INFLUENCE OF TELEVISION ADVERTISING ON CONSUMERS’ PERCEPTION OF COLA DRINKS – A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF COKE AND PEPSI COLA IN LAGOS, NIGERIA.

Abstract

Television aadvertising has no doubt played a vital role in influencing consumers’ perception of cola drinks, to be specific, Coke and Pepsi Cola, which in turn might persuade them into purchase. It has also served as a means of awareness creations for the product. Coke and Pepsi Cola, on the other hand, have been well-patronized brands for ages, yet we do not know how well their TV ads have effectively played a role in this or whether the ads are the major influencing factors that actually affected consumers’ perception, hence the patronage. Therefore, this study sought to establish the extent television advertising affects consumers’ perception of Coke or Pepsi Cola drinks. Survey design was adopted with questionnaire as instrument for data collection. Convenience sampling method was used to select a sample size of 300 and the data collected was analysed using the SPSS. Result shows that the knowledge level of both Coke and Pepsi Cola television adverts among the study participants is low as the mean scores are 1.44 and 1.13 respectively. It also shows that advertising is not the major influencing factor for cconsumers’ perception of Cola drinks but rather other factors such as product taste, packaging, significant others’ influence and price. Furthermore, findings reveal that both Coke and Pepsi cola drinks are well patronized. It is therefore recommended that all the other tools or factors that influence consumers to purchase a Cola drink should be looked into while planning and creating advert campaign. Also, multi-method approach should be adopted for advert campaigns in order to reach diverse segments of the population.