CM1011 – Team assignment 3 22-4-2011

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US - China differences in Nike advertisements – A pilot study Lecturer: Brandellero, words: 945, online version:

Pip Cloo (344865), Koen Glotzbach (345346), Giulia Meyer (346395),

Renate Rocha (275489) & Milou van der Zwan (304042)

In a cross-national comparative research, we will examine the differences between

advertisements of Nike in the US and in China. We already worked on a literature review, and

the next step is conducting a small scale preliminary study. A so-called pilot study helps us

check if the design of the study is feasible and if a full-scale research will provide us with useful

insights to answer our research question: To what extent do the advertisements of Nike as

used in the US and China in 2005 and 2010 differ from each other regarding to their adaptation

to cultural aspects? This report shows how we did the operationalisation and what the results

of our pilot study are.

Operationalisation For our research we will take a qualitative approach to content analysis to see if Nike takes a

country’s underlying assumptions into account in advertising. We can analyze and compare the

advertisements (both videos and print advertisements) of Nike in China and the US. We did not

randomly look at differences: In order to have a good ground for comparison, we identified

eight concepts or categories before conducting our pilot study. Based on these concepts, we

created a coding sheet in which is clear what to look for when examining advertisements. The

coding sheet (which has been revised after testing) is presented in Appendix A and how the

concepts link back to the research question, and below you can find a description of the

concepts we chose to look at.

First, we look at gender of the characters in the advertisements. Secondly, we analyze

what philosophy the advertisers hold. In the US, people are said to be more focused on the

individual whereas Chinese value collectivism (Johnston & Gao, 2009). Yet other sub-concepts

are competitiveness and group cohesiveness, which are particularly related to sports and can

also be identified in advertisements.

The third concept we suggest is language. There can be differences in slogans, or in the

use of implicit versus explicit cues in language. Besides a glocalization strategy, we might

hereby recognize certain underlying assumptions. The kind of sports is our fourth concept,

which of course tells us on what sports this country focuses. Fifth, the characters and their

features – ethnicity, celebrity status versus ordinary people – are important to analyze.

Characters are used as tools to attract audience, so we might see differences between how to

appeal audiences in the US and in China.

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As a sixth concept, we thought of the setting of the advertisement, which can be natural

(indoors, outdoors urban or outdoors rural) or artificial and can arouse feelings of liberation or

excitement (for instance, in a match). The seventh concept, related to the previous concept, is

design of the advertisement. This can give us another view on how to appeal Chinese or US

audiences, by a difference in music and special effects, which contribute to a certain feeling

about the advertisements. The last concept we analyze is product portrayal: There might be a

focus on the brand – which also has to do with a certain lifestyle, because brands nowadays

seem to sell lifestyles – or on the product itself, by emphasizing the quality or price.

Sampling and testing The concepts as described above, were studied in our units of analysis; the advertisements we

selected. The sampling process constituted of the search on the internet for Nike video and

print advertisements from China and the US between 2005 and 2010, and thereafter the

selection. When selecting the advertisements, we searched for advertisements that seemed to

serve the same purpose (promoting the brand, a certain theme or a certain product) in order

not to compare apples with oranges. Because very few ‘pairs’ could be created, this was the

only extra criterion used for sampling.

After the sampling, we looked at the chosen advertisements more carefully and noted

down information on each of the concepts as described in the previous section. We put the

information in a table, which is presented in Appendix B. As said before, the information

retrieved was used to refine the coding sheet.

Difficulties and (possible) solutions Several difficulties appeared when doing our pilot study. Firstly, we could not find much

advertisements and commercials published before 2005 when searching for useful

advertisements. Our initial time-frame was 2000 to 2010, but due to this practical problem

rewrote our research question in between, and changed the date of 2000 into 2005.

Another difficulty is the short time span of the pilot study: Due to the limited scope of

the study we could only search for advertisements on the internet, but we could very few

Chinese advertisements. As a result, we could make only very few pairs to compare. To

overcome the first problem, we may need more time to find advertisements in magazines.

However, we also would need magazines from China.

Thirdly, Chinese advertisements were often not subtitled, which lead to a language

barrier. This problem can be solved by involving someone who can translate Chinese texts. If

these problems are solved, finding comparable advertisements might be easier.

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Adjustments to the measurement instruments Our research question initially was focused on advertisement between 2000 and 2010, but as

we soon discovered that it was hard to find any (comparable) advertisements before 2005, we

already adjusted our research question and now focused on 2005 and 2010. Furthermore, in

our real study, we may add the concept ‘Subject of the advertisement’ to our coding system,

because all advertisements contain elements that are about certain things in life. Additionally,

we could replace the concept ‘Product portrayal’ by the more broad ‘Seemed advertisement

focus’, in order to include looking at themes (as ‘free yourself’ or ‘use your city as a sports

field’) apart from the already included brand and product.

