults. Considering the ever changing and competitive field of advertising, marketing advertisers and marketers always looking for new and easier ways to reach their target audience and what better place than a site with a large population of youths who would  be exposed to their advertisements on products and services.

So in this study, we are going to discover which of these two mediums radio and Facebook have the higher influence on the purchasing habits of undergraduates (Godfrey Okoye university students).

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