Communications in the Sixties Author(s): Richard C. Christian Source: Journal of Marketing, Vol. 25, No. 2 (Oct., 1960), pp.

67-70 Published by: American Marketing Association Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1248616 . Accessed: 03/06/2013 16:35
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By RICHARDC. CHRISTIAN
Marsteller, Rickard, Gebhardt & Reed, Inc. Chicago

in Communications the

Sixties

LABOR LAWS INEFFECTIVE communication is one of industry's top problems today. Faulty In the whole body of labor laws has been communications between employer and em- the impetus that had driven manufacturing ployee; between manufacturer and selling costs up astronomically. As long as our cost channels; between producer and customerincreases were accompanied by similar inall create economic inefficiencies and wastes. creases in productivity, we were all right. Two vital segments of the communica- During this period, two wars tended to tions industry-the business publication and obscure the dangers in these labor-cost inthe advertising agency-must join the in- creases, because much of the output of our dustrial concern in sharpening and refining national plant was going into war and dethe tools of advertising, publicity, sales fense activities. Then, too, traditionally we promotion, and personal selling. have set up tariff barriers which have proThe "publics" of this group are wide and tected our workmen here against the indiverse. Most companies, especially the roads of lower cost of foreign goods. But manufacturers and advertisers, must com- now there have been some drastic changes. municate their stories not only to customers Now we find that our costs have gone up and prospects, but also to the financial com- faster than productivity-not simply the munity, shareholders, employees, and sup- hourly rates, but the cost of featherbedding pliers. These are the targets of a total and job bidding and unemployment compencommunications program. ation. Increasingly today we are paying a How can we orient this program to these premium for not working. Much of these targets? How can we insure effective ad- sloppy labor-management practices grew up vertising, sales promotion, publicity, and during the wars when of necessity the prinselling efforts? The answer lies partially ciple was production at any cost. in a recognition that the greatest impact on But now the wars are over, and other communications comes from two economic countries have money to buy and have the factors which have nothing directly to do plants to make competitive goods at lower with communications. costs. They not only have lower labor rates, The first of these two factors is the whole but they do not have the same problems of body of labor laws developed since the mid- the fringe benefits and featherbedding that 1930s. adds so greatly to the price we have to put The second is the confiscatory corporate on our goods. Until recently our improved and individual tax laws developed in the technology had made it possible for us to same period. offset their lower costs; but now their tech-

67

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68

JOURNAL OF MARKETING

October,

1960

nology is catching up with ours and in some cases perhaps even surpassing it. The tariff barriers we have built are no longer any protection. Even with the duty, many commodities built elsewhere sell for less money in this country than our domestic products. At the same time we are at a competitive disadvantage selling in South American or European countries, and, of course, are frozen out in sales behind the Iron Curtain, so that our traditional export markets are being taken over by others. As our export market is drying up, our companies are beginning to combat this, by either setting up foreign plants of their own or by licensing agreements abroad. How shall we sell-will we have the sales controlled in this country or through our foreign plants and licensees? How shall we advertise-will we control the advertising created here or is it to be produced and directed abroad? And what is going to happen to our business papers, magazines, and advertising agencies? Are they going to go abroad, too?
INTERNATIONAL MARKETING

ments far ahead of reasonable returns in setting up to be competitive in a whole new complex of foreign marketing. We have a great training program ahead, and many people are already concerned about it. A whole new body of information is needed not only on the broad marketing aspects of this world-wide business, but on the simple but totally new details such as foreign monetary exchange, foreign media, and graphicarts availabilities.
TAX LAWS

Some of us will say that export is not important. But now we shall have new competition. If we are an advertiser, our traditional competitive position will be upset by the increasing imports of foreign goods in our product classification. If we are an agency, we face the possibility of less billing as sales and advertising activities move out of this country. At the same time, we face the decision of whether or not we wish to handle advertising in this country for foreign companies who will be importing their goods. What is this going to do to us from a competitive standpoint? If we are a magazine, how are we going to sell space abroad to these manufacturers who will be shipping into our markets? How are we going to provide really good editorial coverage of all these world markets into which our foreign operated subsidiaries and licensees will be selling? We face a vast adjustment in thinking. We are going to need new knowledge of new markets. The advertiser, agency, and magazine face the prospect of big invest-

Consider now the second of these two major economic factors-taxes. Nothing has built big business so much as taxes. Many, if not most, of the mergers of our manufacturing companies have come about as a direct result of the tax laws. The owner of the small business which has grown successfully finds it difficult to build an estate out of earned income and wants capital gains. Then there is the problem of inheritance taxes. In the last ten to twenty years there have been spawned the multidivision industrial company, the concept of diversification, the autonomous offspring of the watchful parent. The same influences have led to the rash of mergers among publishing companies. To see these tax forces at work, consider Platt, Industrial Publications, Industrial Publishing Company, Gage. Among the advertising agencies, the same factors have been at work. Also, as advertisers have grown, become more diversified in products, markets, and geography, and have expected more services, the agencies have followed the same pattern. The larger companies tend to be better marketers and better advertisers. The agencies are more sophisticated, providing more services and better people. The magazines can afford stronger editorial material and better marketing data. We find fewer industrial companies where the president or the sales manager runs the marketing and advertising activities, as was so common thirty or forty years ago. We have fewer "one-man agencies," and it is more difficult for the "fringe magazines" because the advertiser and the agency are less sentimental and expect a