Sources Johnston, L. M., Gao, H. (2009). Resolving conflict in Chinese & US realms for global business

entities. China Media Research, 5, 104 – 117.

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Appendix A – Concepts & coding Concept Coding

Gender Male/ Mostly male / Balanced / Mostly female / Female Philosophy Competitiveness / Group cohesiveness

Individualism / Collectivism Language Presence / Absence

Explicit messages / Implicit messages Spoken / Both spoken and written language / Written Use of slogans and icons (i.e. the Swoosh)

Sports None / Basketball / Soccer / American Football / Running / etc. Characters [Country of origin]

celebrity / ordinary sportsmen / non-sportsmen

Setting or scenery Indoors / Outdoors Urban / Rural Real / Artificial

Design [Music genre] Famous music infamous / Infamous music artist [Font] [Special effects] [Color scheme]

Product portrayal Brand (e.g. lifestyle) / Product (e.g. quality, price, design)

These concepts are explained in the section “Operationalisation”.

How these concepts link back to the research question blabla

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Appendix B – Realisation of the concepts in the advertisements

Pair 1 Concept Chinese advertisement US advertisement

Type Video Video Gender Male Male Philosophy - Individual sports

- No group, no game - Game - Individual performance - Cheering crowd

Language - Almost none - Logo Swoosh

- English text - Logo & Slogan ‘Just do it’

Sports Individual sports: athletics, individual practicing

Basketball

Characters Chinese ordinary people Lebron James, famous basketball player

Setting or scenery - Urban setting - Feeling of urge to express talents

- Basketball field - Daily life settings: school, bakery (with donuts)

Design - No music, just sound of city surroundings

- Black & White - English language music

Product portrayal Focus on brand Focus on brand

Pair 2 Concept Chinese advertisement US advertisement

Type Video Video Gender Male Male Philosophy - Individual sport

- Competitive - Individual performance

Language - Chinese text - Logo & Slogan ‘Just do it’

- English: Lebron talking (“Should I…”) - Logo & Slogan ‘Just do it’

Sports Individual: athletics Basketball, but not really focused on the sport

Characters - Cultural icon: Liu Xiang, famous hurdler - Ordinary people imitating Liu

Lebron James

Setting or scenery - Athletic field - Urban setting

- Basketball field - Video studio - Car - Stage performing - Hospital to remove tattoo - Bakery eating donut - ‘Wild West’ as a villain - Police - Tractor

Design - No text music - No music, just Lebron talking - Switching settings

Product portrayal Focus on brand Focus on brand (lifestyle!)

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Pair 3 Concept Chinese advertisement US advertisement

Type Video Video Gender Mostly male Mostly male Philosophy - out of the box thinking

- playing together Language - almost none: only angry(?)

mother - English: game changers, beat anything, change anything - swoosh

Sports Team play: soccer Frisbeeing Characters - Chinese of lower/middle

class - young Chinese sporting

Regular NYC’ers

Setting or scenery - city of Hong Kong: ‘remote’ open place next to water

NYC rush hour street

Design - upbeat pop-rockish music - light super 8 effect

- Indy like music - handwritten text with chalk on kerb & pen on wall

Product portrayal - Promoting thinking out of the box - brand

- Promoting thinking out of the box - brand

Sources Chinese advertisement 1: Nike China Commercials – WN.COM, World News Search. Available

on: http://search.wn.com/?template=cheetah-search-

adv%2Findex.txt&action=search&results_type=videos&search_string=Nike+tv+comme

rcial+China. Accessed on: May 6, 2011.

US advertisement 1: Lebron James “Chalk” Commercial for Nike Zoom – WN.COM, World

News Search. Retrieved from http://search.wn.com/?template=cheetah-search-

adv%2Findex.txt&action=search&results_type=videos&search_string=Nike+tv+comme

rcial+US on May 6, 2011.

Chinese advertisement 2:Nike China Liu Xiang: 60 spot – WN.COM, World News Search.

Retrieved from http://search.wn.com/?template=cheetah-search-

adv%2Findex.txt&action=search&results_type=videos&search_string=Nike+tv+comme

rcial+China on May 6, 2011.

US advertisement 2: Nike Basketball: Lebron Rise – WN.COM, World News Search. Retrieved

from http://search.wn.com/?template=cheetah-search-

adv%2Findex.txt&action=search&results_type=videos&search_string=Nike+tv+comme

rcial+US on May 6, 2011.

Chinese advertisement 3: Baby – adforum.com. Retrieved from

http://www.adforum.com/creative-work/ad/player/6695298/Nike/JWT-Company-Ltd

on May 6, 2011

US advertisement 3: Nike streets – adforum.com. Retrieved from

http://www.adforum.com/creative-work/ad/player/34442267/Nike/McKinney on May

6, 2011