“Create Your Taste” advertising by McDonald’s

This article analyzes the “Create Your Taste” advertising campaign by McDonald’s in Australia, its target audience, market trends, and effectiveness using AIDA, Innovation-Adoption, and Information Processing models.

Running head: “CREATE YOUR TASTE” ADVERTISING BY MCDONALD’S
“Create Your Taste” advertising by McDonald’s
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1“CREATE YOUR TASTE” ADVERTISING BY MCDONALD’S
McDonald’s, one of the leading brands in the fast food industry, was established
in the year 1940 in California; it was only in 1971 that the company opened its first
outlet in Australia. Since then, more than nine hundred stores have opened up in
different parts of Australia (McDonald’s Australia 2016). In 2015, McDonald’s
launched an advertising campaign that highlighted its new service “Create Your Taste”;
McDonald’s in Australia functions quite differently than the rest of the world, and the
introduction of this new service immediately garnered attention of people all over
Australia (McDonald’s Australia 2016). An advertisement was run in the B&T
Magazine in Australia, which emphasized on this new, innovative campaign (See
Appendix 1). The advertisement, a colorful depiction of the “Create Your Taste” service
offered by the brand can be analyzed to get an idea of the target audience, the prevalent
market trends and market segments, so as to study the effectiveness of the campaign as
a whole.
McDonald’s faced severe competition from numerous fast food chains in
Australia, which included other American companies like KFC; however, the rise of
new and local fast food brands further adversely affected the sales of the company.
Before the launch of the campaign, McDonald’s observed a growth of only five percent,
which can be called negligible (Browne and Han 2015). However, it must be mentioned
that due to the advancement of technology and innovation, the fast food industry in
Australia has an annual revenue of nearly 14.8 billion dollars out of which 4.2 billion is
acquired by the burger shops, like McDonald’s (Bigliardi and Galati 2013). McDonald’s
which has made quite a name for itself selling affordable and delicious fast food to its
customers is one of the most beloved and frequently opted for burger shops all over
Australia; as a result, it holds more than thirty per cent of the market share (Rodrigues,
Nikhil and Jacob 2016). To enhance the declining sales rates, the “Create Your Taste”
campaign was rolled out to all McDonald’s outlets across the country. The target
market in this case was the Generation X and Generation Y customers; McDonald’s
aimed its marketing strategy at the younger audience because this demographic was
deemed twice as more likely to consume junk food on a regular basis (Bernhardt et al.
2014). The target market would also be adults, belonging to the millennial generation,
who have certain expectations as far as quality of the food is concerned. Market
segmentation (psychographic, in this case) was carried out keeping in mind the
expectations of the customers; for instance, the target group of the marketing campaign

2“CREATE YOUR TASTE” ADVERTISING BY MCDONALD’S
was estimated to have certain set standards in mind, with regards to the service provided
and were not ready to compensate. The purpose of executing such a marketing and
advertising plan was to increase the sales rates by at least 15 per cent in the six months
following implementation and to improve profit generation by a margin of nearly 16 per
cent (Rodrigues, Nikhil and Jacob 2016). Nevertheless, it is important to measure the
effectiveness of the advertising campaign; this has been done through a few models, like
the AIDA framework, the Innovation – Adoption model and the Information Processing
Model.
The AIDA model, which is an acronym for attention, interest, desire and action,
is a marketing theory which specifies the stages that a customer goes through from the
time he or she first comes to know about the product or service to the time when he
actually acts on it (Rawal 2013).
 The advertisement, which contains a fine balance of graphics and information,
would immediately grab the attention of customer; moreover, this is a brand
new feature that was initially exclusive to Australia.
 At this point, the interest of the audience is piqued; he or she is intrigued by the
fact that customers would now be able to design their own burgers.
 To further attract the customer and to trigger desire, the advertisement features
in brief some information about the service they are offering.
 The advertisement calls for action because it invites the customers to try the
new service; it immediately appeals to the loyal customer base that McDonald’s
already has.
The Innovation-Adoption Model takes it one step further and provides a step by
step account of a customer’s actions once he or she comes across the advertisement
(Wisdom et al. 2014). In the cognitive stage of the model, the customer comes across
the “Create Your Taste” advertisement and becomes aware of the service. In the
affective stage, he develops an interest in the service and attempts to try it out; in the
final behavior stage of the model, he actually tries out the product and comes to a
conclusion with regards to his feelings about it. If the customer is satisfied with the
service, he or she is likely to return, thus strengthening brand loyalty. The Information
Processing Model lays emphasis on the way a customer perceives and reacts to the
information presented to him (Libby 2017). It also throws light on the ability of a

3“CREATE YOUR TASTE” ADVERTISING BY MCDONALD’S
customer to retain the information which he deems important or relevant; thus, the
advertisement which clearly highlights the key features of the service would be easier
for the customer to retain.
To conclude, it can be said that the McDonald’s “Create Your Taste” campaign was
quite successful; the fact that the customers could now customize their own burgers
gave the brand a competitive edge over others. As a result of the advertising campaign,
the company was able to optimize its revenue generation and improve overall sales
rates. The application of the AIDA model, the Information Processing Model and the
Innovation Adoption model demonstrated the effectiveness of the released
advertisement.

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References:
Bernhardt, A.M., Wilking, C., Gottlieb, M., Emond, J. and Sargent, J.D., 2014.
Children’s reaction to depictions of healthy foods in fast-food television
advertisements. JAMA pediatrics, 168(5), pp.422-426.
Bigliardi, B. and Galati, F., 2013. Models of adoption of open innovation within the
food industry. Trends in Food Science & Technology, 30(1), pp.16-26.
Browne, R., & Han, E. (2015, January 11). Fast food evolution - global super-brands are
having to revent themselves. Retrieved from The Sydney Morning Herald:
http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/ fast-food-evolution--global-superbrands-are-having-to-
reinvent-themselves-to-keep-up-20150106- 12j7mc.html
Libby, R., 2017. Accounting and human information processing. In The Routledge
Companion to Behavioural Accounting Research (pp. 42-54). Routledge.
McDonald’s Australia. (2016). Macca’s Story. Retrieved from McDonalds:
https://mcdonalds.com. au/about-maccas/maccas-story
McDonalds Australia. (2016). Create Your Taste. Retrieved from McDonalds:
https://mcdonalds. com.au/create-your-taste
Rawal, P., 2013. AIDA Marketing Communication Model: Stimulating a purchase
decision in the minds of the consumers through a linear progression of
steps. International Journal of Multidisciplinary research in social & management
sciences, 1(1), pp.37-44.
Rodrigues, J., Nikhil, S. and Jacob, S. (2016). Promotional Strategies of McDonalds and
Market Effects. Journal of Management Research and Analysis, 3(1), p.53
Appendix:

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(Source: B&T Magazine, Australia)