Non-Muslims' Beliefs About Islmic Advertising: Another Exploratory Study in Malaysia

This paper aimed to explore Non-Muslim’s beliefs about Islamic advertising. Being exploratory in nature, this paper applied qualitative method of research by adapting thought elicitation technique of data collection. This method rests in the projective techniques of data collection, and is also known as ‘word association technique’. It allows free thinking of respondents that helps in generating rich data, most required in qualitative studies. When compared to Muslims, some similar as well as dissimilar beliefs were extracted regarding Islamic advertising. While they were categorized into the same dimensions (possibility, nature, characteristics, real-time decisions, and potential outcomes) as their Muslims counterparts, this research also extracted some different sub-dimensions, and some new dimensions (execution, common associations) altogether. This research adds another dimension to view the concept of Islamic advertising. Previously only Muslims’ views were available; this research added the non-Muslims’ perspective. It will help the advertisers carve their advertisements by taking into consideration these beliefs. With a growing concern for business ethics, this research is an attempt to bring Islamic ethics into advertising practice. This will not only eradicate the ill-effects of contemporary advertising, but will also provide sound evidence for revising advertising policies. It adds to the developing field of Islamic marketing, by being the first attempt of its kind in paving the way for Islamic advertising.