Attention-Interest-Desire-Action (“AIDA” of marketing)

Entry in progress—B.P.
 
Wikipedia: AIDA (marketing)
AIDA is an acronym used in marketing that describes a common list of events that are very often undergone when a person is selling a product or service:
 
. A - Attention (Awareness): attract the attention of the customer.
. I - Interest: raise customer interest by focusing on and demonstrating advantages and benefits (instead of focusing on features, as in traditional advertising).
. D - Desire: convince customers that they want and desire the product or service and that it will satisfy their needs.
. A - Action: lead customers towards taking action and/or purchasing.
 
Nowadays some have added another letter to form AIDA(S):

. S - Satisfaction - satisfy the customer so they become a repeat customer and give referrals to a product.
 
Marketing today allows a diversty of products. Using a system like this, allows a general understanding of how to target a market effectively. A.I.D.A however is a acronym that is necessary to learn in marketing.
 
Moving from step to step you lose some percent of prospects. This process is shown as “AIDA Inverted Triangle” figure. To improve AIDA Inverted Triangle sometimes it’s recommend to split AIDA formula into two pair of promotional steps: 1) Attention + Interest 2) Desire + Action.
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Media
Quote: “A-I-D-A. Attention, interest, decision, action.” — Blake (Alec Baldwin), Glengarry Glen Ross (1992).
 
New Developments
Later evolutions of the theory have edited the AIDA steps. New phases such as conviction (AIDAC) and satisfaction (AIDAS) have been added.

One significant modification of the model was its reduction to three steps (CAB):

. Cognition (Awareness or learning)
. Affect (Feeling, interest or desire)
. Behaviour (Action).
 
Along with these developments came a more flexible view of the order in which the steps are taken, suggesting that different arrangements of the model might prove more effective for different consumer-to-product relationships.
         
Wikipedia: Aida
Aida (sometimes spelled Aïda, pronounced /ɑːˈiːdə/ ah-EE-də, from Arabic: عايدة‎, pronounced [ˈʕaːjdah] ) an Arabic female name meaning “visitor” or “returning”) is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Antonio Ghislanzoni, based on a scenario written by French Egyptologist Auguste Mariette (although there are scholars who argue that the scenario was really written by Temistocle Solera). It was first performed at the Khedivial Opera House in Cairo on December 24, 1871 conducted by Giovanni Bottesini.
   
Wikipedia: E. St. Elmo Lewis
E. St. Elmo Lewis (1872-1948) was an American advertising advocate—he wrote and spoke prolifically about the potential of advertising to educate the public. He was the co-founder/first president of the Association of National Advertisers. Lewis was inducted into the Advertising Hall of Fame posthumously, in 1951.
 
Lewis authored a number of books including Financial Advertising and Getting the Most Out of Business. In 1911, he gave a speech before the American Bankers Association, titled “The Savings Idea and the People,” advocating that savings bankers adopt a policy of “aggressive conservation,” wherein they recognize that in order to make savings a national trait, they must acknowledge that “they are here as an economic necessity, representing the principle of the conservation of human effort, and that in order to conserve they have a duty for which they must fight, educate, plead and teach the people…”
     
A Review and Critique of the Hierachy of Effects in Advertising
By Thomas E. Barry and Daniel J. Howard
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Table 2 A summary of popular hierarchy models preceding the Lavidge-Steiner model
YEAR             MODEL                               DEVELOPER       COMMENT
1898 AID         Attention, Interest, Desire             E St. Elmo Lewis Developed as a sales guide for salesmen to be successful in moving a prospect to buy.
Circa 1900 AIDA Attention, Interest, Desire, Action     E St. Elmo Lewis Added the action stage as necessary to convince salesmen to move buyer prospects through complete selling process.
1910 AICA       Attention, Interest, Conviction, Action Printers Ink Editorial The first mention of the hierarchy model for advertising use, a complete advertisement must follow this model of persuasion.
1911 AIDAS     Attention, Interest, Desire, Action, Satisfaction Arthur F. Sheldon Added “Permanent satisfaction” as a necessary part of the persuasive and long-run selling process; the final stage not carried through to contemporary literature.
1915 AICCA     Attention, Interest, Confidence, Conviction Action Samuel R. Hall The necessary steps in writing a good, persuasive advertisement.
 
