Adverting is only one element of the
promotion mix, but it often considered prominent in the overall marketing mix
design. Its high visibility and pervasiveness made it as an important social
and encomia topic in Indian society. Advertising is a powerful communication
force, highly visible, and one of the most important tools of marketing
communications that helps to sell products, services, ideas and images etc.
Many believe that advertising reflects the needs of the times. One may like it
or not but play advertisements are everywhere.
Advertisements are seen in
newspapers, magazines, on television and internet and are heard on radio. The
average consumer is exposed to a very large number of advertisements everyday,
particularly the urban and semi-urban population. Promotion may be defined as
"the co-ordination of all seller initiated efforts to set up channels of
information and persuasion to facilitate the scale of a good or service."
Promotion is most often intended to be a supporting component in a marketing
mix. Promotion decision must be integrated and co-ordinated with the rest of
the marketing mix, particularly product/ brand decisions, so that it may
effectively support an entire marketing mix strategy. The promotion mix
consists of four basic elements.
They are: 1. Advertising 2. Personal
Selling 3. Sales Promotion and 4. Publicity.
1. Advertising is the dissemination
of information by non-personal means through any media where the source is the
sponsoring organization.
2. Personal selling is the
dissemination of information by non-personal methods, like face - to - face
contacts.
3. Sales promotion is the
dissemination of information through a wide variety of activities other than
personal selling, advertising and publicity which stimulate consumer purchasing
and dealer effectiveness.
4. Publicity is the disseminating of
information by personal or non-personal means and is not directly paid by the
organization and the organization is not the source.
ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT OF
ADVERTISING
It has been wrongly assumed that the
advertising function is of recent origin. Evidences suggest that the Romans
practiced advertising; but the earliest indication of its use in this country
dates back to the Middle Ages, when the use of the surname indicated a man's
occupation. The next stage in the evolution of advertising was the use of signs
as a visual expression of the tradesman's function and a means of locating the
source of goods. This method is still in common use. The seller in primitive
times relied upon his loud voice to attract attention and inform consumers of
the availability of his services. If there were many competitors, he relied
upon his own personal magnetism to attract attention to his merchandise. Often
it became necessary for him to resort to persuasion to pinpoint the advantages
of his products.
Thus, the seller was doing the
complete promotion job himself. Development of retail stores, made the traders
to be more concerned about attracting business. Informing customers of the
availability of supplies was highly important. Some types of outside promotion
were necessary. Signs on stores and in prominent places around the city and
notices in printed matters were sometimes used.
What is Advertisement?
Advertisement is a mass
communicating of information intended to persuade buyers to buy products with a
view to maximizing a company's profits. The elements of advertising are:
i) It is a mass communication
reaching a large group of consumers.
ii) It makes mass production
possible.
iii) It is non-personal
communication, for it is not delivered by an actual person, nor is it addressed
to a specific person.
iv) It is a commercial communication
because it is used to help assure the advertiser of a long business life with
profitable sales.
v) Advertising can be economical,
for it reaches large groups of people. This keeps the cost per message low.
vi) The communication is speedy,
permitting an advertiser to speak to millions of buyers in a matter of a few
hours.
vii) Advertising is identified
communication.
The advertiser signs his name to his
advertisement for the purpose of publicizing his identity.
Advertising includes the following
forms of messages: The messages carried in -
★
Newspapers and magazines
★
On radio and television broadcasts
★
Window display and counter - display materials and efforts
★
Store signs, motion pictures used for advertising
★
Novelties bearing advertising messages and Signature of the advertiser
★
Label stags and other literature accompanying the merchandise.
Business ethics should be followed
while advertising. A company can advertise any number of its special features
but should not talk about other Company' Features.
1. Product Related Advertising
2. Public Service Advertising
3. Functional Classification -
Informative Product Advertising
4. Advertising based on Product Life
Cycle
5. Trade Advertising – Retail and
Wholesale
6. Advertising Based on Area of
operation
7. Advertising According to Medium
Utilized
Out of these seven types of
advertising, Product related advertisement plays vital role which again
consists of three types:
A. Pioneering Advertising
B. Competitive Advertising
C. Retentive Advertising
Pioneering Advertising: This type of
advertising is used in the introductory stages in the life cycle of a product.
It is concerned with developing a "primary" demand. It conveys
information about, and selling a product category rather than a specific brand.
For example, the initial advertisement for black – and – white television and
colour television. Such advertisements appeal to the consumer's emotions and
rational motives. Competitive Advertising: It is useful when the product has
reached the market-growth and especially the market-maturity stage. It
stimulates "selective" demand. It seeks to sell a specific brand
rather than a general product category.
It is of two types:
i) Direct Type: It seeks to
stimulate immediate buying action.
ii) Indirect Type: It attempts to
pinpoint the virtues of the product in the expectation that the consumer's
action will be affected by it when he is ready to buy.
Example: Airline advertising.
Retentive Advertising: This may be
useful when the product has achieved a favourable status in the market.
Generally in such times, the advertiser wants to keep his product's name before
the public. A much softer selling approach is used or only the name may be
mentioned in "reminder" type advertising.
The creative part of advertising
involves the process of selecting and presenting the messages. The business of
conceiving, writing, designing and producing these messages is called
"advertising creativity" and the key wordsmith is called a copywriter
or copy chief or copy supervisor. The success of advertising depends to a great
extent on the quality of the message or copy of advertisement rather than the
money spent on advertising.
The conventional theory of
advertising includes the concept of AIDA (Attention, Interest, Desire and
Action). Most of the advertisers believe that the message in advertisement copy
must attract the attention and interest of the consumer if buying is to result.
But they forget that only good advertisement copy or good message can attract
the attention and interest of the receiver until and unless the much advertise
product attributes have a strong impact on consumers. The consumers come to
know the existence of the product only through the advertisement. Advertising
tries to persuade the consumers that they need the product. But if the product
attributes fail to satisfy the need of buyers, good creativity will not pay.
Creativity is an art. An artist, writer, poet, novelists, play writer takes
well known ideas, words and phrases and relates them in a fresh, often
brilliant manner while preparing an advertising copy. They combine the product
attributes and the ideas, words and phrases in such a manner that persuades the
consumers to buy the product. This combination really represents and art or a
creativity. A child can draw a smiling picture of an animal, but it does not
carry a creative message of some worth.
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