Impact of Surrogate Advertisement: An Unconventional and Revolutionary Tool of Marketers

Like making mountain out of a mole hill, if right form of advertising is done, we can make small things larger and put it in the right perspective in front of a customer. The customer will be so fascinated with the advertisement, that he will not get scope to realize that he has been completely bowled over. But it is a different thing that some ads are misleading and even sometimes done unethically to sale the prohibited products like tobacco and alcohol. Even some of the famous celebrities of filmdom and sports do not hesitate to endorse surrogate advertising. Direct advertising of the prohibited products has been banned by the govt because of which companies are forced to adopt surrogate advertising. The current study has been undertaken to examine the useful and antagonistic effect of surrogate advertising on the youth of Bhubaneswar city with more than 100 responses.


Introduction
Advertising is currently a part and parcel of everybody's life. In the current time, commercial promotion contributes gigantically to the modernization of the economy by enhancing the business and trade of different nations. The sole point of promotion is to introduce and impart another item in the market zeroing in on focused buyers financially. Along these lines, a decent ad helps in building a decent brand picture and brand personality in the psyche of buyers. Basically, the target market of ads are consumers and business. Advertisements try to position a brand in the mind of the customers. As famous marketers Jack Trout and Al Ries have quoted "Differentiate or die" in their book "Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind", every company try to differentiate their products from their competitors by taking different paths to make their product visible to the customers, viewers in different advertising mediums, electronic medias.
Out of several paths surrogate advertising is one way of promoting some products which have been banned to advertise directly like cigarettes, tobacco, liquor, pan masala etc. Normally the brands which sell these products are Gold Flake, Wills Lifestyle, Mc Dowell's, Imperial Blue etc.

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International Journal of Management s h a n l a x # S I N C E 1 9 9 0 It is a sort of promotion which effectively upholds or empowers the restricted items like liquor, cigarettes, skillet masala, and so on in hiding the character of another item. This promoting utilizes club soda, mineral water, music CD, playing a card game, and so forth to impart the brand to the clients. The prohibited item isn't directed to clients straightforwardly; however, it disguises another item with same name. In such a manner, when individuals saw these kinds of ads, individuals begin interfacing it with the fundamental item. Some of the surrogate advertising brands in India are Bacardi Blast music CDs, Bagpiper club soda to Officer's Choice playing cards etc. (Lamb, et al.) Some of the surrogate advertisers are Wills, Manik-chand, Bacardi, Kingfisher, Aristocrat, Smirnoff, Seagram, etc.
The inception of surrogate advertising is said to be originated in Great Britain. The housewives of England started protesting when their husbands started domestic violence after consuming liquor, brandy, whisky. The protest aggravated to such an extent that advertisements of the alcoholic were completely banned and outlawed. Then the alcohol companies started a new form of advertisement called surrogate advertisement where the name of these alcoholic products were hidden in other advertisements and brands. In India surrogate advertising dates back to 1995, when Cable TV Regulation Act 1995 made a stricture that "No advertisement shall be permitted which promotes directly or indirectly, production, sale or consumption of cigarettes, tobacco products, wine, alcohol, liquor or other intoxicants". Some familiar surrogate brands and their advertisements are: Review of Literature Nikita Agarwal (2018) has found out in her research that sometimes main products are sold very much with the help of products shown under surrogate advertising. Surprisingly in consumers mind alcohol products keep a special place and identity.
Varalakshmi (2013) The pattern followed by surrogate promotions could end up being shelter for huge and set up players since they bring about higher brand review esteem, along these lines assisting them with promoting their restricted items further. Substitute promotions have substantiated themselves a strapping & successful advertising methodology for the forbidden items. Sareen S. (2013) in her research stressed the measures, government has implemented legislations to curb the advertisements of forbidden products. Suryawanshi S.A. et. al. (2013) has pointed an important finding in her research that the intensification of surrogate advertising is so high that even kids of 14 to 15 years are influenced greatly and expose them to alcohols and liquors.
Rima Bharadwaj in her article -Surrogate Advertisements: A New Judicial Concern analyses that -so many enactments have been done like Cigarettes & Other Tobacco Products (Prohibition of advertisement and regulation of trade and commerce, production, supply and distribution) Act, 2003 by the legislature and judiciary to protect the non-smokers and children from becoming passive smokers.

Objectives
The proposed study is aimed to achieve the following specified objectives: • To recognize the buying behavior of the consumers with respect to surrogate advertisement.

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International Journal of Management s h a n l a x # S I N C E 1 9 9 0 • To perceive the consciousness of surrogate advertisement.

Research Methodology
As in the study descriptive research design is been used the mode of collection of data was primary using the questionnaire as a medium. The survey was conducted with the people living in Bhubaneswar. The responses were collected online from 117 people from different parts of the city.

Data Analysis
When the information was sorted out in Microsoft Excel, distinct insights were led on the fundamental segments like age, gender, and important factors related to the topic. In Table 1, it can be seen that 64 female respondents and 53 male respondents were there.

