Explain the communication process that applies to advertising and promotion
The transactional communication process is appropriate for product advertising and promotion. It assumes that people are connected via communication, and that they engage in transaction (Cairns 2001). In business promotion, it recognizes that both the business and the clients are senders, not merely a receiver, or a sender. Secondly, the transactional communication process model recognizes that communication has an effect on all the involved parties. As a result, communication is simultaneous. In product promotion, the business sends information as an advertisement to the customers. The target customers then respond to the advertisement by purchasing and providing product or service reviews. The business then acts on the customers’ reviews in order to improve the product before undertaking another advertisement. In this scenario, the communication process between the business and its customers is a continuous cycle in which the parties involved transact messages (Cairns 2001).
Explain the organisation of the advertising and promotion industry
The advertising and promotion industry is responsible for bringing a service or a product to the attention of consumers. It involves the adoption of strategies to keep the service or product in the minds of consumers, and stimulation for continued demand for it. The advertisement and promotional industry is closely interlinked with distribution and sales departments (Chandon, Wansink & Laurent 2000). Advertisement and promotions often feature in one or more channels, such as film theatres, television, and print media. Firms involved in the advertisement and promotion industry also publish posters, leaflets, and billboards, in order to advertise and promote their services or products. Majority of the companies in this industry strive to achieve publicity. Publicity personnel are responsible for ensuring that the product or service appears in the press, besides other forms of paid advertisement (Chandon, Wansink & Laurent 2000).
Asses how promotion is regulated
There are several rules restricting what advertisers can and cannot do. In the UK, all the marketing and promotions must meet three important conditions. The first condition is that all marketing and promotion must be legal, truthful and honest (Mangold & Faulds 2009). The second condition is that the promotion should be prepared with a sense of responsibility to the society and consumers. The last condition is that the promotion must respect the principles of fair competition that are generally accepted in business (Mangold & Faulds 2009). These three conditions are embodied in the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations. This regulation implies that the advertisement should not harass or mislead consumers. For instance, including deceptive or false messages, using aggressive sales techniques, and leaving important information is illegal.
Explain current trends in advertising and promotion including the impact of ICT
The first trend is the use of quick response (QR) code, which is a two dimensional symbol similar to the Universal Product Code (UPC) (Mangold & Faulds 2009). The QR code produces certain digital action when scanned by a code reader. In the advertising and promotion industry, the QR is deployed to retrieve additional information concerning the product. When the QR is scanned using smartphones, it can initiate various actions, including making a phone call or sending messages, as well as opening a website (Mangold & Faulds 2009).
The second trend is co-branding, which is a joint venture combining the efforts of advertising of two or more brands in order to create a new consumer product. An example of co-branding is Apple and Nike. Such products have worked to develop new consumer products elevating brand awareness whereas resulting in increased consumer interest in the new introduced products.
The third trend is online advertising and content marketing. Consumers use web to search for several things, including brands. Advertisers are using online tools such as Google AdWords to develop online advertising campaigns (Mangold & Faulds 2009). Content marketing began being popular around 2003 with inception of social media websites, such as Twitter and Facebook. It comprises of advertorials and blogs.
Explain the role of advertising in an integrated promotional strategy for a fast food business
Integrated promotion is a strategy in which a brand uses a wide range of communication and promotional tools to create brand exposure. Some the tools used in integrated promotion include telemarketing, event sponsorship, social media, and Internet ads. For this strategy to function, all the marketing efforts should work together (Chandon, Wansink & Laurent 2000). When marketers deploy advertising amidst other promotional tools, it results in an integrated brand promotion, which highlights features and values of the brand. This implies that the key role of advertising in integrated promotional strategy is highlighting the brand features and values. It is important to note that coordination is a key in integration promotional strategy. Over the last 3 decades, the promotion and advertising industry has evolved to recognize that coordination and integration of promotional elements are a key to the efficient communication and lasting brand identity (Chandon, Wansink & Laurent 2000).
Explain branding and how it is used to strengthen a business or product
Branding goes beyond the business logo to the business core values. It involves every interaction the business has with suppliers and customers. In effect, the business brand develops and maintains its reputation. As a result, it reflects the customers’ experience of the business organisation (Cairns 2001).
