Marketing communication: principles and practice

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BEYOND TRADITIONAL MARKETING
COMMUNICATIONS
In our contemporary update, we have accepted that mass media persuasive
advertising and personal selling are not the limit of marketing communi-
cation. Today, with the development of sophisticated electronic media, we
can take advantage of a social and relational (or associational) nature of
marketing (Duncan and Moriarty, 1998). 
To build brand value for everyone’s benefit requires planning tools that
identify aspects of the complexity of brand communication that have hitherto
been ignored or unrecognized. Analyses such as brand message audit, contact
point review, and stakeholder mapping can reveal gaps and breakdowns in
the communication systems and programmes that cause uncertainty,
confusion, and mistrust.
Several simple principles need to be followed:
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1
Product cues
Packaging (shape & colour, styling), presentation, brand image,
guarantee
2
Price cues
List price, credit, discounts, other financial factors
3
Place cues
Quality, location and number of retail outlets; direct-response
media, delivery times, distribution
4
Paid-for advertising
Newspapers, magazines, TV, radio, outdoor – all ‘above the line’
– permanent media
5
Promotion
Direct mail, exhibitions, competitions, financial offers, samples,
literature, stationery – all ‘below the line’
6
Personal selling 
Field sales force, service depots and engineers, merchandisers
and service
enquiry and complaints hotlines
7
Publicity
Press relations and activities leading to editorial coverage –
news and features/stories