Information content of television advertising in Hong Kong and China

A content analysis of 341 commercials broadcast in Hong Kong and 324 commercias broadcast on national and regional channels in China was conducted. Coding frame on advertising information content and style of advertising was based on The Resnik and Stern (1977) evaluation criteria were adopted to determine the level of advertising information contents in television advertising. It was found that 56% and 58% of the sampled commercials in Hong Kong and China television advertising were classified as informative respectively. Ther
four most frequently occurring information cues in Hong Kong and China television advertising were performance, quality, availability and components/contents. Drug and non-durables commercials were found to be most informative while liquor advertising was least informative in Hong Kong. Non-durables and drug commercials were most informative while cigarette and
liquor advertising were least informative in China. Hong Kong commercials contained a higher proportion of information cues on special offer, availability, price and independent research. China commercials contained a higher proportion of cues on performance. Information contents were mainly determined by types of products advertised and was not dependent on characteristics of commercials like duration, broadcast day, time and channel.