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Step 8: Managing IMC

"A planning process designed to assure that all brand contacts received by a customer or prospect for a product, service, or organization are relevant to that person and consistent over time"—AMA

Developing Effective Communications (8 steps) - Step 2: Set the Communications Objectives—Possible objectives

1. Establish the need for the category - necessary for removing or satisfying a perceived discrepancy 2. Build brand awareness - Fostering the consumer's ability to recognize or recall the brand in sufficient detail to make a purchase. 3. Build attitude toward the brand - Helping consumers evaluate the brand's perceived ability to meet a currently relevant need. 4. Influence brand purchase intention -Moving consumers to decide to purchase the brand or take purchase-related action. 5. Note: The most effective communications can achieve multiple objectives

Developing Effective Communications (8 steps) - Step 4: Select the Communications Channels

1. Personal communications channels 2. Mass (non-personal) communications channels 3. Mixed (integrated) communications channels

Developing Effective Communications (8 steps) - Step 1: Identify the Target Audience

1. Well-defined target audience: potential buyers of the company's products, current users, deciders, or influencers, as well as individuals, groups, particular publics, or the general public. The target audience is a critical influence on the communicator's decisions about what to say, how, when, where, and to whom. 2. Preferably by product benefit or product usage, not (just) demographics

Developing Effective Communications (8 steps) - Step 5: Establish the Total Marketing Communications Budget—Leading methods to determine:

1. What can we afford? ("Affordable" method) 2. Percentage-of-sales method 3. Competitive-parity (in share-of-voice) method 4. Share-of-voice equal to share-of-market method 5.Objective-and-task method (Sunburst energy drink example, p. 572): defining specific objectives, identifying the tasks that must be performed to achieve these objectives, and estimating the costs of performing them.

Developing Effective Communications (8 steps) - Step 3: Design the Communications—Need to answer 3 questions

1. What to say? (Message strategy) -management searches for appeals, themes, or ideas that will tie in to the brand positioning and help establish points-of-parity or points-of-difference. 2. How to say it? (Creative strategy) Are the way marketers translate their messages into a specific communication a. Informational: elaborates on product or service attributes or benefits b. Transformational: elaborates on a nonproduct-related benefit or image. 3. Who should say it? (Message source—Evaluate on:) a. Expertise b. Trustworthiness c. Likability

Mobile marketing

A special form of online marketing that places communications on consumer's cell phones, smart phones, or tablets.

Public relations and publicity

A variety of programs directed internally to employees of the company or externally to consumers, other firms, the government, and media to promote or protect a company's image or its individual product communications.

Sales promotion

A variety of short-term incentives to encourage trial or purchase of a product or service including consumer promotions (such as samples, coupons, and premiums), trade promotions (such as advertising and display allowances), and business and sales force promotions (contests for sales reps).

The Marketing Communications Mix

A. Traditional platforms 1. Advertising 2. Sales promotion 3. Public relations and publicity 4. Personal selling B. Newer platforms 1. Online and social media marketing 2. Mobile marketing 3. Direct and database marketing 4. Events and experiences (used to be considered part of PR/publicity)

Characteristics of each marketing communications tool: Advertising

Advertising reaches geographically dispersed buyers. It can build up a long-term image for a product (Coca-Cola ads) or trigger quick sales (a Macy's ad for a weekend sale). 1. Pervasiveness—Advertising permits the seller to repeat a message many times. It also allows the buyer to receive and compare the messages of various competitors. Large-scale advertising says something positive about the seller's size, power, and success. 2. Amplified expressiveness—Advertising provides opportunities for dramatizing the company and its brands and products through the artful use of print, sound, and color. 3. Control—The advertiser can choose the aspects of the brand and product on which to focus communications.

Advertising

Any paid form of nonpersonal presentation and promotion of ideas, goods, or services by an identified sponsor via print media (newspapers and magazines), broadcast media (radio and television), network media (telephone, cable, satellite, wireless), electronic media (audiotape, videotape, videodisk, CD-ROM, Web page), and display media (billboards, signs, posters).

Developing Effective Communications (8 steps) - Step 6: Decide on the Marketing Communications Mix

Characteristics of each marketing communications tool (pp. 574-575) Factors in setting the marketing communications mix a. Type of product market b. B2C (advertising/sales promotion) vs. B2B (personal selling) Buyer-readiness stage (Fig. 19.4) Product Life Cycle stage

Commonality.

Commonality is the extent to which common associations are reinforced across communication options; that is, the extent to which different communication options share the same meaning.

Complementarity.

Communication options are often more effective when used in tandem. Complementarity relates to the extent to which different associations and linkages are emphasized across communication options.

Buyer readiness

Communication tools vary in cost-effectiveness at different stages of buyer readiness.

Characteristics of each marketing communications tool: •Sales Promotion

Companies use sales promotion tools—coupons, contests, premiums, and the like—to draw a stronger and quicker buyer response, including short-run effects such as highlighting product offers and boosting sagging sales. Sales promotion tools offer three distinctive benefits: 1. Ability to be attention-getting—They draw attention and may lead the consumer to the product. 2. Incentive—They incorporate some concession, inducement, or contribution that gives value to the consumer. 3. Invitation—They include a distinct invitation to engage in the transaction now.

