Marketing Communications

Is traditional advertising dead, or just on its last legs?

Introduction Study of internal as well as external marketing environment is very important in setting business goals and estimating success rates. This can also be helpful to determine marketing problems by analyzing markets potential, which aids to uncover buying behaviors of consumers and their attitude towards different goods/services by person with the help of personal as well as group the group techniques. Marketing and advertising are closely related to each others, role of advertising can never be neglected in making a brand popular. This paper has to study the marketing environment of UK in relation to advertising practices. Traditional advertising is facing challenges and now people are shifting their attention from newspaper and magazines to internet. Following paragraphs will shed light on the threats faced by traditional advertising techniques, moreover, different marketing alternatives and their role within UK will be discussed. UK Market Factors: There are many factors that affect the market trends within a country, for instance; economic development, demographic changes, political changes, change in fashion etc. Marketers in UK must be aware of a these challenges so as to survive and meet the competition In UK south east England and East Anglia are the regions with maximum population, over 19 million people live here, on the other hand France has 9 such regions with combined population of over 30 million. Italy has 11 regions and population here is 36 million. These areas lie close to other regions of UK where business is in flow. Therefore less easily accessible areas of UK are not considered to be a good option (Kotler, Amstrong, 2004).

There are several different factors, which must be considered by marketers before formulating their market mix, these are as under: Social Factors Social factors change gradually with time, for in, instance, in 21st century there has been an explosion of Asian culture in UK and USA. People had a great demand of eastern goods. Availability of ethnic food, eastern cloths and goods was a change observed in the markets. As an example, the latter food culture was the mainstay for ethnic eating out in France for a long period of time. Social behavior of people affects their choice and hence their attitude towards buying therefore marketers must understand these social changes to achieve good results (Misiuria, 2006, p.39). Political Factors: Political factors greatly influence the business within a country, for example in UK major governmental actions helped in shaping business activities. From 1997 to 2002, 13 Millennium Commission projects were formulated with an investment of $ 700 million; the money came from government side. This investment resulted in increases in business activities within the country. Economical Factors: If people have good amount of income, which they plan to spend in buying different goods and services then market conditions are supposed to be favorable for investment. This disposable income is said to be the money left after spending on food, accommodation and health. People in UK love recreation and other activities, buying food from outside is also a trend, but joblessness

in recent years has badly affected the buying capacity of these people, therefore, economic conditions are not very good here. However, government plans to create jobs so as to improve the buying capacity of people (Swarbrooke, 2002, p.105). The disposable income of people can be estimated by finding out following parameters; 1- Number of people on jobs 2- Level of unemployment within the country 3- Policy of taxation from government 4- Level of wages and the difference of income between manual workers as well as industries 5- Income difference between people belonging to white collar jobs, professionals, workers and managers 6- Relative generosity 7- People receiving social security benefits and pensions All these factors and much more can give a fair estimation of buying capacity of people. Advertisement: Advertising improves the sale and helps in selling products, people feel amused with advertisement and Advertisements and make them involved in a specific product later on it becomes their habit to use that particular item. Some events like sports match are very helpful in this regard, for example during Super Bowl people enjoyed the event with an increased sale of products which were advertised during this time (Bojenic, Reid, 2009, p 239).

Advertising Effectiveness Advertising is an important aspect of marketing, people watch television during which they come across the advertisement of a variety of products. According to a research the retail sales in TV ads roused to a level of 40 percent after the successful usage of advertising techniques. Now teenagers pass 8.5 hours per day, in front of TV and internet, which is one hour more than in 2000, when these people used to spend 7.5 hours while watching TV and using internet. This has also increased the importance advertisement on internet, now marketers are planning to introduce their products or services directly on different websites. However, marketers must realize the changes occurring in this field, new developments must be adopted. Skills must be updated according to latest standards, methods used in the promotion of a product must be efficient and effective, this can help the organization to achieve its goals and gain success. Moreover, the role of technology must not be neglected, most of the marketing occurring now is technology based. Marketers need to understand that the sum of money they spend on advertising will return back with an appreciable amount of profit (Matauschek, 2010, p. 212). Traditional advertisings role and offering In UK Traditional advertising utilized media like television, press, cinema, outdoors and radio, here the Press can be divided into two main categories; a- Newspapers (local and national) b- Magazines (consumers and business oriented)

Britain is supposed to be the most the strongest area in press with more than 11 national dailies and 10 national Sundays. This diverse national press allows advertisers to utilize maximum potential of this media. Choices are there for marketers and they can use the newspaper or magazines well suited to their brand. Moreover, market research data is also easily available that gives information about the type of the readers of a particular newspaper. Targeted users can be approached with the help of their favorite daily news paper or magazine. Outdoors is another growing area of advertising like; petrol pumps, pub toilets, air port trolleys and phone boxes etc. moreover, buss, tubes and taxies are also used in this. Significant competition is now being posed by internet marketing. The total advertising is now being shifting away from print towards TV and internet. In the year 2006, the spending on internet was more than 11 percent of the total UK ad-expenditure, and it is supposed to increase in future years. When UK expenditure is compared to other countries then it reveals that it is very less than that of the whole world, in the year 2006 it was 19, 083, 000, 000, which is double than estimated cost of 2012 Olympics (McRury, 2009, p. 91). Now internet presents a serious threat to traditional media, fastest growing web has challenged the radio news paper and television, as it has greater potential than that of the previously used advertisement techniques. Now marketers and advertisers show a great deal of interest in this accepting it as a mainstream medium. Many companies have accepted it as an integral part of their marketing strategy (Pernul, Madria, Bauknecht, 2000, p. 301). PVRs: (Personal Video Recorders) Personal video recorders have helped people to watch their favorite programs without the interruption cased by advertisements. Viewers can record program and forward the