Chart 1: Gender
Chart 1 depicts that 55% of the respondents were female and 45% of the respondents were male.  Table 2 showing number of respondents belongs to different age groups. In the age group of 18-25, there were 40 respondents. 29 respondents belong to 26-35, 23 belong to 36-45 and 25 belong to 46 and above.

Chart 2: Age
Chart 2 above is indicating number of respondents belong to different age groups. It is clearly seen that majority of the respondents were youth.  Table 3 depicts that 71 out of 117 respondents were aware about surrogate advertisement and 46 were not aware.

Chart 3: Awareness about Surrogate Advertisement
Chart 3 shows 61% of the respondents were aware whereas 39% don't.  Table 4 is indicating that peer group and advertisements influence a consumer while choosing a brand in case of banned products. Chart 4 below shows that 35 consumers said that they got influenced by advertisement whereas 36 consumers said that they got influenced by the peer group.

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International Journal of Management s h a n l a x # S I N C E 1 9 9 0 Chart 4: Factors Influencing Choosing a Brand Table 5 depicts 42 said yes that advertisements change the perception of the brands. 28 respondents disagree with that. Chart 5 shows that 36% of the respondents agree that advertisements change the perception of the brands. Chart 5: Do Advertisements Change the Perception of the Brands? Table 6 represents 40 said yes that they buy product after watching advertisements. 39 respondents disagreed with the statement. Chart 6 shows that 35% of the respondents agree that advertisements influence them to buy whereas 33% said no.   Table 7 represents TV advertisements have more impact on consumer.

Chart 7: Which Type of Ads have an Impact on Consumer?
Chart 7 depicts 44 respondents said that TV advertisements have greater impact than any other type of advertisements.  Table 8 is showing that influence of celebrity in case of surrogate advertisements is quite high. We

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International Journal of Management s h a n l a x # S I N C E 1 9 9 0 can see that from the table above that 26% have the opinion that it has high impact and 15% said it has a very high impact.

Chart 8: Influence of Celebrity in Surrogate Advertisements
Chart 8 above depicts that 30 and 18 respondents were having the opinion that celebrity influences purchase in case of surrogate advertisements highly and very highly respectively.  Table 9 shows 45 respondents said that there is an increased consumption of these types of products due to advertisements, whereas 44 said there is no impact of advertisements on these banned products.

Chart 9: Impact of Ads on Consumption of Products
Chart 9 indicates the impact of advertisements on the consumption of these products. It is clear from the above column chart that most consumers said there is an increased impact.  Table 10 shows 42 respondents said that interesting content can make surrogate advertisements attractive followed by 34 said use of celebrities can make it interesting. 23 said event sponsorship will make it interesting whereas 18 said it has to be informative.

Chart 10: Ways of making Surrogate
Advertisements Attractive  Table 11 indicates different perceptions of the respondents about surrogate advertisements. 30 respondents said they are informative. 21 said they are misguiding. 28 said they are harmful. 26 said they are entertaining. 12 said they provoke to consume more.

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International Journal of Management s h a n l a x # S I N C E 1 9 9 0 • H0: There is no association between gender and awareness about surrogate advertisements • H1: There is an association between gender and awareness about surrogate advertisements  In our society these banned products are consumed more by male than female. So in this paper we have made an attempt whether the awareness is more with the male members than females. Keeping that in view we have used a chi-square test to see whether there is any association between gender and awareness level towards surrogate advertisements. Form the above Table 12(b) it can be seen that the p value for the chi-square test result is 0.000, which is < 0.05 and significant. The H0 here is rejected and hence it can be concluded that there is an association between gender and awareness about surrogate advertisements. • H0: There is no association between age groups and opinions regarding surrogate ads change perception to buy products • H1: There is an association between age groups and opinions regarding surrogate ads change perception to buy products  Keeping in view whether these advertisements appeal all age groups equally or it attracts any specific age group, we have made an attempt to check whether there is any association between age groups and opinions regarding surrogate ads change perception to buy products. It has been seen in the above table 13(b) that the chi-square test result for the same is 0.046 which is < 0.05 and it is considered to be significant. Hence it can be considered that the H0 here is rejected and there is an association between age groups and opinions regarding surrogate ads change perception to buy products. That indicates that it appeals a particular age group instead all age groups.

Conclusion
Out of several paths surrogate advertising is one way of promoting some products which have been banned to advertise directly like cigarettes, tobacco, liquor, pan masala etc. From the data analysis it has been concluded that 39% of the respondents were not aware about the concept. Advertisements and peer groups influence mostly to consume such products. In 36% of the cases the advertisements change the perception about the brands. 34% of the respondents buy such products after watching advertisements. TV advertisements have more influence than any other mode of advertisements. Influence of celebrities in case of surrogate advertisements is quite high. A major chunk of people believe that advertisements Shanlax International Journal of Management s h a n l a x # S I N C E 1 9 9 0 provoke them to consume more. From the analysis it has been found that awareness about surrogate advertisements is dependent on gender. Also opinions of the respondents regarding surrogate ads change perception to buy products, is dependent on age. That indicates it appeals a particular age group instead all age groups.