Integrated Marketing Communications

1
Integrated Marketing Communications

• Dr. John T. Drea
• Professor of Marketing
• Western Illinois University

2
The Promotional Mix

• Promotion
• Communicating information between sellers and
  buyers or others in the channel to influence
  attitudes (feelings or beliefs) or behavior.
• The marketing mix is ? but the promotional mix
  is
• Advertising (paid non-personal communication)
• Publicity (non-paid, non-personal communication)
• Personal selling (paid, personal communication)
• Sales promotion (other activities)
• These are the tools available to the marketer.

3
Promotional goals

• In a broad sense, promotion is used to
• Make demand more inelastic (demand the same
  quantity at a higher price/margin) and/or
• Increase the quantity demanded (move the demand
  curve to the right)
• More specifically, promotion can be used to
• Create awareness
• Stimulate demand
• Encourage product trial
• Identify prospects
• Retain loyal customers
• Facilitate reseller support
• Combat competitive promotional efforts
• Reduce sales fluctuations

Remember that the goal is to eventually generate
a sale!
4
Promotion and the PLC
Introduction PR before introduction Build
awareness (pioneering) Induce trial Use
selling to obtain distribution
Growth Heavy Advertising Less
sales promotion Build preference and
loyalty (competitive)
Maturity Ads focus on persuading
and reminding More sales Promotion Use selling
to maintain distribution
Decline Reduce ads and PR Lower levels of
sales Promotion Milk brand or divest
5
Think strategically about promotion

• You should always develop a message strategy and
  a media strategy.
• Message strategy
• What will you say? (i.e., the content of your
  promotional message)
• What is it you want someone to think, feel or do
  as a result of seeing your message? (measurable
  outcome)
• Media strategy
• What combination of tools (the promotional mix)
  will you use to accomplish the message strategy?

6
Are you pushing or pulling (or both?)

• Pushing strategy - persuading others in the
  channel to carry your product
• Ex Manufacturer pushes the product to the
  wholesaler, wholesaler pushed the product to the
  retailer, retailer pushes the product to the
  consumer.
• Pulling strategy - persuading final users to
  demand the product, pullingit through the
  channel
• Ex A manufacturer advertises to final consumers,
  knowing the retailer will demand the product to
  meet consumer needs, and the wholesaler will
  stock the product to meet a retailers needs.
• Many marketers push and pull at the same time!

7
How much should I spend?

• Percentage of sales approach
• Matching competitors
• Basing budgets on previous years
• The all you can afford method
• Whats wrong with these four?
• Objective and task
• Base the budget on the job to be done - specify
  the objective and the tasks necessary to
  accomplish the objective, then compute what needs
  to be spent to accomplish it
• Over budget? Refine objectives or refine tasks
  until agreement is reached

8
Think AIDA!
Attention
AIDA is a linear and sequential process
Interest
AIDA
Desire
Action
9
AIDA - different tools for different jobs

• Attention
• What will you do to capture the attention of your
  target market? (Advertising, PR)
• Interest
• How will you hold their interest to facilitate
  message processing? (Ads, PR, personal sales,
  contests, etc.)
• Desire
• How will you connect the problem someone has to
  the product/service offered so the target market
  desires the product to meet the need?
  (Advertising, personal sales)
• Action
• How will you get the consumer to take action
  within a specified time frame? (Personal sales,
  sales promotion)

10
Know what you want to do...

• Direct or Indirect Advertising?
• Pioneering or Competitive?
• Comparative - draws a comparison between the
  product and another.
• Direct comparative - the other product is named
  (ex the Ford 500 is better than Honda Accord)
• Indirect comparative -the other product is not
  specifically named (ex The Honda Accord is the
  best car in its class)