Marketing communication: principles and practice

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This communication
is often one way to
the customer as 
object
The relationship with
competitors is often
not recognised – yet
there is communication,
whether desired or 
not!
The corporation
The customer
The competitor
Figure 18.3
Communicative relationships

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such as transaction costs, information alternatives, and power may also be
considered as central to marketing. Day and Wensley (1983) criticize the
generally accepted theory of marketing as simplistic and incomplete in
considering major elements of both practice and the discipline. The argument
has been summarized in Table 18.2 by comparing the traditional perspective
with a modern approach that is more in keeping with a relational and
communication-based theory.
Day and Wensley (1983) integrate the shifts in thinking to form a growing
consensus that: 
the marketing function initiates, negotiates, and manages acceptable
exchange relationships with key interest groups, or constituencies, in
pursuit of sustainable competitive advantages, within specific markets,
on the basis of long-run consumer and channel franchises.
However, as Day and Wensley (1983) point out, the newer field of strategic
management has addressed many of the issues that were part of the strategic-
marketing orientation, that is, demand-based sources of competitive advan-
tage. General managers mostly do not see themselves as marketers, but they
should do just that, and corporate strategists must be marketing strategists
(Baker, 1992). Without a market there is no purpose for the corporation
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Table 18.2
Marketing theory for the modern manager
Traditional paradigm of marketing
Modern paradigm of marketing
A unidirectional stimulus 
⇒
Dyadic exchange: two-way transactional relations 
response mechanism implicit: 
between sellers and buyers – outcomes depend 
customers react to management 
on bargaining, negotiation, the balance of power, 
actions (Arndt, 1979)
and the sources of conflict between the parties 
(Bagozzi, 1978)
Little explicit attention to competitive Competitor orientation views customers as the 
forces – customer orientation implies prize gained at the expense of rivals through 
direct appeal to customers who are 
advantage in distribution arrangements, 
then won over
preferential treatment, lower costs, and so on. 
Competitive advantage is pursued
Innovation results from the adoption 
Marketing is organized, rational innovation 
of products by customers
– marketers identify opportunity for, and initiate 
and monitor, change (Simmonds, 1982)
Neo-classical economic theory-
The task of organization is to maintain the 
based assumption of profit 
enterprise by negotiating resource exchanges 
maximization
with external interests – internal coalitions adapt 
to enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of 
performing these negotiating functions 
(Anderson, 1982)

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and no role for the corporate strategist. This denies claims that the latter takes
a broader view than the corporation’s activity in the marketplace.
But what of those who are destined never to be customers, or may be
customers as well as holding other stakes in the actions and purpose of the
corporation? Business is not primarily about products or profits – it is carried
out by and for people. Several distinctly different groups have some form of
relationship with business (Mesdag, 1991). Each group has an interest in
the business, and some interests are (at least, apparently) directly opposed.
Several groups expect to get money or value for money from the business
enterprise of the corporation. This may be in the form of wages, salaries,
taxes, environmental protection schemes, dividends, margins, or remittances.
One further group is unique – it pays money to the corporation. While those
tasked with generating profits, through direct or indirect activities, have a