Marketing communication: principles and practice

A contemporary perspective on the field 
of marketing communication
The consequence of recognising the concerns of communication theorists is
that a contemporary textbook will be newly selective in the presentation of
relevant concepts and principles, and will be particularly critical of certain
traditional practices (see Table 2.2).
The more up-to-date concerns of the ‘abnormal’ marketing communi-
cation theory takes contemporary communication theories as the basis for
examining marketing communication principles and practices. This textbook
will, therefore, not follow the outmoded orthodoxy: models to explain the
effects of intentional messages on individuals premised on a ‘conduit’
conception of human communication. Instead, rather more helpfully, we will
A C O M M U N I C A T I O N C O N C E P T
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Table 2.2
Priority topics in the ‘old’ vs. ‘new’ marketing communication theory
‘Normal’/traditional marketing 
‘Abnormal’/contemporized marketing 
communication theory is concerned with:
communication theory is concerned with:
The psychology of interpersonal and 
1 The complex, rule-governed 
mediated communication effects on the 
relationships of families and households 
individual: a simple stimulus–response 
with advertising media and content
model
2 The institutional effects of advertising
3 Cognitive and critical perspectives on 
the cultural effects of advertising: social 
reality; beliefs, values, moral orders and 
knowledge claims; enculturation; 
socialization; hegemony
Effects of single messages or campaigns 
The cumulative effect of marketing 
on identified individuals
communication as central to meaning 
production in our post-industrial consumer 
society – symbolic interaction
Passive audiences that do not actively 
Interpretative communities: Uses and 
interpret messages and are relatively 
Gratifications model; the interactive 
powerless towards the message content 
model
to which they are exposed
Commonness or co-orientation – sharing 
Interpretative frames – communication as 
understandings through information
co-productive interaction – conjoint action 
– meaning not transferred or shared but 
jointly produced in social ‘interaction’

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base our exploration of contemporary practices by establishing contemporary
principles from contemporary communication theory. This will allow
students of marketing communication to understand better the process and
effects of marketing communication by examining theories that attempt to
describe, explain, and interpret phenomena in a manner that normal
marketing communication theory cannot. If you simply wish to bring about
short-term cognitive, affective, and behavioural change in a managerialistic
fashion, then read one of the other books!