Samenvatting

The purpose of this report is to document research at The Hague University of Applied Sciences (THUAS) on the topic of the importance of culture in the differences in perceived effectiveness of advertisements between Surinamese and Dutch individuals in the Netherlands.
The researcher came up with this topic, because of the experienced misunderstandings that occurred within the researcher’s environment. On top of that, the mix of marketing and culture has always been of the researcher’s personal interest. This research contains the main question ‘What is the role of culture in the differences of perceived effectiveness of advertisements between the Surinamese and Dutch individuals in the Netherlands?’ In order to come to a conclusion, the following sub questions proved to be useful:
1. What is effective advertising?
2. What are the cultural profiles of the Surinamese and the Dutch?
3. How do the responses of the Dutch and Surinamese on the showed advertisement differ?
To get an idea how both Surinamese and Dutch individuals within the Netherlands are influenced by their culture while viewing advertisements, the decision has been made to use the AIDA model as advertising theory, and Trompenaars cultural theory. After an extensive comparison and reflection, and with the help of a comparison table and an organizational table, these theories have been proven to be the most suitable for this research. In addition to the theories, the choice has been made to carry out a questionnaire as well. The questionnaire was published online and was handed out on paper. In total, 50 respondents filled in the questionnaire. Since the number of respondents was not equally divided, 70% of the respondents were born in the Netherlands, thus 30% were born in Surinam, and it is considered as a limitation to this research. However, despite this limitation, this report revealed valuable insights. The results of the questionnaire have been compared with both the advertisement as the cultural theory and showed that 6 out of the 7 dimensions of Trompenaars cultural theory matched with the Surinamese, and only 3 out of 7 with the Dutch respondents. Therefore, it can be concluded that culture does play a significant role in the perceived effectiveness of advertisements, especially among the Surinamese in the Netherlands.
Therefore, the recommendation is to execute a follow up research on how businesses can address a multicultural society more effectively through advertisements. Due to the fact that advertising is the main channel of businesses communicating towards their customers, and the number of multicultural societies is increasing, further research is highly recommended. This has not been done in this research, since it would be preferable to write such a report in commission of a company.

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