marketing chapter 17: integrated marketing communications
To estimate reach, use the
# of impressions and the click-through rate (CTR)
CTR →
# of times a user clicks on an online ad / by # of impressions
Impressions →
# of times an ad appears in front of the user
in the case of an advertisement, the ROI =
(sales revenue generated by ad - ad's cost) / ad's cost
Personal selling →
2-way flow of communication between a buyer/seller designed to influence buyer's purchase decision
if they hope to reach the most users, marketers must be able to
adapt to/establish a presence on newly popular platforms quickly
Perhaps the most visible of the IMC channels
advertising
That is, the communication budget is the money available
after operating costs/profits have been budgeted
Transmitter →
agent/intermediary with which sender works to develop marketing communications
Feedback loop →
allows receiver to communicate with sender; informs sender whether the message was received/decoded properly
Return on marketing investment (ROMI) →
amount of profit / by value of the investment
Noise →
any interference that stems from competing messages, a lack of clarity in the message, or a flaw in the medium
Web-tracking software → software used to
assess how much time viewers spend on web pages and the # of pages they view
disadvantage of %-of-sales:
assumes same % used in past/by competitors is still appropriate for the firm
AIDA:
awareness leads to interests, which lead to desire, which leads to action
rule-of-thumb methods → budgeting methods that
base IMC budget on either the firm's share of the market in relation to competition, a fixed % of forecasted sales, or what's left after other operating costs and forecasted sales have been budgeted
This integration of channels provides the firm with the
best means to reach the target audience with the desired message
By keeping track of who is visiting their fan pages, marketers can
better customize their material by getting to know the ppl visiting
The different forms of direct marketing demonstrate how this IMC format can vary on
both the interactivity and online-offline dimensions of the matrix
Free samples or POP displays are designed to
build short-term sales
contests and sweepstakes have become integral tactics of some firms' CRM programs as a means to
building customer loyalty
the sender must be
clearly identified to the intended audience
Percentage-of-sales →
communication budget is a fixed % of forecasted sales
available budget assumes
communication expenses don't stimulate sales/profit
rule-of-thumb methods include
competitive parity, %-of-sales, and available budget
The media chosen must be appropriate to
connect the sender with its desired recipients
Key consideration is what gets received; consumer must receive
consistent, comprehensible info that in turn makes them want to embrace the message/engage in activities that it recommends
3 elements in an IMC strategy:
consumer, channels through which the message is communicated, evaluation of the results of the communication
Aided recall → an awareness metric that occurs when
consumers recognize a name of a brand that's been presented to them
Reach → measure of
consumers' exposure to marketing communications
a new form of marketing communications
corporate blogs
The lagged effect →
delayed response to a marketing communications campaign
A firm must develop a communication strategy to
demonstrate the value of its product
Relevance → in the context of search engine marketing, it's a metric used to
determine how useful an ad is to the consumer doing the search
Objective-and-task method → an IMC budgeting method that
determines cost required to undertake specific tasks to accomplish communication objectives
Available budget → marketers forecast their sales and expenses, excluding communication, during the budgeting period;
difference between forecast sales and expenses + desired profit is reserved for communication budget
the IMC channel that's received the greatest increase in aggregate spending recently
direct marketing
As the marketer's repertoire of IMC channels has expanded, so too have the ways in which marketers can communicate with their customers, so,
direct marketing appears in all 4 boxes
Internet-based technologies have had a profound effect on
direct marketing initiatives
The proliferation of media has led many firms to shift their promotional dollars from advertising to
direct marketing, website development, and product placements
Action → the ultimate goal of any form of marketing communications is to
drive the receiver to action
Thus, social media help facilitate the consumer decision process by
encouraging need recognition, info search, alternative evaluation, purchase, and postpurchase reviews
High top-of-mind awareness means that the brand probably
enters the evoked set of brands
Such goals should be
explicitly defined and measured
competitive parity doesn't allow firms to
exploit unique opportunities/problems they confront in a market
reach is a % of the target population
exposed to a specific marketing communication, such as an ad, at least once
personal selling can take place in various settings:
face-to-face, via video-conferencing, on the phone, or over the Internet
Communicating with consumers → as the # of communication media has increased, the task of understanding how best to reach target consumers has become
far more complex
Sender →
firm from which an IMC message originates
Traditional media → when measuring IMC success, the firms should examine when and how often consumers have been exposed to various marketing communications; to gauge consumers' exposure to marketing communications,
firm uses measures of frequency and reach
Competitive parity → communication budget set so that the
firm's share of communication expenses = its share of the market
