Abstract:

Managing the advertising function for established brands requires an understanding of the nature of the advertising-sales relationship. Historically, both experimental and non-experimental approaches have been used to investigate this relationship, but the impressive amount of literature in this area seems to have identified only a number of broad generalisations. In part, this is due to the inadequacies of the different methodologies and data sources that have been used, which make difficult a comparison of the reported studies for this purpose of establishing guidelines for strategic advertising management. Continuous panel-based experimental research seems to offer greater potential for providing further insights into the nature of the advertising-sales relationship.