Communicative Adequacy of Linguistics Features Incorporated in the Design of the National Microfinance Bank Commercial Advertisements in Tanzania

Abstract

This study investigated the communicative adequacy of linguistic features employed in the design of commercial advertisements for the National Microfinance Bank (NMB) in Tanzania. A qualitative research approach and an analytical research design were used. The study employed a population of 250 NMB commercial advertisements, six direct sales officers and a sample of 153 advertisements and three direct salespeople as the representatives of the entire population. A content analysis with an observation checklist for commercial advertisements was used to collect and analyze the sampled advertisements, whereas the interview schedule was used to collect data from NMB direct sales officers. The study concludes that NMB advertisers used a variety of features in their advertising language such as capitalization, different forms of lexicon and varying types of sentences in an effort to capture readers' attention and to impress readers with the quality of their products or services. In grammar perspectives, the language used flouted Grice’s maxims of effective communication. However, the viewers or readers could easily understand the meaning implied. The use of both English and Kiswahili facilitated communication in the country with linguistic diversity and the use of short sentences and phrases was the best strategy to facilitate readability much as the vocabulary used was extensive and vibrant. The study recommends that NMB designers should keep using graphology and layout of advertisements for they reinforce sufficient communication and arouse interests in readers. Furthermore, NMB should continue using code-mixing and code-switching for the strategies tend to effectively grab the attention of customers.