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Business - Marketing & Advertising

Advertising and Media Sources Market Segments Market Research Basic Reference Books in Marketing & Advertising
Consumer Behavior and Attitudes Market Share Miscellaneous Marketing & Advertising Web Sites Finding Copies of Ads

Advertising and Media Sources

 

Advertising Age's Data Center
Provides access to data on the 100 Leading National Advertisers plus other summary statistics (e.g. Top Radio Advertisers, etc.)

Advertising Principles
Advertisingprinciples.com "attempts to summarize all that is known about how to create an effective advertising campaign."

Agency ComPile
Search for agencies by name, client, location, billings, industry experience, etc.

Gale Directory of Publications and Broadcast Media
Ref. AP 2 .A9
Provides basic directory information on media outlets.

Media Awareness Network
The Canadian media conglomerate provides information on radio, television, film, video, and Internet ownership, production, and marketing are given in a concise, browsable format. Although Canadian statistics are emphasized, many American and international figures are included.

Media Power 50
Annual list of the top b-to-b advertising venues. Other rankings available: top list managers, top 100 b-to-b advertisers, the best b-to-b web sites and more.

paintedcows.com : the advertising and marketing resource
Provides links to many sources of information.

SRDS (Standard Rate and Data Service)
This publisher provides rate data and media requirements by publication.
Business Publication Advertising Source [Ref. HF 5905 .S723]
Consumer Magazine Advertising Source [Ref. HF 5905 .S725]
Direct Marketing List Source [Ref. HF 5861 .D54]
Newspaper Advertising Source [Ref. HF 5905 .S73 and available electronically]
Out of Home Advertising Source [Ref.HF 5813 U6 088]
Radio Advertising Source [Ref. HF 5905 .S74]
TV and Cable Source [Ref. HF 5905 .S745]

NOTE: SRDS has a useful web site which includes, among other things, a Media Planning and Buying Calculator which helps you calculate cost per point or cost per thousands (click on Support Services to get to the Media Calculator).

Advertising Red Books: Advertisers
Ref. HF 5805 .S71

Advertising Red Books: Advertising Agencies
Ref. HF 5805 .S72
Provides basic directory information, summary expenditures by firm.

Top 50 Market Profiles
From MediaWeek. Each brief profile contains info on ad spending by media, local evening news ratings, and newspaper circulation information.

 


If you need to find detailed information on expenditures on a particular campaign, your best bet is often articles...from the business press. Databases such as Factiva, Lexis Nexis Academic, and ABI Inform Complete will be useful.

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Market Segments

Demographic data is widely available in a variety of sources--print and electronic. The most significant problem you will (likely) have is finding demographic data to the level of specificity in which you are interested. Keep in mind that is often is difficult to collect detailed public demographic data on very specific small clusters of the population because of privacy restrictions. Additional data sources available at Business-Statistics-Demographics.

Abbot Wool's Market Segment Resource Locator
Provides links to market segment resources on the web.

American Business Climate and Economic Profiles
HC 102.2 .A44 1994
Has data and rankings on 319 metropolitan areas. Designed more for business planners.

Baby Boomers Envision Their Retirement: An AARP Segmentation Analysis This entire report, which examines Baby Boomers' plans, expectations, and attitudes about their upcoming retirement. Might yield some interesting data if you are researching Boomers' attitudes.

Lifestyle Market Analyst
Ref. HF 5415.33 .U6 L54
Provides geographic, demographic, and lifestyle information at local, regional, and national levels.

Survey of Buying Power
HF 5415 .S13
Has statistics on population, effective buying income & other purchasing information.

TargetMarket News: The Black Consumer Market Authority
Provides some free data on black consumers, though most information is for sale.

You Are Where You Live! (Claritas)
By entering a zip code you can get information about lifestyle types (or clusters) in that zip. Very basic, but fun, data for free.

 

In addition to the web sites listed abpve, the CSULB Library has many books and government documents that contain demographic and market information. Click on these links to initiate a search in COAST for these kinds of materials:
Demographic surveys United States--statistics
Population statistics Vital statistics
Market segmentation Psychographics
Target marketing

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Market Research

Finding relevant market research can be difficult, but don't give up! The CSULB library does not buy market research reports; the costs of such reports usually make them prohibitively expensive. However, we do subscribe to a database that provides market research SUMMARIES which you may find useful.