Effective branding is concerned about promoting the strengths of the business. Strengths refer to what the business can use to survive competition. Therefore, a strong brand can make the business achieve a competitive advantage over its rivals in the market. Employees and customers can build emotional attachments to certain brands, which allows for strong loyalties and even a sense of ownership. This can assist in maintaining employee motivation and in increasing the sales. The brand is what the business is really selling to its customers, and not just a service or a product for which there might be already many existing providers (Cairns 2001).
Review the creative aspects of advertising
For advertising to be effective, three aspects are universally most accepted. The three aspects include the creative process, creative persons, and the creative situation. The creative process involves receiving most attention, focusing on mechanism and stages involved during the creative act. The creative person related is to the personality traits of the creative persons who are responsible and important for this process (Mangold & Faulds 2009). With regard to the creative scenario, the criteria and characteristics of creativity are considered in order to provide acceptable, practical, and workable aspects of the situation. There are three rules of creativity in the advertising. The first rule is that creativity should make the product relevant to the consumers. The second rule is that creativity should be promising to the customer. Lastly, creativity should put the production at the centre of the business.
Examine ways of working with advertising agencies
The work of advertising agency is to assist the business in reaching its goals by presenting it to the potential customers in the best possible light. Advertising agencies achieve this by assisting the business in fine-tuning its message, and by developing an advertising campaign, which fits within the budget and marketing plan parameters. Both the business and the advertising agency should collaborate to ensure that the business goals are achieved. Besides making payments, there are several things that the advertising agency expects from the owner of the business (Mangold & Faulds 2009).
For a business owner, it is important to enter the advertising process with an open mind. The owner of the business knows more about the company than any other person. However, it is important to keep in mind that the reason one hires an advertising agency is that he or she understands the business a little too well. This implies that business owner might make certain presumptions concerning the product or service, which are not as obvious to customers. The advertising agency is the objective voice. As a result, it is important to listen to what the advertisement agency says. Sales are frequently the best measure of the effective advertisement campaign. From the sales, the agency might survey and interview the customer base in order to determine the efficiency of the campaign (Mangold & Faulds 2009).
Assume that you have recently been promoted to the position of advertising manager of a cosmetics company; explain the primary techniques of below-the-line promotion and how you will use them in an integrated promotional strategy for your business.
Below-the-line (BTL) promotion deploys media, which are focused on a particular niche. Examples of the main BTL primary techniques include discounts, coupons, promotional pricing, free products, and contests and sweepstakes (Mangold & Faulds 2009). Discounts provide value to buyers essentially by lowering the final cost for purchasing the product. Discounts are offered to customers after making a purchase. Most often, customers are required to submit personal information, such as customer identification, to obtain discounts. Coupons provide buyers price savings or other incentives when coupon is redeemed at the time of purchase. In addition, like discounts, coupons also require the involvement of the consumer for his or her to realise the value. Frequently, the involvement comprises of the consumer making an effort to get the coupon and then presenting it during purchase. Another major and powerful BTL technique is promotional pricing. This technique involves decreasing the price to increase product demand. Promotional pricing might have a considerable effect on sales, though advertisers must exercise it with caution because frequent deployment of this technique makes customers expect price reduction. As a result, customers are likely to refrain from making purchases until when there is a reduction in price (Chandon, Wansink & Laurent 2000).
Evaluate other techniques used in below-the-line promotion used
Other BTL techniques include door-to-door selling, trade-ins, and loyalty programs. This technique involves walking from one door to the next to sell products or services to the public. This strategy should be executed when people are at home. As a result, afternoons are always the best time for conducting door-to-door selling (Chandon, Wansink & Laurent 2000). Trade-in promotions enable customers to obtain lower prices by exchanging something owned by the customer with another new product though at a lower price. The good traded in by the customers covers a certain amount of the cost. Loyalty programs refer to promotions offering consumers a reward, such as free products and price discounts, particularly for frequent buying.
How would you design an appropriate process for the formulation of a budget for an integrated promotional strategy?
