Multi-platform communication is becoming the norm as media practice has been changing with the growth of technologies that put viewers in more control and introduce interactivity. This chapter focuses on the Turkish cross-platform advertising campaign, Tweet Village for Sekerbank that received a bronze prize in 2015 at Cannes Lions, which is globally regarded as the most important festival in the field of creative communication. The campaign focused on thousands of family farmers who quit farming to migrate to urban cities in order to support those who resisted leaving. The campaign involves multiple platforms, such as social media, print advertisements, outdoor advertisements and radio spots which make it a successful case for explaining the use of storytelling in cross-media advertising. The case of Tweet Village was evaluated through Berger's (2013) criteria for sharing the campaign's message online as well as Chiu et al.'s (2012) brand story elements.
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Considering the growth of technologies that put the viewer in more control and introduce interactivity, media practice has been changing toward a more connected system. Multi-platform or cross-media communication is becoming the norm in such a complex and multi-faceted media environment. In terms of advertising, cross-media advertising campaigns have the potential to achieve the broad reach essential for successful branding efforts (Taylor et al., 2013, p. 200). The interaction between the media used in an advertising campaign is a significant element of successful and effective campaigns. As the media is evolving into a more synergistic system, advertising must understand and adapt to this new way of media consumption.
Neijens and Voorveld (2011, pp. 363-364) surveyed academic articles on advertisements using multiple media and identified several reasons for their success compared to single medium campaigns. By using multiple media, the target group can be extended, the campaign can benefit from the strength of each media, wear-out effects of repetition can be reduced and synergy can be created which results in the combined effect of multiple marketing communication activities exceeding the sum of their individual effects. It is also noted that encoding variability will increase the complexity of information encoded as well as source credibility. Academic articles surveyed also showed that exposure to an advertisement in one medium enhances processing of following advertisements in other media.
Campaigns utilizing multiple channels are more effective than single channel ones (Neijens & Voorveld, 2011, p. 365) because of synergy effects. Although synergy is important in advertising campaigns utilizing multiple platforms, television can still stimulate sales among the target audience who are exposed (Taylor et al., 2013, p. 206) and is still very important in the media mix (Neijens & Voorveld, 2011, p. 365). Despite the wide-ranging spread of digital media, television advertising continues to drive sales (Taylor et al., 2013, p. 206). If increasing sales is the ultimate objective, advertising combined with direct sales proves to be the most effective strategy (Neijens & Voorveld, 2011, p. 365).
Aleksandrovs et al. (2015, p. 454) show that if creating interest in the brand is the main objective of the advertising campaign, increasing the budget of the campaign does not have a large impact on the objective. Taking the advertising campaign objectives and media used into consideration, certain media were utilized more with certain goals. Social networking and consumer involvement activities were more likely to be used to re-energize the customer base. Websites, PR and events were employed more when rectifying negative publicity or declining equity. When challenged with a low budget, television advertisements were combined with viral videos, word-of-mouth initiatives, website activities, TV program sponsorship, branded content. Direct mail was more likely to be used in collaboration with WOM or viral in addition to direct mail. Campaigns with WOM viral and social networking were more likely to draw on PR and events (Romaniuk et al., 2012, p. 9).