A Guide to Getting Published In the Journal of Advertising Research
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* Colin Campbell

## Helping Researchers Write Successful Articles And a Salute to Best Paper and Best Reviewer

![Figure1](http://www.journalofadvertisingresearch.com/https://www.journalofadvertisingresearch.com/content/jadvertres/63/2/106/F1.medium.gif)

[Figure1](http://www.journalofadvertisingresearch.com/content/63/2/106/F1)

The *JAR*’s mission is to be the leading publisher of industry-relevant advertising research. For authors who want to be part of that mission, I devote most of this editorial to providing guidance on successfully submitting your work. Also honored: our latest Best Reviewer and Best Paper winners.

But first, a brief review of this edition’s body of impressive scholarship and variety of topics, starting with a rethink for how we conceptualize advertising. In “**Why the Experiential View Is Vital to Marketing Communications Research Now: An Enhanced Framework for Examining the Effects of Contemporary Marketing**” (please see page 109), Jean-Luc Herrmann (University of Lorraine) and former *JAR* Editor-in-Chief John B. Ford (Old Dominion University) call for a shift from persuading consumers to instead providing experiences that blend entertainment with more indirect persuasion. This is essential, the authors argue, given the dramatic changes that the internet and social media have brought in both the volume and style of content that consumers view, as well as consumer involvement in brand-related discussions.

Consumer response to ads in streamed video content is the focus of “**Disruptive versus Nondisruptive Advertising in Online Streaming Video Services: How Does Advertisement Placement Affect Consumer Perceptions and Ad Effectiveness?**” (please see page 123). In it, Katheryn R. Christy, Ranran Z. Mi, Ran Tao and Linqi Lu (all at University of Wisconsin-Madison, except for Mi who is at Kean University) compare pre-roll ads with both disruptive and non-disruptive mid-roll ads, and across both narrative and non-narrative content. Key findings include brand recall being higher with pre-roll ads, and that ad placement had no effect on consumer perceptions of—or desire to keep watching—the focal program.

When it comes to influencers on social media, how do their engagement rates vary with follower size? In “**A Comparison of Social Media Influencers’ KPI Patterns across Platforms: Exploring Differences in Followers and Engagement on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, and Twitter**” (please see page 139), authors Naser Pourazad (Flinders University), Lara Stocchi, and Shreya Narsey (University of South Australia) examine a large dataset of posts from 180 influencers. They find that while larger influencers generally see a decrease in engagement, the effect is reversed on TikTok and not present at all on Instagram. These effects hold true across influencers with different expertise.

Ads that are sarcastic or even derogatory to viewers take the spotlight in “**The Advertisement Puts Me Down, but I Like It: Examining an Emerging Type of Audience-Targeted Negative Advertisement**” (please see page 160). Authors Hongjie Sun (Hainan University, China), Yong (Eddie) Luo (University of Kent), Feifei Liu (Shandong Vocational University of Foreign Affairs, China), and Ben Lowe (University of Kent) conducted multiple studies to show that rather than offend viewers, these negative ads evoke empathy and can lead to positive responses. The effects are strongest for low status products and when a moderate level of negativity is used.

In “**When Brands Go Dark: A Replication and Extension—Examining Market Share of Brands that Stop Advertising for a Year or Longer** ” (please see page 172), Peilin Phua, Nicole Hartnett, Virginia Beal, Giang Trinh, and Rachel Kennedy (all at Ehrenberg-Bass Institute for Marketing Science, University of South Australia) add new insight to what occurs when advertising ceases. Examining market share data, they find that losses increase the longer a brand remains silent. This result varies significantly across 22 product categories.

Finally, a methodological piece by Melissa Archpru Akaka (University of Denver) and Hope Jensen Schau (University of Arizona) offers advice on presenting qualitative findings in a manner that is more digestible to industry. I am particularly intrigued by “**The Stories You Tell: Crafting Managerially Relevant Articles Based on Qualitative Research**” (please see page 185), since I personally know how challenging writing qualitative research can be, especially for a managerial audience. Their article provides actionable strategies that authors can use to make sure their qualitative work moves beyond mere description.

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Our goal at *JAR* is to publish the world’s best research on advertising and marketing. To make that happen, we rely on the strength of our authors as well as the subject matter experts on our Editorial Review Board. For 2022, I awarded Best Reviewer to Danielle Chmielewski-Raimondo (University of Melbourne). And, votes cast by our Editorial Board members awarded Best Paper to Koushyar Rajavi (Scheller College of Business, Georgia Institute of Technology), Donald R. Lehmann (Columbia University Graduate School of Business), Kevin Lane Keller (Tuck School of Business, Dartmouth College), and Alireza Golmohammadi (Belk College of Business, UNC Charlotte), for their article, “**How Advertising Expenditures Affect Consumers’ Perceptions of Quality: A Psychology-Based Assessment of Brand, Category and Country-Level Moderators**” (*JAR* 62, 4). The runner-up is “**Can Personalization or Creativity Reduce Banner Blindness? An Executive Functions Approach to Media and Creative Strategies**” (*JAR* 62, 3) by Farzad Abedi and Scott Koslow (both at Macquarie University).

