Advertising Management And Sales Promotion Advertising Planning and Decision Making

Advertising manager will be involved in the development, implementation and overall management of an advertising plan The major internal factors involved in advertising planning and decision making are situation analysis, marketing programme and the advertising plan Advertising plan should be guided by the basic aspects like objective setting and target market identification

Situation Analysis
Given a situation, all those important and pertinent factors which influence the situation need to be analysed One can use both secondary data as well as the primary data Example: Videocon relayed on pricing strategy for a period and their campaigns were concentrating on price platform

Advertising Management And Sales Promotion Once when conducted research they found most of their competition is with foreign brands and hence changed their campaign to product and features (like sound, aesthetics, style) This can be detrimental or beneficial to them A Comprehensive situation analysis will cover the entire marketing components and provide answers to various questions relating to demand, competition, environment factors, product, price, distribution , etc An analysis of the consumer behaviour in terms of the motivation and changes to response from product, service, idea etc by using the achievements can throw open avenues to companies to exploit

Advertising Management And Sales Promotion Situation analysis involves research of some kind The Agency need to coordinate in terms of : 1. what to research? 2. Whether it is to be based on conventional approach, managerial acumen or the creativity in the advertisements? However, it should relay on customers, market and competition It can help in understanding the marketing involvement and specific need for advertising In the case of consumer and market analysis, the size of the market, growth pattern of the market seasonal nature if any, geographical distribution, the available consumer segments and changes happening in the entire market need to be analyzed.

Advertising Management And Sales Promotion A Very important factor is the company should understand the buying decisions, attractiveness of the product, the number of brands and their effective off-take, etc need to be studied Ex:1. Lakme from Cold cream to Winter care lotion- Positioned itself from cold creams to cold cream plus moisturiser in one EX:2. Margo Soap- positioned as Modernisation of Margo with edges more rounded and a brighter green wrapper- headline states; Margo was always good for skin and now it looks good too EX:3 MilkMaid established in a long-run position- Rich and creamy when milk shortages, it was used as creamer for tea/coffee as a substitute for milk, later it was repositioned as a topper over fruits and puddings- product remained unchanged

Advertising Management And Sales Promotion Competitor analysis: Market structure and perceptual mapping can help identify the extent and nature of competition The analysis need to include : 1. The current market share, 2. The loss/gain in the market share over a period, 3. The number of competitors who entered during the period, 4. The extent of capturing the companys market share, 5. The strengths and weakness of the competitors, 6. The extent of promotions undertaken by the competitors 7. Whether the company needs to continue/enhance/reduce the marketing and advertising activities Ex: Bajaj when introduced 60-80cc (Sunny & M80)

Advertising Management And Sales Promotion Marketing Programme Marketing programme includes planning, execution and control of the total product line or a DMU (Decision making unit) which drives the advertising planning and decision making teamwork A comprehensive marketing plan which encompasses the entire marketing activities together with activity chart should satisfy the needs and wants of the consumers This can be successful if the company has got good distribution management, absorbed pricing in the market, otherwise, it will fall into pieces The role of the brand manager and his effective use of the marketing mix elements is hence vital for the organization to succeed

Advertising Management And Sales Promotion The role of advertising comes into effect when the problem or opportunity identified for the product involves its communication with customers The relative merits of various tools of communications need to the analysed viz a viz advertising When a company develops a prestigious products with a premium price, it is important that advertising campaign for the product reinforce the idea of high quality and prestige This can be done by advertising in premium media and associating the product with prestigious people, situation or events like Wills Davis cup or Pepsi World Cup or DLF IPL CUP

Advertising Management And Sales Promotion When the company offers a low priced product, the job of advertising might be to stress the price differential by using hard hitting copy like Gillette blade commercial, Airtel 1 commercial Advertising nature and significance will differ according to whether the company is using a push or pull strategy and whether the distribution strategy is intensive or exclusive or franchisee basis Advertising plan It is the next stage to advertising planning and decision making framework It has to follow the components like: 1. Advertising objectives and target selection 2. Segmentation strategy 3. Message strategy and tactics 4. Media strategy and tactics

Advertising Management And Sales Promotion Decision making concerns the choice of the best alternatives which strategy is feasible in a given stance? What is to be adjusted and what to reject? What media mix will be offering the best coverage? These need to be looked into while preparing the plan by an advertising/marketing manager Message strategy The form and content of the communication drives a particular advertisement A major activity in advertising management is the development and execution of the message strategy Appropriate words or visuals are used focussing a particular theme, if not, the entire campaign will be a waste

