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Online Advertising Intrusiveness and Consumers’ Avoidance Behaviors

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Handbook of Strategic e-Business Management

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Abstract

The proliferation of advertising in all communication media causes consumers to perceive a significant amount of competitiveness between advertised products, as well as to feel overwhelmed by the intrusiveness of their advertisements. When taken together, these dimensions form the concept “advertising clutter.” A review of the literature shows that perceived intrusiveness is the main component of the perception of clutter. Advertising clutter can prompt undesired behaviors (e.g., advertising avoidance) as well as attitudes contrary to those that companies’ advertising campaigns hope to achieve. It also leads to diminished advertising efficacy in terms of consumer memory, a decrease in positive attitudes towards the message and brand, as well as declined purchasing intention and, therefore, sales. In this article, the main consequences of advertising clutter for consumers in online media are reviewed and discussed. To that end, a theoretical review of this concept and its main dimensions is performed; special attention is paid to the online context. Finally, some practical recommendations and research opportunities are pointed out.

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Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank the Research Project ECO2012-31712 under Subprogram for Non-Oriented Fundamental Research Projects, Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness, Spain for their financial support.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Granada, Granada, Spain

    Francisco Rejón-Guardia

  2. University of Granada; and Open University of Catalonia, Barcelona, Spain

    Francisco J. Martínez-López

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  1. Francisco Rejón-Guardia
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  2. Francisco J. Martínez-López
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Correspondence to Francisco Rejón-Guardia .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Business Administration, University of Granada, Granada, Spain

    Francisco J. Martínez-López

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Rejón-Guardia, F., Martínez-López, F.J. (2014). Online Advertising Intrusiveness and Consumers’ Avoidance Behaviors. In: Martínez-López, F. (eds) Handbook of Strategic e-Business Management. Progress in IS. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-39747-9_23

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