INTRODUCTION

The study looked at the influence of advertising on consumers’ purchasing behaviour of toothpaste in Uyo Urban. The survey research method was used for this study with population of 436,606. Data were gathered using questionnaire from four hundred respondents. However, three hundred and eighty copies were completed and returned valid for the study. The objectives of the study were to: determine whether consumers in Uyo Urban have access or are exposed to advertisement on toothpaste; ascertain if advertising influences Uyo Urban consumers’ purchasing behaviour of toothpaste; determine if advertising increases Uyo Urban consumers’ preference for a particular brand of toothpaste and to determine if there are other factors than advertisement that influence Uyo Urban consumers’ buying behaviour of particular toothpaste brand. With Uses and Gratifications and Cognitive Dissonance theories of communication as theoretical frameworks, it was found out from the study that: toothpaste consumers in Uyo Urban were exposed to advertisements on toothpaste brands; advertising did not influence consumers’ purchasing behaviour of toothpaste brands in Uyo; although consumers' of toothpaste in Uyo Urban are exposed to advertisements of different toothpaste brands, it did not increase their preference of their toothpaste brand and that there are other factors than advertisement that influence Uyo Urban consumers of toothpaste brands. Based on the findings, the researcher recommended majorly that advertisers of toothpaste meant for Uyo market should not only rely on advertisement to sell their products but should incorporate other factors like affordable price, quality taste and satisfaction that will be derived from using the product, packaging, etc. to help influence the patronage of the advertised product.

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

Advertisement is one of the major tools used to stimulate consumer's demand for goods and services. In other to know the influence of advertisement on consumer's behaviour, it is necessary to know what advertising itself is and its goal and purpose. Wikipedia (2018) defines advertising as, "an audio or visual form of marketing communication that employs an openly sponsored service or idea. Advertising is differentiated from public relations in that an advertiser pays for and has control over the message. It differs from personal selling in that, the message is not directed to particular individual. 

Advertising is communicated through various mass media including traditional media such as newspapers, magazines, television, radio, outdoor advertising or direct mail and new media like blogs, social websites or text messages. The actual presentation of the medium is referred to as an advertisement or "ad" for short. Terence (2007) defines advertising as a paid, mediated form of communication from an identifiable source, designed to persuade the receiver to take some action, now or in the future. The basic purpose of advertising is to communicate the news to the user or the customer that there is something new in the market. Beyond the above stated purpose of advertising, it also serves as the source to persuade or attract customer about the product to do a certain action which is usually to purchase a product (Kenneth and Donald, 2010). 

   Advertising serves a good purpose for business nowadays (Onunkwo, 1997) because of the number of goods and services produced every day. Advertising helps in telling the consumer about any new product or service or any new promotion on the existing product and service. Advertising helps to describe the features and characteristics of products or services in the visual form so that the customer can understand it easily. So advertising has become important for business nowadays (Bardi, 2010)

A good advertisement persuades the customers to the final purchase and keeps them motivated to do a certain action (Kenneth and Donald, 2010). So advertisement has an important role to play in today’s business. Advertisement not only persuade the customers to buy but also gives them the options that can be considered when they go out to purchase and to distinguish the products among many. So when the customers go to purchase anything, he will once think that there is a certain product with certain features (Agwu, 2013: Ikpefan, Owolabi and Agwu, 2014). It has also been such a persuasive and intrusive socio-economic force in Nigeria, as in other countries, that neither manufacturer nor consumers can ignore it (Bardi, 2010; Edwin, 2014).

Advertising is generally accepted as an essential service to the industry and the public. Its effectiveness depends largely on the audience; it is the way audience perceives the information that is very important. Today, advertising is constructed to make a favourable impact on the behaviour of consumers to patronize organizations offerings. It is used by philanthropic organizations to raise funds for social welfare projects. So it can be seen that advertisement cuts across all aspects of social, political, and economic life. It is necessary to say at this point that an advertising campaign is considered successful only when the consumer themselves have begun to appreciate and talk about the product, service or idea. 

Ampofo (2014) notes that consumers are final users of products. They keep the production circle moving. A firm’s primary mission is to reach prospective customer’s attitudes and buying behaviour. They spend a lot of money to keep individuals (market) interested in their products. To succeed, they need to understand what makes potential customers behave the way they do. The firm's goal is to get enough relevant market data to develop accurate profiles of buyers to find out the common group for communication. 

As a communication medium, advertising invades our streets, offices, villages, and homes pushing in messages about various products and services, ideas, persons (dead or alive) and institutions through various media outlets (Ozoh, 1998). It does this intensively and persistently that it is only our natural abilities to selectively perceive and recall information that saved us from the thraldom of what communication experts have described as "information overload" (Nwosu, 1990).

According to Ukessays (2017) "consumer's behaviour is defined as the behaviour that the consumer shows in searching for, purchasing, using, evaluating, and disposing of products, services and ideas that they expect will satisfy their needs.

  Thakur (2017) defines consumer’s behaviour as the behaviour that consumer displays in searching for, purchasing, evaluating, and disposing of products, services, and ideas that they expect will satisfy them. The author further cites Philip Kotler who says that consumer behaviour is all psychological customers as they become aware to evaluate, purchase, consume, and tell others about products and services. Individual behaviour is influenced by economic, social, cultural, psychological and personal factors.  

More would be discussed in details on advertising and importantly on the impact it plays on stimulating consumer's behaviour towards patronizing a given product especially consumer's goods. 

The study of consumer behaviour is concerned not only with what consumers buy, but also with why they buy it, and how often they buy it. It is concerned with learning the specific meaning that products hold for consumers. 

Advertising is seen by scholars as a tool used to stimulate consumer's buying behaviour by ways of getting them informed or remind them about a product but it must persuade them. There are other ways which can be used to determine consumer's loyalty. Knowing fully well that advertisers spend money to advertise their products on the media and if these products are not accepted or patronized, they will not get value for their money, this researcher, therefore, sought to investigate how advertisements of toothpastes are accessed by Uyo Urban consumers and whether the ads influence their searching, purchasing, using, evaluating, and disposing of toothpastes.