Exam - Q9

Question 1

Integrated marketing communications

Answer 1

Integrated marketing communications involves careful integration of a company’s many communications channels to deliver a clear, consistent and compelling message about the organisation and its brands

Question 2

Reasons for having an integrated marketing communications approach

Answer 2

Allows for them to recognise all touch points where the customer may encounter the company and its brands.
Also ties all the company’s messages and images

Question 3

Promotion tools in the promotion mix

Answer 3

The promotion mix is a specific blend of advertising, public relations, personal selling, sales promotion and direct-marketing tools that the company uses to persuasively communicate customer value and build customer relationships

Question 4

Advertising

Answer 4

Advertising is any paid form of non-personal presentation and promotion of ideas, goods or services by an identified sponsor.
Advertising would be a useful tool for Earth Naturals to use as it has the ability to reach masses of geographically dispersed buyers at a low cost per exposure, and it enables the seller to repeat a message many times. However, advertising is also impersonal and cannot be directly persuasive as can company salespeople.

Question 5

Sales promotion

Answer 5

Sales promotion are any short-term incentives used to encourage the purchase or sale of a product or service.
Sales promotion include a wide assortment of tools that attract customer attention, offer strong incentives to purchase, and can be used to dramatize product offers and to boost sagging sales. However, these effects can be short-lived and not as effective as advertising or personal selling in building long-run brand preference and customer relationships.

Question 6

Personal selling

Answer 6

Personal selling involves personal presentation by the firm’s salesforce for the purpose of making sales and building customer relationships.
Personal selling is the most effective tool at certain stages of the buying process, particularly in building up buyers’ preferences, convictions and actions. However, a salesforce requires a longer-term commitment than does advertising, advertising can be turned up or down, but salesforce size is harder to change.

Question 7

Public relations

Answer 7

Public relations involve building good relations with the company’s various public by obtaining favourable publicity, building up a good corporate image, and handling or heading off unfavourable rumours, stories and events.
Public relations has the ability to reach many prospects who avoid salespeople and advertising, the message gets to the buyer as ‘news’, rather than as sales-directed communication. However, businesses may suffer from a lack of content control. They are unable to manage everything the media finds out about them.

Question 8

Direct and digital marketing

Answer 8

Direct and digital marketing involves making direct connections with carefully targeted individual consumers to both obtain an immediate response and cultivate lasting customer relationships.
Direct and digital marketing is a great way of targeting small groups of people or individuals with a cleverly structured message that matches their preferences. Messages can be prepared quickly and are interactive for consumers. However, direct marketing does have limited reach due to its narrow marketing structure. Less consumers will receive the message