U.S. ads called boon to image

By Jeff Billington, The Tulsa World
November 29, 2006

Jami Fullerton believes a 2002 advertising campaign by the State Department improved the United States' image in the Middle East and Indonesia.

Fullerton, an associate professor of advertising at Oklahoma State University, shared her thoughts Tuesday at the Tulsa Press Club Page One luncheon regarding the media campaign, sponsored by the State Department, that was presented for five weeks in 2002.

She and Alice Kendrick, a professor in the Temerlin Advertising Institute at Southern Methodist University, are the co-authors of "Advertising's War on Terrorism: The Story of the U.S. State Department's Shared Value Initiative."

The book describes what went wrong, and what went right, with the initiative and how to change the country's approach to public diplomacy.

"We present some impressive research suggesting advertising could promote America's reputation abroad," Fullerton said.

The goal of the initiative was to convince the Muslim and Arab world that the United States isn't waging war on Islam. The effort supplied print and television spots depicting several Muslims living and working in the U.S.

The broadcast advertisements, which Fullerton described as "testimonial style, slice-of-life commercials," aired in several Middle Eastern and Asian countries between late October and December 2002. The advertisements appeared in nine different languages.

Fullerton said the initiative was a disappointment to the State Department and wasn't supported by many U.S. ambassadors. Some foreign governments described the ad campaign as propaganda, she said.

But Fullerton said her research showed the program to be successful.

"There was a focus on faith, family and learning -- values considered shared by us and people in the Middle East," she said.

Fullerton and Kendrick, while researching material for their book, performed testing with international students in London, Cairo and Singapore in order to gauge their feelings toward the ad campaign.

"Basically, we asked the question, 'Was the program successful?' " she said.

The two found that the attitude toward the United States government improved as did the opinion on how Muslims are treated in this country.

They found that 91 million Indonesians were aware of the commercials.

"It not only got people talking about Muslim life in America, it also produced more positive perceptions of America," she said.