Advertising Management And Sales Promotion This message strategy and its execution derive from the copy platform A copy platform consists of full description of the relevant product characteristics to be promoted and highlighting of product features- it is set on general tone or mood of the message The creative work done in the copy is the full expression of the message Example: Print media such as magazines and newspapers allow only the use of words and visuals Television commercials use sight and sound While radio commercials rely on audio appeal Advertisement must be able to attract attention and hold interest and desire see/hear and communicate again

Advertising Management And Sales Promotion Example: Multidimensional scaling techniques are used by MARG a market research organisation in India to reduce the gaps between the brands and its positioning like; Dabur Amla Makes hair glossy Keo Karpin - Prevents hair falling Parachute helps in hair grooming Bajaj Almond Non Sticky Hair oil Brylcream Hair styling cream Media Strategy This is crucial for a media planner Even the excellent message not properly communicated through media could never deliver the response for the advertiser

Advertising Management And Sales Promotion Media strategy is nothing but decision on How much to spend on the advertising campaign? Whereas, media tactics means the decisions on a specific media or media vehicles to spend the money It is important that the knowledge on the available media in India is a paramount importance Ex: there are 50 odd satellite and terrestrial channels are available and one has to allocate the money for TV advertising It is becoming important and increasingly difficult for the media planner to apportion the advertisers money in planning and selecting the appropriate media

Advertising Management And Sales Promotion Segmentation Strategy Segmentation in advertising management is to build relationship between advertising and market segmentation Since consumer market is heterogeneous market, segmenting the consumers with broadly similar wants is termed as market segmentation It is hence obvious that a clearly defined market target is vitally important for a manufacturer/advertiser Advantages of segmentation 1. Market segmentation helps the companies in a number of ways as obtaining real competitive advantages among certain groups of consumers

Advertising Management And Sales Promotion 2. Segmentation helps improve the effectiveness of marketing operations since marketing efforts are focussed specifically on those groups of consumers who are most likely to want the product offered 3. Market opportunities are ground by market segmentation Disadvantages of Segmentation: 1. When ever market segmentation is considered, the manufacturer needs to make customised products which causes higher costs in both production and marketing for them 2. R & D costs may go higher because the manufacturer needs to develop different versions of the product 3. Higher inventory costs is possible due to the need to keep adequate stock

Advertising Management And Sales Promotion 4. Media costs will be higher because the advertising budget will have to be divided among several product types instead of one or two 5. The management involvement in these activities will be more deriving them of their valuable time Criteria for segmentation a) The segment should be easily identifiable; even at individual members b) The segment must be measurable; Quantify the potential size of the market segments sales, revenues, cost and profits c) The segment must be attractive enough; it must be substantial in size d) The promotion should be able to target the exact segment

Advertising Management And Sales Promotion e) Reference of demographic descriptors and non-demographic descriptors need to be studied age, sex, income, occupation, education etc lifestyle measures Methods of segmentations Graphical segmentation: Designating customers by geographical area is the oldest form of segmentation and is of significance for media planners while deciding national, regional or local advertisement campaigns Product user segmentation: Based on the amount and /or consumption patterns of a brand or product category, is segmented heavy, medium or light users

Advertising Management And Sales Promotion Life style segmentation: This is a method of combining several variables into a number of descriptive clusters These clusters are more accurate characterising a person than any single variable would be Benefit segmentation: This involves differentiating buyers not according to a preorientations of demographic or psychographic groups but more in relation to various benefits which buyers are seeking from particular products Example: toothpaste market- decay prevention segment, brightness of teeth segment, flavour and appearance segment and price-oriented segment It is also possible to segment the Industrial market

Advertising Management And Sales Promotion The identification of those segments mentioned in the example could have a significant implications for advertising copy and the choice of media Segmentation should enable the practical marketer to improve the effectiveness of his marketing operations and provide choices for identifying untapped market opportunities Target Market selection After market segmentation and choosing one or more segments, the opportunities within each segment need to be targeted effectively by the advertiser This is the result of assessing the identified segments as to their potential for the achievement of marketing and corporate goals

Advertising Management And Sales Promotion By proper research and analysis, the proportion of promotion efforts in each segment can be planned The marketer must be able to define the cost of the marketing efforts necessary to produce the desired market response from a segment This is again dependent on the extent of competitive activities, the market share, the customer loyalty towards players within the segment If based on the projections of sales, market share and profitability are ground to exceed the established goals, then a company may concentrate on the sale of the segment concerned and target their promotion