Over the years, advertising has been given various definitions by different scholars. Etymologically, the word ‘advertising’ is derived from the latin word ‘ ad vetere’ which means ‘to draw attention’. It is all about drawing a person’s attention to buy a product or seek for service. This is why Hart and O’Connor in Eluwa (1999) defines advertising as the action of calling something to the attention of the public especially by paid announcement”. From the above advertising. It is clear that Hart and O’Connor are saying that advertising is all about the public attention drawn by the paid announcement. This definition is similar to Frank Jefkins definitions cited in Eluwa (1999) as the means by which we make known what we have to sell or what we want to buy. But it is limited from the angle of the media of communication.
Frank Jefkins by this definition is saying that advertising is all about communicating the products with the sole aim of selling the products. It accepts interpersonal communication, macro-communication as part of advertising but Aliede in Okunna (Ed. 2002), sees it as ” a form of communication through the media about products, services, ideas, personalities or organizations paid for by an identified sponsor. Definition of advertising as the non-personal communication of information usually paid for and usually persuasive about products, services or ideas by identified sponsors through the various media:
The above definition and Aliede’s definition both speak of communication through the media which is a non-personal communication. Non-personal communication refers to the object of the message as -not to a single person but to a selected group of persons e.g. youths, children, workers etc. It also speak on the message as paid for by an identified sponsor who is the initiator of the message.There’s also an agreement on the products, services, and ideas as the subject of the message.
The difference is seen in the emphasis by Bovee and Arens (1992) definition that the message is usually persuasive in nature. What it means is that the message must urge and convince the target audience to do something. Hence the definition instigated by the American Marketing Association that advertising is any form of non -personal promotion of ideas, goods and services by an identified sponsor. The non-personal promotion covers the communication process by the media. The media here refers to the various organs of mass communication which include the radio, television, cinema, newspapers, magazines bill boards, posters and the internet which of course is the most recent advertising medium.Every advert message performs and create brand awareness,equally inform consumers about the product Since the Internet become commercialized, large and small businessmen saw it as a great opportunity to increase the awareness of their business and at the same time to increase sales. At present different business ranging from local to global manufacturers use the Internet to present multimedia content that include bulletin boards interesting or entertaining information product data and even games. This is due to the fact that the Internet audience is characterized by different taste and need which has made it necessary for caution on the part of the agencies when creating advertisement. .It appeal to consumer to try new especially internet connection.
