Open Access

Nicole Denise Munz

• Advertising plays a major role in a company’s marketing activities, especially today, where people are surrounded by a massive number of advertisements in daily life. Therefore, it is important to know how advertising design can be applied in such a way that is able to attract interest and to stand out against competition. When it comes to comprehension of international advertising, cultural aspects should be taken into consideration as well. The aim of this paper is to identify and compare cultural and societal characteristics in advertising design by detailed examination of Japanese and Western culture, predominantly Germany, to accomplish cultural comprehension. Literature research and analysis represent the chosen method in order to achieve this aim. Furthermore, examples of Japanese and German consumer goods advertising shall be analysed and compared. In the course of this paper it was pointed out that Japan has a high number of unique cultural aspects and is different in many aspects compared to Germany. This is observable in advertising design as well.