The simplest method for developing promotion budget is using a percentage of the previous year’s sales or the anticipated sales for the next year. This technique does not account for any unexpected scenarios, especially changes in the market. Nevertheless, several businesses utilize this technique due to its simplicity and straightforwardness. When using this strategy, the business budgets for promotional costs within a certain percentage of the sales (Chandon, Wansink & Laurent 2000).
There are also other techniques of budgeting, such as the affordable method, competitive parity, and objective and task method. The affordable method involves budgeting within the funds that the business can provide. It is frequently used by small businesses. Competitive parity involves keeping the promotional spending relative to the spending level of competitors. The objective or task method is a more rational approach whereby the marketing managers first determine what they want to accomplish with their communication (Chandon, Wansink & Laurent 2000).
State how you would follow an appropriate process for the formulation of a budget for an integrated promotional strategy
A component of the budgeting process involves deciding how much money to allot to various media. Despite most spending being predominantly on traditional media, changes in spends are occurring as the media continues to change. As a result, one should set aside funds to cater for the changes in spends. This is just to ensure that all activities in advertising are implemented as budgeted. In case there are no changes, the funds can be diverted to other business activities (Chandon, Wansink & Laurent 2000). In order to follow the appropriate process for the formulation of marketing process, the marketing manager should note all the activities and technologies required, and the cost of implementing such activities. This requires honesty especially in quoting and tendering the promotional activities. There are cases where marketing managers overcharge prices because of their personal gains. As result, it is important to support all the spending using necessary financial documents, which might also reveal if the due process was followed to the latter.
Assume that you have recently been appointed the advertising manager of a car manufacturing company. Carry out the development of a promotional plan for the new brand of car called ‘’Cricket’’ recently launched by the company
A marketing plan is a part of the overall business plan. A god marketing strategy is the basis of a well-written marketing plan. Whereas a marketing plan comprises of a list of actions, a plan without a sound strategic basis is of little importance. It is important to note that the marketing plan should be designed to match the particular needs of the organisation (Mangold & Faulds 2009). In this scenario, the marketing plan will comprise of three key activities as discussed below.
The first activity is reviewing the marketing environment of the cars. This activity aims at studying the organisation’s market, competitors, customers, and the entire economic, cultural, and technical environment. The second activity in the marketing plan is reviewing the detailed car marketing activity. This involves studying the marketing mix of the company in terms of price, product, promotion, placement, people, physical environment, and packaging, which are also referred to as 7Ps. The third activity is reviewing the marketing system. This involves studying the marketing organisation, marketing research systems and the present marketing objectives and strategies (Mangold & Faulds 2009).
How would you plan the integration of promotional techniques into the promotional strategy for a chocolate bar?
Integrated promotional techniques comprise of high spending for advertising, publicity and consumer production in order to create a strong demand for the chocolate bar (Chandon, Wansink & Laurent 2000). The promotional strategy integrates the promotion mix strategy and message strategy. The promotion mix strategy for the chocolate bar will be a pull strategy. This is because chocolate is a premium product making it necessary for the consumer to ask the retailer. The various tools to be integrated into the promotional strategy include television, Internet marketing, and magazines. Television advertising is likely to assist in developing a premium position, whereas the magazine will convey the health benefits. The message strategy for promoting chocolate bars can be luxurious, tasty, and good for health sweet sensation. The message can be communicated to the target consumers across all the promotional tools. It can also be anticipated that a strong “pull” will be created, and consumers will book orders on the website.
What appropriate techniques would you use for measuring campaign effectiveness?
It is extremely useful for the business to measure the efficiency of the marketing campaigns. Small organisations are frequently challenged in terms of budget (Chandon, Wansink & Laurent 2000). There are several ways of tracking the effectiveness of the advertisement campaigns. The first way is assessing the pre- and post-sales. The difference in the post-sales and pre-sales is a measure of the effectives. An increase in the pre-sales implies an effective advertisement depending on the magnitude of the change. The second way is measuring the changes in the perception, awareness, or preference. Increase in awareness and positive perception towards the product implies an effective campaign. Lastly, response measurement is also another technique of assessing the effectiveness of a campaign.