advertisement while watching TV. It is a system that allows viewers to skip quickly from the television ads. People think that it can cause harm to television ads and the whole industry can suffer, however, according to a latest research by SKY the system cause people to watch more advertisements. The study was done by sky view panel on 20,000 homes where people were asked to utilize this system; the result showed that total amount of TV-watching amongst people with PVRs is higher than those without PVRs. People who use this system show 12 percent more TV watching than others. Therefore, a total of 5.4 percent increase in television advertisement watching has been observed. Advertising Alternatives: More than one Advertising alternatives are being used now a day, some of these are named as under;

Advertisement on billboards Use of internet Directing people to websites through televisions Share of UK ad-expenditure by Media is shown by following data analysis

Source: Fletcher, 2010, p.47 Consumers Choice: Consumer choice is of fundamental importance in choosing method of advertisement; moreover, creative and informative form of advertising has a great role in accessing consumers choice. Consumers demand for different products, this is the reason why hundreds of different forms of same product are available in market. Advertising serve as a communication media, especially the internet sites which promote products and receive users feed back, are very helpful in this respect. Advertising must be for consumers welfare; in UK ASA (Advertising Standards Authority) is the main body that remains watchful for the advertisement industry. According to its standards the advertisements should be legal decent as well as truthful to the consumers (Reynolds, Lancester, 2001, p. 338). Marketing Practitioners Opinion Marketing practitioners have different opinions about UK marketing environment for instance; Oldryed says that forecasting techniques within markets; largely rely upon studying the history

by analyzing previous information. This trend can be helpful but in many cases it proves itself to be useless. In UK many companies utilize computer based system that is highly sophisticated, but forecasting done in this manner can give wrong information of because of short and temporary, for example, it took 18 months longer than what was predicted to reach the Green shots of recovery after recession period. There are many other factors that affect the market environment, for instance; 1- Sharp tax rise can also affect the market conditions 2- It is import to take into account all these issue. George Orwell says that the efficiencies of communication tools are making prediction of market environment very easy. In UK the incorporation of this technology has made the business information available at a very low cost. Moreover, UK market is also able to get valuable information about Asian and other emerging economies of the world, with the help of which future competition in the market can be predicted (Oldryed, 2007, p.249). Benady asserts that advertisers must use attractive and vigorous means to advertise goods this must appeal users. According to him new digital environment is not only giving opportunities to viewers but it also making life fast, where people do not want to sit in front of TV while watching ads. Personal video recorders and their utilization amongst public have endangered the advertising agencies, which solely work for television advertisements. Therefore, a new and interesting approach must be sought to meet he latest challenges (Benady, 2011). Conclusion:

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Marketing and advertising have a very close relation with each others; advertising helps marketers to convey their impression amongst public. Consumers behavior is a primary importance while selecting a particular media for advertisement. During last few years internet has earned a great share of advertising in UK media sector. Keeping in view the taste of people marketers should select the advertising media. Television advertisement budgeting is going down very swiftly, and researchers say that this budget is shifting from television to internet. Many brands are using internet and escaping from television to avoid loss f money. However, it is a fact that television offers creative people to utilize this medium, as it allows 30 seconds advertisement, which can capture the attention of thousands of people of all age groups. In UK marketers are now incorporating internet as an essential tool in their marketing mix, which helps them a lot in receiving the attention of an appreciable amount of audiences. (Benady, 2011).

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References Alekzander, N., 1997. International retailing. Wiley-Blackwell; Benady, D., 2011. PVR didnt kill the TV ad star, Marketing Week, [online]. Available at <http://www.marketingweek.co.uk/opinion/pvr-didnt-kill-the-tv-adstar/2053676.article> [Accessed 27 June 2011]; Fletcher, W., 2010. Advertising. Oxford University Press; Oldroyd, Michaer and Oldroyd, Mike, 2007. Marketing Enviroment. Butterworth-Heinemann; Kotler, P., Amstrong, G., 2004. Principles of marketing. Sprimger; Gnther, P., Sanjay Kumar, M. and Kurt, B., 2000. Electronic commerce and web technologies. Springer; Raylond, P., Lancester, G., 2001. Marketing. Butterworth-Heinemann; Reid D Robert, Bojanic Dvid C, 2009. Hospitality marketing management. John Wiley and Sons; MacRury Lan, 2009. Advertising. Routledge; Matauschek, J., 2010. Advertisement in UK. Peter Lang; Swarbrooke, J., 2002. The development and management of visitors attractions. ButterworthHeinemann; Singh Satish, 2007. Pvr Cinemas marketing Strategy, [online]. Available at http://www.scribd.com/doc/23880321/Pvr-Cinemas-Marketing-Strategy [Accessed 28 June 2011].