21 March 1906, Winnipeg (Manitoba, Canada) Free Press, “Ethical Facts For Business Men; A. F. Sheldon Speaks of Basic Principles Underlying Commercial Success,” pg. 7, col. 2:
He also gave technical advice in regard to closing a sale. A customer was to be led through the various stages of attention, interest, desire, until the resolve to purchase was developed. The salesman should be ready to grasp the psychological moment. Mr. Sheldon claimed that all his teachings were of the kind which if followed would produce dividends.
   
Google Books
24 April 1906, The Electrical Magazine, pg. 248, col. 2:
An advertisement, of whatever kind, should do four things: first, attract atttention; second, arouse interest; third, create desire; fourth, bring about resolve to buy.
 
25 September 1906, Syracuse (NY) Post-Standard, pg. 4, col. 3:
The Art of Advertising.
Business Philosopher.
Recently a business philosopher has analyzed pulling letters and drawing ads with the result that both, in their essential points, are married by the same construction. This thinker has discovered that all letters and all ads, to be truly effective must carry the reader successfully through these four mental stages: Attention, Interest, Desire and Resolve.
     
Google Books
November 1906, Salesmanship, “All That Selling Comprehends” by Frank E. Long (President, The Long Critchfield Corporation, Chicago), pg. 192, col. 2:
Even the advertising of such a firm, provided the firm does advertise, is conducted along independent lines, with little regard as to whether or not it is the kind of advertising that will attract attention, arouse interest, create desire, and lead to resolve.
   
9 March 1909, Belleville (IL) News Democrat, pg. 2 ad:
TALKS ON ADVERTISING
XII.—Considering
the Ad. In Its parts
By Henry Herbert Huff
COPYRIGHT, 1909, BY AMERICAN PRESS ASSOCIATION
“Mr. Business Man, if you wanted to learn how an alarm clock is constructed you would very likely take it apart. Let us examine the advertisement in the same way. We can get it together again, as there are but four pieces. I was saying in my last talk that the advertisement is an application of the laws of salesmanship. Consequently the same elements will appear in it—attention, interest and desire, convincing the will and the resolve to buy. Our next four talks will take these up in order, discussing each at some length.
         
Chronicling America
26 March 1909, Paducah (KY) Evening Sun, pg. 7, col. 4 ad:
5. Business Psychology—How to bring about Attention, Interest, Desire and Resolve—the four mental steps in every sale.
(The Sheldon School, Chicago, Ill., by Arthur Frederick Sheldon—ed.)
 
Google Books
Read’s Lessons in Salesmanship
By Harlan E. Read
Chicago, IL: J. A. Lyons & Company
1910  
Pg. 90:
Please notice the order in which these topics are named; audience, attention, interest, desire, action. This is the order in which you will have to present your argument.
 
6 May 1911, Duluth (MN) News-Tribune, “Salesmen Hear Striaght Talk,”  pg. 7:
So declared the editor of the Business Philosopher, Arthur Sheldon, in his address at the Commercial club last evening on “The Science of Business Building.”
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The customer must be made to pass through six mental stages—favorable attention, interest, desire, action, confidence and satisfaction and when this was accomplished he would be the desired “permanent and profitable patron.”
 
Google Books
The Science of Business
By Arthur Frederick Sheldon
Textbook C: The Advertisement
Chicago, IL: Arthur Frederick Sheldon
1917
Pg. 61:
For when all is said the advertisement is simply a news carrier developed to its highest degree, and designed to do in general four things, namely, (1) to attract attention; (2) to arouse sufficient interest so as to induce investigation; (3) to create desire for the goods or services advertised; (4) to stimulate the will to favorable action.
     