The sum of all the individual communication plan budgets becomes the
firm's total marketing communications budget
various communication disciplines:
general advertising, personal selling, sales promotion, public relations, direct marketing, and online marketing including social media
PR activities support the other promotional efforts by the firm by
generating free media attention
Marketing communications managers usually state their media objectives in terms of
gross rating points (GRP)
Manufacturers, retailers, and service providers build top-of-mind awareness by
having memorable names; repeatedly exposing their name to customers; using memorable symbols
Frequency → measure of
how often audience is exposed to a communication within a specified period of time
Integrated marketing communications (IMC) → encompasses a variety of communication disciplines
in combination to provide clarity, consistency, and max communicative impact
The goal of IMC is to use the channels
in conjunction so that the sum > the total of the individual channels
Research has shown that online product reviews
increase customer loyalty and provide a competitive advantage for sites that offer them
Interest → once the consumer is aware that the company or product exists, communication must work to
increase the consumer's interest level
SEM → an activity used in online searches to
increase the visibility of a firm by using paid searches to appear higher up in search results
What are considered social media also are morphing as
innovative firms create new methods of communicating with and selling to consumers
Novel social media allow users to
interact among themselves (form a community) and provide other like-minded consumers (members of their community) and marketers with their thought/evaluations of a firm's products/services
If there's a difference between the encoding and the decoding,
it's probably due to noise
Google provides a measure of relevance through
its ads system using a quality score
In general, a high quality score means that a
keyword will trigger ads in a higher position and at a lower cost-per-click
Many firms operate websites devoted to community building; these sites offer an opportunity for customers with similar interests to
learn about products/services that support their hobbies and share info with others
these goals can also be
long term in nature; increasing sales, market share, customer loyalty
Contains a variety of traditional and new forms of marketing communications initiatives: traditional direct marketing includes
mail and catalogs sent through the mail
Such measures become particularly challenging when
marketing efforts include creative and new forms of communication
Mobile marketing →
marketing through wireless handheld devices
Firms must invest in the marketing communications campaign with the idea that it
may not reach its full potential for some time
Measuring success using marketing metrics → once a firm has decided how to set its budget for marketing communications and its campaigns have been developed and implemented, it reaches the point that it must
measure the success of the campaigns using various marketing metrics
Brand awareness →
measures how many consumers in a market are familiar with the brand/what it stands for
Reaching the right audience is becoming more difficult, however, as the
media environment grows more complicated
How consumers perceive communication → each receiver may interpret the sender's message differently, and senders often adjust their message according to the
medium used and the receivers' level of knowledge about the product/service
The AIDA model → a common model of the series of
mental stages through which consumers move as a result of marketing communications
top-of-mind awareness occurs when consumers
mention a specific brand name 1st when asked about a product/service
Desire → after the firm has piqued the interest of its target market, the goal of subsequent IMC messages should
move the consumer from "I like it" to "I want it"
%-of-sales doesn't take into account
new plans
Setting and allocating IMC budget → because all the methods of setting a promotional budget have advantages/disadvantages,
no 1 method should be used in isolation
a problem for all communication channels
noise
Blogs (weblog) →
online diary with periodic posts that allows ppl to share their thoughts, opinions, and feelings with the entire world
To measure the program's effectiveness, conduct an
online survey using questions regarding the communication objectives
Social media →
online/mobile technologies that distribute content to facilitate interpersonal interactions, with the assistance of various firms that offer platforms, services, and tools to help consumers/firms build their connections
Public relations (PR) →
organizational function that manages the firm's communications to achieve a variety of objectives, including building and maintaining a positive image, handling or heading off unfavorable stories/events, and maintaining positive relationships with the media
Advertising →
paid form of communication delivered through media from an identifiable source about an org, product/service, or idea designed to persuade the receiver to take some action now/in the future
Instead of consisting of separate marketing communications channels with no unified control, IMC programs regard each of the firm's marketing communications channels as
part of a whole, each of which offers a different means to connect with the target audience
Regardless of their measure or changes, goals constitute
part of the overall promotional plan; usually a subsection of firm's marketing plan
After being exposed to marketing communications, consumers go through several steps before actually buying or taking some other action; there's not always a direct link between a
