Creativity, Marketing Effectiveness and Recall: when is creativity effective in advertising?

Abstract

There is a discussion as to the direction of creativity in the context of advertising, because when aimed at winning prizes, the proposal of marketing communication can be harmful or contradictory. Thus, this exploratory empirical study compared campaigns considered creative, awarded at the Cannes Lions festival 2016, against the determinant criteria of creativity and advertising effectiveness found in the literature, as well as with merely informative campaigns, measuring the recall. To this end, the study was structured in nine stages, gathering mixed data, with a quantitative and qualitative approach. The results show that some awarded pieces are not effective in terms of remembering, but that creativity, when well contextualized, will not be decoupled from market efficiency.