Snapshots Market Research Reports North America

Additionally, the business press publishes articles which might summarize such reports and even though the entire report might be unavailable, there may be enough information in the article to make it useful.

Datamonitor Industry Reports
These reports are based on primary research with industry panels and consumers. They include information on market segmentation, market growth and pricing, competitors and products, and forecasts.

Researching the Researchers - Finding Market Research Agencies on the Web by By David Mort
Full text article from Free Pint.

AC Nielsen
Specializes in consumer products and services industries, provides access to some free reports.

Gartner
Specializes in information technology industry news and analysis, gives some executive summaries of research, requires registration for access to some sections of the site.

ESOMAR Directory of Research Organizations
This is a copy of the printed version of the ESOMAR Directory of Research Organisations. "These pages give an outline of the functions of each organisation and a detailed chart showing the methods and techniques used to supply their various services and specialisations. More than 1500 entries are included from all over the world, displaying information on market research organisations employing one or more ESOMAR members. URLs for individual firms are listed as available.

FIND/SVP, Inc.

Frost & Sullivan
An international marketing consulting company, site lists publications, etc.

Nielsen Media Research
Nielsen tv ratings are a service of Nielsen Media. No ratings information given on the web page, but does give company background and information on how ratings work.

Quirk's Marketing Research Review magazine
The site is designed to be a "one-stop source of information on marketing research.

ResearchInfo.Com
Some free information about market research.

USA Data
This provider of consumer data requires a subscription to get to the really juicy stuff, but they do have some limited sample data.

Yahoo/Market Research

 

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Basic Books in Marketing and Advertising

 

Dictionary of Marketing Terms (Bennett) HF 5415 .D4874 1995
Handbook of Marketing Scales Ref. HF 5415.3 .B323 1993
Marketing Encyclopedia Ref. HF 5415. M2982 1995
Marketing Information: A Professional Reference Guide HF 5415.124 .M37 1995
Markets of the U.S. for Business Planners Ref. HC 106.8 .M333 1996


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Consumer Behavior and Attitudes

LifeStyle Market Analyst
Ref. HF 5415.33 .U6 L54
Provides geographic, demographic, and lifestyle information at local, regional, and national levels.

Media By the Numbers
HF 5415.3 M442 1998-99
Provides costs for different media categories and the audience that uses that category.

Media Trends
HF 5415.3 M44 1998
Provides statistical analysis of media categories and their audiences. Includes these categories: broadcast television, cable television, VCR, radio, magazines, newspapers, outdoor billboards, and alternate media such as in flight, in store, mall...etc.

MediaMark Research
HF 5415.3 .M43 (1996 edition)
Surveys U.S. households re: product use and media readership/viewership.

Simmons Study of Media and Markets
HF 5815 .U5 A382 (1991 and 1993 editions)
No longer published in print, the older volumes are available in the library and may be useful for historical data.

 

In addition to the usual business research databases, a database which will also be useful to anyone doing research on consumer behavior is PsycInfo . Though PsycInfo provides very few full text articles (it is, basically, an electronic index), it is a useful resource for references to the journal literature in consumer behavior. A search in PsycInfo for "consumer behavior" and "tobacco" and limited to the age group 13-17 yields 20+ article references. A few of those references actually have attached full text.

There are a number of books in COAST on consumer behavior and on consumers preferences. If your interest is in target marketing to various ethnic groups, you may want to consult one of these reference books which will provide useful background information on ethnic groups:

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Market Share

Market Share Reporter
Ref. HF 5410 .M35
The easiest way to find market share. Provides tables which have been extracted from published articles. Unfortunately it doesn't have EVERYTHING.

D & B Business Rankings
Ref. HG 4057 A237
Doesn't give market share per se, but may be useful to help identify the players in an industry and some rough calculations of market share might be done from figures provided in this volume.market share might be done from figures provided in this volume.

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Miscellaneous Web Sites

 

Ad Cracker
A fun approach to helping people create marketing campaigns and advertising concepts.

AD Resource - Online Advertising and Online Marketing Resources

Advertising Quotes

Advertising World
An extensive directory of links to marketing communications sites maintained by the University of Texas at Austin.

American Marketing Association
The AMA's home page announces conferences, publications, provides links to the collegiate division and local chapters, and offers a marketing job bank!

Arent-Fox Advertising Law
This site is produced by a law firm and includes articles by the firm's staff on advertising law, links to relevant FTC documents and guidelines.