particular form of marketing communications and a consumer's purchase
The individual channels of IMC can be viewed on 2 axes:
passive and interactive (from the consumer's perspective) and offline and online
the PR tactic is relatively
passive; customers don't have to take any action to receive it
Receiver →
person who reads, hears, or sees/processes the info contained in the message/ad
It isn't enough to let people know that the product exists; consumers must be
persuaded that it's a product worth investigating
Mass advertising can entice consumers into a conversation with marketers, though it doesn't necessarily require much action by consumer, which
places it on the passive end of the spectrum
Measuring the effect of a current campaign becomes more difficult because of the
possible lagged response to a previous 1
GRP → measure used for various media advertising:
print, radio, or television; GRP = reach * frequency
to determine the present communication budget, rule-of-thumb methods use
prior sales and communication activities
Decoding →
process by which receiver interprets sender's message
Encoding →
process of converting sender's ideas into a message; could be verbal, visual, or both
Channels used in an IMC strategy → for any communications campaign to succeed, the firm must deliver the right message to the right audience through the right media, with the ultimate goal of
profiting from long-term customer relationships rather than just short-term transactions
IMC represents the
promotion dimension of the 7 Ps
Customers can buy many products/services without the help of a salesperson, but salespeople simplify the buying process by
providing info/services that save customers time/effort
The cost of communicating directly with a potential customer compared with other forms of promotion is
quite high, but it's the best/most efficient way to sell certain products/services
The increased use of customer databases has enabled marketers to identity and track consumers over time and across purchase situations, which has contributed to the
rapid growth of direct marketing
The quality score looks at a variety of factors to measure how
relevant a keyword is to an ad's text and to a user's search query
The objective-and-task method process must be
repeated for each product/service
To evaluate the IMC program, compare the
results of the program with its objectives
In these online sites, consumers
review, communicate about, and aggregate info about products, prices, and promotions
Direct marketing →
sales/promotional techniques that communicate directly with target customers to generate a response/transaction
To reach new customers, use
search engine marketing (SEM)
The communication process →
sender (firm), transmitter encodes message, communications channel (media), receiver (consumer) decodes message
Awareness → even the best marketing communications can be wasted if the
sender doesn't gain the attention of the consumer 1st
Various rule-of-thumb methods can be used to
set budgets
after they have established the goals, marketers can
set the budget for the campaign and choose the marketing metrics to evaluate whether it's achieved its strategic objectives
objective-and-task method process entails
setting objectives, choosing media, and determining costs
These goals can be
short term; generating inquiries, increasing awareness, prompting trial
Any comparisons using the GRP require a
single medium
Sales promotions →
special incentives or excitement-building programs that encourage the purchase of a product/service, such as coupons, rebates, contests, free samples, and point-of-purchase (POP) displays
To create effective IMC programs, marketers must understand how marketing communications work; generally marketing communications move consumers
stepwise through a series of mental stages
Planning for and measuring IMC success → we begin by examining how marketers set
strategic goals before they implement any IMC campaign
Communications channel →
the medium (print, broadcast, Internet) that carries the message
If all competitors use the competitive parity method to set communication budgets,
their market shares will stay approximately the same over time
firms are steadily improving customers' potential experience with
their mobile interface
Direct marketing retailers try to target their customers carefully so
they'll be more receptive to their messages
Budgeting may take several rounds of negotiations among the various managers, who are each competing for resources for their own areas of responsibility,
to devise a final IMC budget
transmitter: marketing department or external agency receives the information and
transforms it for use in its role as the transmitter
Top-of-mind awareness → a prominent place in people's memories that
triggers a response w/out them having to put any thought into it; highest level of awareness
Goals → as with any strategic undertaking, firms need to
understand the outcome they hope to achieve before they begin
Social shopping →
using Internet to communicate about product preferences with other shoppers
This integration of channels enhances the
value story by offering a clear/consistent message
brand awareness is created through repeated exposures of the
various brand elements in the firm's communications to consumers
Assessing the effectiveness of any web-based communication efforts in an IMC campaign generally requires
web-tracking software
Online marketing → we now examine several electronic media vehicles:
websites, blogs, and social media
Each element of an integrated marketing communications (IMC) strategy must have a
well-defined purpose and support/extend the message delivered by all the other elements
The sender has little, if any, control over
what meaning any individual receiver will take from the message