Third-Party Endorsement

Publicity Endorsements.

Claims about third-party endorsement effects were first invoked most frequently when practitioners and clients compared the relative benefits of publicity (coverage in the editorial portions of the press) to paid advertising. Mass media researchers during the middle of the 20th century generally agreed the news media were a powerful force that could confer status, legitimacy and credibility on the topics they covered. In the same vein, research had consistently shown that people distrusted advertising and avoided, resisted or counter-argued with claims that appeared as advertising.

Research in 1980s and 1990s challenged claims about publicity's third-party endorsement effects and the superiority of news versus advertising. More than a dozen experimental tests were published where identical messages were either labeled as news or advertising, or presented in editorial versus advertising formats.

Studies directly comparing groups exposed to one format versus the other suggested a clear preference among participants for information presented in editorial formats. But the results were not consistent when commonly used experimental measures of message impact were analyzed: topic recognition or recall, message learning, attitude change or behavioral intent.

Kirk Hallahan contended that the differences previously attributed to third-party endorsements effects could be explained by (1) people's strong [Page 855]dislike for advertising compared with news, and (2) different cognitive processing rules that are invoked based on the content class (news versus advertising) in which a message appears.

Because news values stress the importance of impartiality and balance in coverage, media audiences expect the language and tone of news to avoid excessively laudatory claims, which is why people might be more accepting of messages presented as news versus advertising. Journalists are expected to be impartial—to tell, not to sell. However, if the language used in news is excessively laudatory, the credibility of the source can be compromised. When it sounds like a journalist is a confederate of a product promoter, any advantage associated with publicity versus advertising is diminished dramatically.

Similarly, when a person is highly involved in a topic, Hallahan found that content class made little difference. Indeed, people who are actively seeking information were open to obtaining information from a wide range of sources. Although people understand that the purpose of ads is to show products in a highly favorable light, individuals who are highly involved in seeking information or in making a judgment will disregard the source and will pay attention to ads. Audiences know that advertisers are knowledgeable—they must simply be wary about misrepresentations or omitted facts. Some evidence also suggests that today's young people are more open to obtaining information from many sources, and might not be as predisposed to news as prior generations.

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