Download Personal selling

Promotional Methods
There are five forms of promotion: personal selling, advertising,
sales promotion, public relations, and publicity. Each has
distinct features that determine in what situations it will be
most effective.
 Personal selling



Is the direct presentation of a product to a prospective customer
by a representative of the organization selling it.
Personal selling takes place face to face or over the phone, and
it may be directed to a middleman or a final consumer.
Across all businesses, more money is spent on personal selling
than on any other form of promotion.

Advertising



Is impersonal mass communication that the sponsor has paid for
and in which the sponsor is clearly identified.
The most familiar forms of ads are found in the broadcast (TV
and radio) and print (newspapers and magazines) media.
However, there are many other advertising alternatives, from
direct mail to billboards and the telephone directory yellow
pages.

Sale Promotion






Is demand-stimulating activity designed to supplement
advertising and facilitate personal selling.
It is paid for by the sponsor and frequently involves a temporary
incentive to encourage a purchase.
Many sales promotions are directed at consumers.
The majority, however, are designed to encourage the
company’s sales force or other members of its distribution
channel to sell its products more aggressively.
This latter category is called trade promotion.
Included in sales promotion are a wide spectrum of activities,
such as contests, trade shows, in-store displays, rebates,
samples, premiums, discounts, and coupons.

Public Relations





Encompasses a wide variety of communication efforts to
contribute to generally favorable attitudes and opinions toward
an organization and its products.
Unlike most advertising and personal selling, it does not include
a specific sales message.
The targets may be customers, stockholders, a government
agency, or a special-interest group.
Public relations can take many forms, including newsletters,
annual reports, lobbying, and sponsorship of charitable or civic
events.
The Goodyear and Fuji blimps and the Oscar Mayer Wiener
mobile are familiar examples of public relations devices.
Good Year Blimp

Publicity



Is a special form of public relations that involves news stories
about an organization or its products.
Like advertising, it involves an impersonal message that
reaches a mass audience through the media.
But several things distinguish publicity from advertising:
it is not paid for
 the organization that is the subject of the publicity has no control
over it
 and it appears as news and frequently provide the material for it in
the form of news releases, press conferences, and photographs.

There is, of course, also bad publicity, which organizations try to
avoid or deflect.
Promotion and Marketing


Promotion serves three essential roles—it informs,
persuade, and reminds prospective customers about a
company and its products. The relative importance of
these roles varies according to the circumstances faced
by a firm.
The most useful product or brand will be a failure if no
one knows it is available!
Determining The Promotional Mix




An organization’s combination of personal selling,
advertising, sales promotion, public relations, and
publicity to help in achieving its marketing objectives is
its Promotional Mix.
An effective promotional mix is a critical part of virtually
all marketing strategies.
Product differentiation, market segmentation, and
branding all require effective promotion.
Designing an effective promotional mix involves a
number of strategic decisions.
Factors Influencing The Promotional Mix

These four factors should be taken into
account when determining the promotional
mix: (1) the target market, (2) the nature of
the product, (3) the stage of the product’s life
cycle, and (4) the amount of money available
for promotion.
Target Market


As in most areas of marketing, decisions on the
promotional mix will be greatly influenced by the
audience or target market. At least four variables affect
the choice of a promotional method for a particular
market:
Readiness to buy. A target market can be in any one of
six stages of buying readiness. These stages—
awareness, knowledge, liking, preference, conviction,
and purchase—are called the hierarchy of effects
because they represent stages a buyer goes through in
moving toward a purchase and each defines a possible
goal or effect of promotion.

Geographic scope of the market. Personal selling may
be adequate in a small local market, but as the market
broadens geographically, greater emphasis must be
placed on advertising. The exception would be a firm
that sells to concentrated pockets of customers scattered
around the country. For example, the market for certain
plastics is heaviest in Ohio and Michigan, because these
plastics are used by component suppliers to the auto
industry. In this case, emphasis on personal selling may
be feasible.

Type of customer. Promotional strategy depends in part
on what level of the distribution channel the organization
hopes to influence. Final consumers and middlemen
sometimes buy the same product, but they require
different promotion.
Nature of the Product

Several product attributes influence promotional strategy.
The most important are:
 Unit Value. A product with low unit value is usually
relatively uncomplicated, involves little risk for the buyer,
and must appeal to a mass market to survive. As a
result, advertising would be the primary promotional tool.