Events and experiences

Company-sponsored activities and programs designed to create daily or special brand-related interactions with consumers, including sports, arts, entertainment, and cause events as well as less formal activities.

Contribution.

Contribution is the inherent ability of a marketing communication to create the desired response and communication effects from consumers in the absence of exposure to any other communication option.

Coverage.

Coverage is the proportion of the audience reached by each communication option employed as well as the amount of overlap among those options.

Events and Experiences

Events and experiences offer many advantages as long as they have the following characteristics: 1. Relevant—A well-chosen event or experience can be seen as highly relevant because the consumer is often personally invested in the outcome. 2. Engaging—Given their live, real-time quality, events and experiences are more actively engaging for consumers. 3. Implicit—Events are typically an indirect soft sell.

Personal selling

Face-to-face interaction with one or more prospective purchasers for the purpose of making presentations, answering questions, and procuring orders.

The Role of Marketing Communications

Functions: The reasons why firms attempt to communicate with customers about the products and brands they sell To inform To persuade To remind

Conformability.

In any integrated communication program, the message will be new to some consumers and not to others. Conformability refers to the extent to which a marketing communication option works for such different groups of consumers.

Product Life-Cycle Stage

In the introduction stage of the product life cycle, advertising, events and experiences, and publicity have the highest cost-effectiveness, followed by personal selling to gain distribution coverage and sales promotion and direct marketing to induce trial. In the growth stage, demand has its own momentum through word of mouth and interactive marketing. Advertising, events and experiences, and personal selling all become more important in the maturity stage. In the decline stage, sales promotion continues strong, other communication tools are reduced, and salespeople give the product only minimal attention.

Mobile Marketing

Increasingly, online marketing and social media rely on mobile forms of communication and smart phones or tablets. Three distinguishing characteristics of mobile marketing are: 1. Timely—Mobile communications can be very time-sensitive and reflect when and where a consumer is. 2. Influential—Information received or obtained via a smart phone can reach and influence consumers as they are making a purchase decision. 3. Pervasive—Consumers typically carry their smart phones everywhere, so mobile communications are at their fingertips.

Cost.

Marketers must evaluate marketing communications on all these criteria against their cost to arrive at the most effective and most efficient communications program.

Public Relations and Publicity

Marketers tend to underuse public relations, yet a well-thought-out program coordinated with the other communications-mix elements can be extremely effective, especially if a company needs to challenge consumers' misconceptions. The appeal of public relations and publicity is based on three distinctive qualities: 1. High credibility—News stories and features are more authentic and credible to readers than ads. 2. Ability to reach hard-to-find buyers—Public relations can reach prospects who prefer to avoid mass media and targeted promotions. 3. Dramatization—Public relations can tell the story behind a company, brand, or product.

Step 7: Measuring Communication Results (Fig. 19.5)

Members of the target audience are asked whether they recognize or recall the message, how many times they saw it, what points they recall, how they felt about the message, and what are their previous and current attitudes toward the product and the company. The communicator should also collect behavioral measures of audience response, such as how many people bought the product, liked it, and talked to others about it. Total, awareness, brand trial, satisfaction

Online and social media marketing

Online activities and programs designed to engage customers or prospects and directly or indirectly raise awareness, improve image, or elicit sales of products and services.

Online and Social Media Marketing

Online marketing and messages can take many forms to interact with consumers when they are in active search mode or just browsing and surfing online for something to do. They share three characteristics: 1. Rich—Much information or entertainment can be provided—as much or as little as a consumer might want. 2. Interactive—Information can be changed or updated depending on the person's response. 3. Up to date—A message can be prepared very quickly and diffused through social media channels.

Personal Selling

Personal selling is the most effective tool at later stages of the buying process, particularly in building up buyer preference, conviction, and action. It has three notable qualities: 1. Customized—The message can be designed to appeal to any individual. 2. Relationship-oriented—Personal selling relationships can range from a matter-of-fact selling relationship to a deep personal friendship. 3. Response-oriented—The buyer is often given personal choices and encouraged to directly respond.

The Changing Marketing Communications Environment

Technology—Has changed the way customers a. Process communications b. Choose to process communications at all 2. Commercial clutter is rampant 3. Marketers must a. Be creative in using technology, but b. Don't intrude in customer's lives

The Purpose of the Promotion "P"

The Promotion "P" is about communication with 1. Customers (both current and potential) 2. Stakeholders 3. General public

Direct and Database Marketing

The advent of "Big Data" has given marketers the opportunity to learn even more about consumers and develop more personal and relevant marketing communications. Three noteworthy characteristics of direct and database marketing are: 1. Personal—Personal facts, opinions, and experiences can be stored in massive databases and incorporated into personal messages. 2. Proactive—A direct marketing piece can create attention, inform consumers, and include a call to action. 3. Complementary—Product information can be provided that helps other marketing communications, especially in terms of e-commerce. A good catalog might spur online shopping.

Promotion "P"

The question is not whether to communicate, but rather 1. What to say 2. How and when to say it 3. To whom 4. How often

Direct and database marketing

Use of mail, telephone, fax, e-mail, or Internet to communicate directly with or solicit response or dialogue from specific customers and prospects.

Coordinating media and implementing IMC (6 Cs)

a. Coverage b. Contribution c. Cost d. Commonality e. Conformability f. Complementarity