Marketing communication: principles and practice

WHAT DO YOU THINK?
1 To what extent are purchase decisions really made by people as discrete
decision-makers?
2 In what circumstances are you an innovator or a laggard? What
implications has this categorizing scheme for planning communication
activities?
3 People have a limited capacity to ‘process’ information. What impli-
cations has this for the design of marketing communication systems and
activities?
4 Find an example of a recent innovation in applying consumer behaviour
theory to the management of marketing communication.
5 What considerations must a communication manager make in sup-
porting new product development?
6 Explain how the rational treatment of consumer behaviour will fail when
choice is not free.
7 How might the growth in use of the Internet affect consumer response
to traditional marketing communication activities?
8 What communication ‘tools’ are used close to the buyer decision point? 
9 Explain how buyers incrementally learn as they progressively solve their
problems.
10 It is reported that corporations can save large sums of money by enabling
people to use the Internet more. Suggest ways in which this might work,
and identify implications for communication managers (how do buyer
and consumer interventions affect marketers?).
FURTHER READING
Arnott, D. and Fitzgerald, M. (eds) (2000) 
Marketing Communications Classics: An
International Collection of Classic and Contemporary Papers
, London: Thomson
Learning/Business Press.
Barnes, B. (1995) 
The Elements of Social Theory
, London: University College London
Press.
Blythe, J. (2000) 
Marketing Communications
, London: Financial Times/Prentice-Hall.
East, R. (1997) 
Consumer Behaviour: Advances and Applications in Marketing
, London:
Prentice-Hall.
Foxall, G. R. (1992) ‘The behavioral perspective model of purchase and consumption:
from consumer theory to marketing practice’, 
Journal of the Academy of Marketing
Science
20 (2): 189–98.
Gabriel, Y. and Lang, T. (1995) 
The Unmanageable Consumer: Contemporary
Consumption and Its Fragmentation
, London: Sage.
Stiff, J. B. (1994) 
Persuasive Communication
, New York: Guilford Press.
Wells, W. D. and Prensky, D. (1996) 
Consumer Behavior
, New York: John Wiley &
Sons.