Degree of customization. If a product must be adapted
to the individual customer’s needs, personal selling is
necessary.
Presale and post-sale service. Products that must be
demonstrated, for which there are trade-ins, or that
require frequent servicing to keep them in good working
order lend themselves to personal selling.
Nature And Scope of Advertising

All advertisements have four features:
–
–
–
–

A verbal and/or visual message.
A sponsor who is identified.
Delivery through one or more media.
Payment by the sponsor to the media carrying the message.
Advertising, then, consists of all the activities involved in
presenting to an audience a non-personal, sponsor-identified,
paid-for message about a product or organization. Advertising
in one form or another is used by most organization.
Developing an Advertising Campaign





An advertising campaign consists of all the
tasks involved in transforming a theme into a
coordinated advertising program to
accomplish a specific goal for a product or
brand.
Know who the target audience is.
Establish the overall promotional goals.
Set the total promotional budget.
Determine the overall promotional theme.
Defining Objectives




Support personal selling. Advertising may be used to
acquaint prospects with the seller’s company and
product.
Improve dealer relations. Wholesalers and retailers like
to see a manufacturer support its products.
Introduce a new product. Consumers need to be
informed even about line extensions that make use of
familiar brand names.
Counteract substitution. Advertising reinforce the
decisions of existing customers and reduces the
likelihood that they will switch to alternative brands.
Establishing a Budget

Once a promotional budget has been established, it
must be allocated among the various activities
comprising the overall promotional program.
Creating a Message

Whatever the objective of an advertising
campaign, the individual ads must
accomplish two things:
–
–
–
get and hold the attention of the intended
audience
influence that audience in the desired way.
Remember that the ultimate purpose of
advertising is to sell something, and that the ad
itself is a sales message.

If the ad succeeds in getting the audience’s
attention, the advertiser has a few seconds to
communicate a message intended to
influence beliefs and/or behavior. The
message has two elements, the appeal and
the execution. The appeal in an ad is the
reason or justification for believing or
behaving.







Health (food, nonprescription drugs)
Social acceptance (cosmetics, health and
beauty aids).
Material success (automobiles, investments).
Recognition (clothing, jewelry).
Sensory pleasure (movies, candy).
Time savings (prepared foods, conveniences
stores).
Peace of mind (insurance, tires).


Execution is combining in a convincing, compatible way
the feature or device that gets attention with the appeal.
An appeal can be executed in different ways. Consider
the ways you could communicate the benefit of reliable
performance in a home appliance—presenting operating
statistics, obtaining the endorsement of a respected
person or organization, collecting testimonials from
satisfied owners, or describing the meticulous
manufacturing process.
Selecting Media

In describing the steps in developing an
advertising campaign, we have discussed
creating an advertising message before
describing the selection of advertising media
in which to place the ad.
1.
2.
3.
Which type of medium will be used—newspaper,
television, radio, magazine, or direct mail? What about
the less prominent media of billboards, specialty items,
and yellow pages?
Which category of the selected medium will be used?
Television has network and cable; magazines include
general-interest (Newsweek, People) and specialinterest (Popular Mechanics, Runner’s World)
categories; and there are national as well as local
newspapers.
Which specific media vehicles will be used? An
advertiser that decides first on radio and then on local
stations must determine which stations to use in each
city.
Objectives of the ad. The purpose of a particular
ad and the goals of the entire campaign
influence which media to use.
 Audience coverage. The audience reached by
the medium should match the geographic area
in which the product is distributed. Furthermore,
the selected medium should reach the desired
types of prospects with a minimum of wasted
coverage.




Requirement of the message. The medium should fit the
message. For example, food products, floor coverings,
and apparel are best presented visually.
Time and location of the buying decision. The medium
should reach prospective customers when and where
they are about to make their buying decisions.
Media cost. The cost of each medium should be
considered in relation to the amount of funds available to
pay for it and its reach or circulation. For example, the
cost of network television exceeds the available funds of
many advertisers.



Newspapers. flexible and timely. Ads can be inserted or
canceled on very short notice, and can vary in size from small
classifieds to multiple pages.
Television. combines motion, sound, and special visual
effects. Products can be demonstrated as well as described
on TV. It offers wide geographic coverage and flexibility in
when the message can be presented. However, television is a
relatively expensive medium.
Direct Mail. Direct mail, also known as direct marketing, is the
most personal and selective of all media. Kraft General Foods
has created a data base that includes the names and
addresses of 25 million users of its 140 products.



Radio. Over the past decade, radio has enjoyed a rebirth
as an advertising and cultural medium.
Magazines. Magazines are the medium to use when
high-quality printing and color are desired in an ad.
Magazines can reach a national market at a relatively
low cost per reader.
Outdoor Advertising. Spending on outdoor advertising
remains fairly constant, at about 1 percent of all
advertising.
And now lets break into groups