14. Engaging Customers and Communicating Customer Value: Integrated Marketing Communication Strategy

Question 1

promotion mix—also called its marketing communications mix—consists of

Answer 1

the specific blend of advertising, public relations, personal selling, sales promotion, and direct marketing tools that the company uses to engage consumers, persuasively communicate customer value, and build customer relationships.
The five major promotion tools are defined as follows:
• Advertising.
• Sales promotion.
• Personal selling.
• Public relations (PR).
• Direct and digital marketing.

Question 2

Advertising

Answer 2

Any paid form of nonpersonal presentation and promotion of ideas, goods, or services by an identified sponsor.

1. Broadcast
2. Print
3. Online
4. Mobile
5. Outdoor

Question 3

Sales promotion

Answer 3

Short-term incentives to encourage the purchase or sale of a product or service.

1. Discounts
2. Coupons
3. Displays
4. Demonstrations

Question 4

Personal selling

Answer 4

Personal customer interactions by the firm’s sales force for the purpose of engaging customers, making sales, and building customer relationships.

Question 5

Public relations (PR)

Answer 5

Building good relations with the company’s various publics by

1. obtaining favorable publicity,
2. building up a good corporate image,
3. handling or heading off unfavorable rumors, stories, and events.

Question 6

Direct and digital marketing

Answer 6

Engaging directly with carefully targeted individual consumers and customer communities to both obtain an immediate response and build lasting customer relationships.

Question 7

The New Marketing Communications Model (changing, advances)

Answer 7

• Consumers are changing.
• Marketing strategies are changing.
• Advances in digital technology

Question 8

Content marketing

Answer 8

creating, inspiring, and sharing brand messages and conversations with and among consumers across a fluid mix of paid, owned, earned, and shared channels.

Question 9

Integrated marketing communications (IMC) (def and purpose)

Answer 9

Carefully integrating and coordinating the company’s many communications channels /to deliver a clear, consistent, and compelling message about the organization and its products.

Question 10

Steps in Developing Effective Marketing Communication

Answer 10

1. Identify the target audience
2. Determine the communication objectives
3. Design the message
4. Choose the media to send the message
5. Select message source and collect feedback

Question 11

Buyer-readiness stages (Determine the communication objectives step)

Answer 11

The stages consumers normally pass through on their way to a purchase awareness, knowledge, liking, preference, conviction, and, finally, the actual purchase.

Question 12

Designing a Message (3 parts, AIDA Model (4))

Answer 12

1. Message content is “what to say.”
2. Message structure and 3. format is “how to say it.”

AIDA model:
Get Attention
Hold Interest
Arouse Desire
Obtain Action

Question 13

Message Content – “What to Say” (def/ rational, emotional, and moral)

Answer 13

The marketer has to figure out an appeal or theme that will produce the desired response. There are three types of appeals: rational, emotional, and moral.

1. Rational appeal relates to the audience’s self-interest.
2. Emotional appeal is an attempt to stir up positive or negative emotions to motivate a purchase.
3. Moral appeal is directed to an audience’s sense of what is right and proper.

Question 14

3 Message Structure Issues

Answer 14

Marketers must also decide how to handle three message structure issues.

1. draw a conclusion or leave it to the audience.
2. present the strongest arguments first or last
3. present a one-sided argument or two-sided argument

Question 15

Message Format

Answer 15

In a print ad, the communicator has to decide on the headline, copy, illustration, and colors. To attract attention, advertisers can use novelty and contrast; eye-catching pictures and headlines; distinctive formats; message size and position; and color, shape, and movement.

Question 16

personal communication channels (def, 4types)

Answer 16

Channels through which two or more people communicate directly with each other, including face-to-face, on the phone, via mail or email, or even through an internet “chat.”

Question 17

Word-of-mouth influence

Answer 17

The impact of the personal words and recommendations of trusted friends, family, associates, and other consumers on buying behavior.

Question 18

Buzz marketing

Answer 18

Cultivating opinion leaders and getting them to spread information about a product or a service to others in their communities.

Question 19

Nonpersonal communication channels (def, 3 types)

Answer 19

media that carry messages “without personal contact or feedback”, including major media, atmospheres, and events.

Major media include print media (newspapers, magazines, direct mail), broadcast media (television, radio), display media (billboards, signs, posters), and online media (e-mail and company web sites).

Atmospheres are designed environments that create or reinforce the buyer’s leanings toward buying a product. Thus, lawyers’ offices and banks are designed to communicate confidence and other qualities that might be valued by clients.

Events are staged occurrences that communicate messages to target audiences. For example, public relations departments arrange grand openings, shows and exhibits, public tours, and other events.

Nonpersonal communication affects buyers directly. In addition, using mass media often affects buyers indirectly by causing more personal communication. For example, communications might first flow from television, magazines, and other mass media to opinion leaders and then from these opinion leaders to others.

Interestingly, marketers often use nonpersonal communication channels to replace or stimulate personal communications by embedding consumer endorsements or word-of-mouth testimonials in their ads and other promotions.

Question 20

Setting the Promotional Budget (4 methods)

Answer 20

1. affordable method
2. percentage-of-sales
3. competitive-parity method
4. objective-and-task method

Question 21

affordable method

Answer 21

Setting the promotion budget at the level management thinks the company can afford.

Question 22

The percentage-of-sales method

Answer 22

Setting the promotion budget at a certain percentage of current or forecasted sales or as a percentage of the unit sales price.

Question 23

Competitive-parity method

Answer 23

Setting the promotion budget to match competitors’ outlays.

Question 24

Objective-and-task method

Answer 24

Developing the promotion budget by

(1) defining specific promotion objectives,
(2) determining the tasks needed to achieve these objectives
(3) estimating the costs of performing these tasks. The sum of these costs is the proposed promotion budget.

Question 25

The concept of integrated marketing communications suggests that

Answer 25

the company must blend the promotion tools carefully into a coordinated promotion mix.

Question 26

The Nature of Each Promotional Tool

Answer 26

Sales promotion includes coupons, contests, cents-off deals, and premiums that attract consumer attention and offer strong incentives to purchase.
Public relations is a very believable form of promotion that includes news stories, features, sponsorships, and events.
Direct and digital marketing is an immediate, customized, and interactive promotional tool that includes direct mail, catalogs, telephone marketing, online, mobile, and social media.

Question 27

push strategy

Answer 27

A promotion strategy that calls for using the sales force and trade promotion to push the product through channels. The producer promotes the product to channel members who in turn promote it to final consumers.

Question 28

pull strategy

Answer 28

A promotion strategy that calls for spending a lot on consumer advertising and promotion to induce final consumers to buy the product, creating a demand vacuum that “pulls” the product through the channel.

Question 29

Integrating The Promotional Mix

Answer 29

The company must take steps to see that “each promotion mix element is smoothly integrated.”
The various promotion elements should “work together to carry the firm’s unique brand messages and selling points.”

Question 30

Advertising and Sales Promotion (4 rules)

Answer 30

Communicate openly and honestly with consumers and resellers
Avoid deceptive or false advertising
Avoid bait-and-switch advertising
Conform to all federal, state, and local regulations

Question 31

Personal Selling

Answer 31

Follow rules of “fair competition”
Do not offer bribes
Do not attempt to obtain competitors’ trade secrets
Do not disparage competitors or their products