Google Books
Outdoor Advertising
By Wilmot Lippincott
Published by McGraw-Hill Book Company, Inc.
1923
Pg. 68:   
The writer remembers having read somewhere a formula for all advertising, which is well worth remembering. This is A-I-D-A, which can easily be memorized, as it spells the name of a famous opera. The letters stand for Attention, Interest, Desire, Action.
 
Google Books
Practical Advertising:
Its principles and its functions in the sales plan
By Herbert Field King
New York, NY: D. Appleton and Company
1933
Pg. 361:
A Attention
I Interest
D Desire
A Action
   
Google Books
How To Be A Successful Secretary
By Louise Hollister Scott
New York, NY: Harper & Brothers
1937
Pg. 35:
Remember that the letter should meet the same tests that a good advertisement of any product or service should meet—the tests suggested by words whose first letters spell AIDA: it should attract favorable Attention, create Interest, arouse Desire, and result in Action.
   
Google Books
Theory and Practice of Composition
By United States. Government Printing Office
Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office
1950
Pg. 242:
...keeping in mind four essentials which are indicated by the four initials, AIDA, representing Attention, Interest, Desire, and Action
   
Google Books
Salesmanship:
Principles and methods of effective selling
By Alfred Gross
New York, NY: Ronald Press Co.
1952
Pg. 139:
The four letters AIDA refer to the four terms: attention, interest, desire, action.
   
Google Books
Profitable Roadside Marketing:
A practical digest of principles for successful roadside market operation
By Robert Bain Donaldson and William F. Johnstone
Published by College Science Publishers
1955
Pg. 123:
Ask yourself if your ad has “AIDA Power.” Does it get Attention — arouse Interest — create Desire — stimulate Action?
     
Google Books
How to write for the world of work
By Thomas E. Pearsall and Donald H. Cunningham
Published by Holt, Rinehart and Winston
1978
Pg. 72:
The basic secret lies in the direct-mail writer’s organizational formula AIDA, an acronym for attention, interest, desire, action.
 
YouTube
Alec Baldwin - Best performance
DavidSalomon
October 26, 2006
In Glengarry Glen Ross, Alec Baldwin plays the character Blake, almost earning Baldwin an Oscar for the role. The salestalk presented is one of the finest ever, allthough sarcastic, it contains the foundations of a well meditated salesmen.
 
Google Books
Does Your Marketing Sell?:
The secret of effective marketing communications
By Ian Moore
Published by Nicholas Brealey Publishing
2005
Pg. 254 (APPENDIX: The origins of AIDA):
Here’s an excerpt from The Psychology of Selling and Advertising (1925, by Edward Kellogg Strong, Professor of Psychology, Graduate School of Business, Stanford University—ed.) that gives an insight into AIDA’s more distant origins:
 
“Many changes in selling procedure have of necessity been made in the past fifteen years. Among them is the growing recognition of the buyer’s point of view.
Pg. 255:
The development of the famous slogan—‘attention, interest, desire, action, satisfaction’ == illustrates this. [Note that Strong considered it famous by 1925.] In 1898 E St. Elmo Lewis used the slogan, ‘Attract attention, maintain interest, create desire,’ in a course he was giving on advertising in Philadelphia. he writes he obtained the idea from reading the psychology of William James. Later on he added to the formule, ‘get action.’ [Stop right there! They didn’t.] About 1907, A.F. Sheldon made the further addition of ‘permanent satisfaction’ as essential to the slogan.”
 
So it would seem that if anyone can be credited with developing the AIDA model (though not the acronym), it is the wonderfully named E St. Elmo Lewis. Strong himself refers to the version that includes the fifth element, satisfaction, as “this slogan of Lewis and Sheldon.”
 
While striving to promote his own “buying formula,” Strong did recognize the impact of the Lewis-SHeldon model. He wrote that it “has had a very profound effect upon the seeling world” and that “the formula has caused order to come out of chaos.” Writing in 1925, he acknowledged that the “majority of books and articles since 1907 have endorsed the slogan in one form or another.”