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INDUSTRIALMARKETING great deal more in factual information before they buy. Also, in the large multi-division company the vogue for the marketing concept finds its greatest development. The small, informally operated company has less need for interaction between departmental specialists. In the little company the advertising manager is still the general practitioner; but in the larger company the advertising and sales-promotion activities tend to be run by a more specialized group of people, who in turn look to similarly specialized people in the agencies and in the media.
CHANGING ROLEOF ADVERTISING MANAGER

69 gram of the advertiser. The agency is going to have to provide increased research and public relations services. It is going to have to take on collateral materials and catalogs, whether it likes it or not. It is going to have to produce more visual aids. The production departments in the agencies of the future are going to have to be much more sophisticated than at present. We are developing a whole new world of graphic arts. Few advertisers will buy in such quantity to have real buying influence in any one of these graphics, and the extent of knowledge needed to deal with them will require more specially trained production people. Likewise in the media department we are going to be staffed with true analysts. We are likely to have specialists in overseas advertising, and even media specialists by markets. The advertiser of the future is going to want this kind of attention. Media buying is a tremendously complex function today, and will become even more so in the future.
TRENDSIN BUSINESSPAPER PUBLISHING

Therefore, the advertising manager is changing. In the company of the future he is going to have much more exposure to top management and to top-management ideas. He will have more responsibility but will be better paid. By the end of the 1960s most advertising managers will be marketing men. To put it another way, mostly it will be marketing men who will head advertising and sales promotion and publicity and related functions. We are probably in for more title changes. We will have Communications Managers, and the title Marketing Services Manager will become increasingly common. This man of the future who will run advertising and sales promotion will need to know a lot about some things he does not have to concern himself with too much today. He will need to know cost accounting to much greater extent, and have a much better understanding of the real effects of overhead. He will understand individual product profitability, and what produces profits and how they are calculated. He will have to know a great deal more about pricing. He will have a much better grounding in psychology.
CHANGESIN AGENCIES

What changes can we expect in advertising agencies ? It seems perfectly evident, regardless of the fact that we occasionally read that it is time that the advertising agency went back simply to preparing advertising, that the agency of the future is going to be much more involved in the total marketing pro-

Our business papers are headed for a change, too. The competition for reading time will, of course, grow increasingly intense; and so the magazines are going to have to be edited to provide summary information on all subjects for those who need only the basic understanding. Yet this will have to be buttressed by details for those who need to know the facts in depth. With the growth of the marketing concept, plus the increasing importance of marketing in business today, industrial manufacturers and their agencies have been striving to make the communications job as scientific and as effective as humanly possible. In this process they have been relying more and more each year on the research facilities of business publications. This trend has accelerated to the point that publishers now find themselves not only in the publishing business but, in a very real sense, in the research business. There are at least six major areas in which business publications are providing research services to their advertisers and advertising agencies:

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70

JOURNAL OF MARKETING Designed to tell how well advertising and editorial pages are read. a. Advertising recognition studies (Readex, Starch, Ad-Gage, Reader Feedback, Mills Shepard). b. Reader impression studies (Starch Reader Impression, Gallup-Robinson). c. Reading habit studies.

October,

1960

1. Advertising and Editorial Readership Studies:

2. Market Research Studies:

Designed to analyze the market. a. General market potentials and industry forecasts. b. Analysis of market trends. c. Buying influence studies. d. Buying habit studies. e. Detailed statistical market studies. f. Psychological and motivational research. g. Analysis of new markets and products.
3. Distribution Research Studies:

a. Selection of channels of distribution. b. Operating methods of dealers and/or distributors. c. Dealer attitudes and/or opinions. d. Dealer costs and profit margins. e. General studies involving the movement of goods.
4. Studies of Elements of Advertising:

Color, size, frequency, copy, headlines, illustration, layout.

5. Product Research Studies:

In the first case, publishers are finding that they must build marketing and advertising research departments and staffs competent to conduct resultful and unbiased research. The second problem concerns the tremendous cost which additional research has imposed upon business publications. Essentially it is the responsibility of the publisher to provide certain basic marketing and advertising research facilities and information. There are two ways to cover research costs. One is simply to raise the page rates. The other is to put the research operation of a publisher on a businesslike basis in which there are pre-determined charges to the advertiser and agency for research services performed by the publisher. These services should be offered and put on a sensible "pay-as-you-go" basis, just as any other company charges for its basic services. There are going to be changes in spaceselling practices, too. Space selling of the future is going to be more interpretive selling-interpretive of both markets and of editorial material. And the space salesman is going to have to spend more time in the field with the industry and with the reader.
THE EVOLUTIONARY 60s

Product specifications, characteristics, uses, trends.

6. Brand Recognition and Brand Preference Studies:

Measurement of impact and effectiveness of marketing and promotion mix. Among the many problems that the growth of publication research has brought to the publishing industry, two stand out. The first concerns the need for skilled manpower to produce the research. The second is directly related to the economics of producing such research.

These developments will be evolutionary through most of the 1960s, but the momentum will build. Perhaps we have ten years to get ready; but, just as the Gilbreths set up a whole class of industrial engineers who left the old concept of the shop superintendent behind, just as the National Labor Relations Board changed the employment manager into a labor relations director, so we can expect a new understanding of the position and values of industrial communications and promotion.

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