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We want authors to have every chance for success when submitting their work, and we want our reviewers to be well resourced. To that end, we’ve hosted webinars (on our YouTube channel, @journalofadvertisingresearch) offering tips for becoming better reviewers and on writing for *JAR*. Another webinar brings to life our first-ever list of research priorities—announced in *JAR* March (63, 1)—addressing the advertising industry’s key research needs. We trust this list will enable researchers to direct attention toward areas that are ripe for discovery, and that prospective authors can learn from our areas of instruction, which I expand on here.

## CHOOSING A TOPIC

*JAR* is looking for papers that are both academically rigorous and relevant to the advertising industry. Ideally, a *JAR* paper is one that advertisers find interesting and useful, with generalizable and enduring insights. This means that academic research without clear relevance to industry is not a good fit for *JAR*. Likewise, we are not interested in market research since its insights are less enduring and often don’t develop general understanding of how advertising works.

Choosing a topic and developing interesting questions is vital to a paper’s success but can be challenging, a key reason why we developed the *JAR* research priorities list. Researchers can also keep a pulse on the advertising industry and new trends by following monitoring sources such as WARC, *Ad Age*, IAB, the Drum, and McKinsey, many of which have newsletters. And when brainstorming potential ideas, ask: “Would findings from this study cause an advertiser to think or act differently?” and “Would my findings be interesting to an MBA class?” If the answer is “yes” to both questions, that is a good sign.

## WRITING A LITERATURE REVIEW

Successful *JAR* articles show how their article engages with and builds on relevant research conversations occurring in advertising journals. If you are examining a topic where research is growing quickly and new articles are constantly emerging, ensure that your literature review is up to date. If researching a brand-new topic or area, expand your literature review to draw on a broader set of existing literature that informs what you are researching. Early research on influencers, for instance, draws more heavily on celebrity endorser studies. Positioning tables and visualizations can be useful tools to illustrate how an article builds on and is different from existing research. Writing in the present tense is less clunky and acknowledges that existing findings continue to hold true.

## DEVELOPING RESEARCH QUESTIONS AND HYPOTHESES

When examining every *JAR* submission, I ask, “Are these findings obvious or easily intuited given existing research?” I encourage authors to pose the same question when brainstorming to cull out dull ideas and focus on the questions that expand collective understanding. More interesting research questions strive to answer questions that get at “how” and “why” an effect occurs, which naturally push us toward explaining the mechanism through which an outcome occurs (a process often termed “mediation”). Understanding this not only provides richer theoretical insight, but also enables you and others to begin thinking of factors (often referred to as “moderators”) that might cause that effect to become stronger or weaker.

Newer researchers are sometimes unsure what exactly is needed when asked to include “theory” in a paper. Theory refers to a reasonable explanation for why a study’s results are expected to occur. This explanation can certainly be provided by drawing on established theories and existing research, but a researcher can also develop their own theory by providing carefully articulated logic and reasoning. Qualitative research is often a useful tool for this process.

## DESIGNING AND CONDUCTING STUDIES

*JAR* is open to all types of papers: qualitative, quantitative, conceptual, and replication. Choose a method that is appropriate to your research questions and the current state of the literature, and view your paper through the lens of someone working in the advertising industry. Does the set of evidence that is provided offer strong enough support to change how advertising is carried out? Although there are exceptions, multiple studies generally make a quantitative paper stronger than using a single study. Correlation-based (*e.g.*, SEM or PLS) studies on their own, for example, generally do not make a strong enough contribution to warrant publication unless they draw on unique field data. Following up with experiments—particularly ones that use a range of realistic stimuli and scenarios—is a great way to demonstrate causality and explore moderators. Wherever possible try to use real behavior (or its closest proxy) as an outcome rather than attitudes or intentions.

*JAR* welcomes all sources of data and encourages a variety of data sources to be used within a paper to show effects are robust. Like at all journals, we request that appropriate quality checks are performed. These include checks to detect inattentive or speeding participants. Studies should be designed to detect robot participants as well. Questions that are in a survey but hidden to the naked eye are one way to detect robots, since robots will answer those questions, but real participants will not. Other ways to detect robots are asking for a description of a picture or a recent experience. Authors should stay apprised of developments in this area since the specific methods to detect robots will likely evolve as they become more sophisticated. Where appropriate, researchers should also confirm that their manipulations operated as expected and check for potential confounds. Authors should include complete reporting of their methods, include their scale items, provide all stimuli, and detail their data quality checks. Feel free to include these in a web appendix if space is an issue.

## WRITING UP

*JAR* is designed to be read by both academics and industry practitioners. For this reason, we ask that authors use a writing style that is approachable. Use short sentences. Think outside your silo: Avoid acronyms and jargon. Include visualizations and tables that aid the reader and summarize the literature, your methods, and your findings. Include notes under all visualizations and tables so that they are interpretable on their own. Use descriptive titles and subheadings (*e.g.*, “A hedonic appeal increases influencer conversions”) rather than more generic ones (*e.g.*, “Study 1 results”).

Finally, be clear in describing how your paper contributes to theory by expanding our common understanding of how advertising works. Include a separate managerial implication section that provides rich description of how your results might change advertising and marketing practice. Run both sections by colleagues, industry contacts, and even interested MBA students to get their feedback.

While I know there is an incredible array of talented researchers in advertising, I hope these ideas and suggestions are nonetheless helpful in preparing strong submissions for *JAR*. We want the best research to be published and want to help you be the one to create it.

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