CyberAtlas: Internet Statistics and Market Research for Web Marketers

Dictionary of Terminology - Advertising

ERSYS (Earth Resource SYStem)
Texas-based Ersys market research company offers much of its demographic and geographic data available for free with a handy tool allowing you to select a state and then choose from a list of cities and towns to view information on population, climate and pollution, politics, media, income, education, transportation, and much more.

Glossary of Internet Advertising Terms

Internet Intelligence Index
A compilation of sites useful in gathering competitor and marketplace information on the Internet. All links are annotated and organized by subjects ranging from legal resources to patents and industry-specific information.

KnowThis.Com
A very comprehensive "virtual library" on marketing. Has sections on Marketing, Research, Advertising, Selling, Promotion, and more.

Marketing Jobs

Marketing on the Internet
Presents data on the Internet and "Market Research, Product, Place, Promotion, and Price".

Marketingprofs.com - Marketing Know-How from Professors and Professionals
Includes articles, tutorials, a marketing FAQ, the "hottest how-to's," and selected links.

PR & Marketing Network
From the publishers of PR News, provides information on marketing, public relations, a directory of firms, career information, industry links, etc.

Yahoo/Marketing and Advertising

Yahoo/Advertising on the Web and the Internet

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Finding Copies of Ads

Finding copies of actual advertisements is not always simple...depending on what you need. If you want to find examples of exemplary advertisements, the CSULB library has a number of books which reproduce various advertisements.

  • 20 ads that shook the world: the century's most groundbreaking advertising and how it changed us all HF 5811 T9 2000
  • Advertising in America: the first 200 years HF 5813 .U6 G64 1990
  • Art Directors Annual. NC 997 A1 A69
  • The Best in Advertising HF 5801 .B45
  • The Best of Ad Campaigns HF 6182 .U5 B58 1988
  • The Best in Medical Advertising and Graphics : selections from the Rx Club shows HF 6161 .D7 B47 1989
  • A Century of American Icons: 100 products and slogans from the 20th century consumer culture HF 6161 .B4 C46 2002
  • Clio Awards: a tribute to 30 years of advertising excellence HF 6146.T42 T48 1989
  • Graphis Design Annual NC 997 A1 G73
  • Logo design that works: secrets for successful logo design NC 1002 L63 S55 2001
  • Mad Ave : award-winning advertising of the 20th century HF 5813 .U6 M23 2000
  • Major Marketing Campaigns HF 5415.2 .M356
  • The New Advertising; the great campaigns from Avis to Volkswagen HF 5813 .U6 G55
  • The One Show: Advertising's Best NC 1001.5 .O53
  • The 100 Best TV Commercials--and why they worked HF 6146 .T42 K36 1999

There are web sites which do much the same thing as the above books. Use the following to 1) find an advertisement (or series of) for a particular company or 2) find different organizations recommendations of "best" ads. Ad tracking--finding actual ads in popular magazines by company or by product--can be quite expensive. Commercial services that provide this service charge real $$, so are not an option for student researchers.

  • adflip.com . This archive of classic print ads can be searched by subject and by year (e.g. Pepsi for 1940), by year alone, by category, by publication, etc.
  • Fifty Years of Coca-Cola Television Advertisements : Highlights from the Motion Picture Archives at the Library of Congress.
  • Hartman Center for Sales, Advertising & Marketing History . This center at Duke University has an image database of ads (1911-1955) from magazines and newspapers. Ad*Access , a database of images and information for over 7,000 advertisements printed in U.S. and Canadian newspapers and magazines between 1911 and 1955 is also available from the Hartman Center.
  • IFilm has an entire section of commercials.
  • University of Texas Advertising World: Links to Advertising Resources . This is a great web site and this section has links to places to find ads on the web.
  • Indexes in the back of magazines. Most trade magazines have a little section in the back called "Advertisers". It's often just a short column that tells who advertised in that issue and on what page you'll find the ad.
  • Company web sites. A company will often include logos and sometimes include images from ads.
  • Articles about ad campaigns. An article discussing an ad campaign might reproduce an image from an ad. Databases such as Factiva, Lexis Nexis Academic, and ABI Inform Complete will be useful to find articles on specific campaigns. I would likely start with ABI Inform Complete since they provide full image articles for at least some of the publications they index.
Some of the companies that do commercial ad-tracking (for fees) are:

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Content maintained by Susan Jackson, Business Librarian