Chapter 19 summary

Chapter 19 measuring the effectiveness of the promotional program from Pujarini Ghosh

Chapter 15 summary

Chapter 15 internet and interactive media from Pujarini Ghosh

Chapter 10 from Pujarini Ghosh

Creative strategy implementation and evaluation from Pujarini Ghosh

Chapter 8 Summary

Creative strategy: Planning and Development from Pujarini Ghosh

Chapter 5 Summary

The Communication Process

The function of all elements of the promotional mix is to communicate, so promotional planners must understand the communication process. This process can be very complex; successful marketing communications depend on a number of factors, including the nature of the message, the audience’s interpretation of it, and the environment in which it is received. For effective communication to occur, the sender must encode a message in such a way that it will be decoded by the receiver in the intended manner. Feedback from the receiver helps the sender determine whether proper decoding has occurred or whether noise has interfered with the communication process.

Basic Model of Communication Process

•          Source/Sender – the person or organization that has information to share

•          Receiver – person(s) with whom the sender is sharing thoughts

•          Message – the information the source hopes to convey

•          Channel – method by which the communication travels from source to receiver  

•          Encoding – putting thoughts, ideas, or information into symbolic form

•          Decoding – transforming the senders message back into thought

•          Response – receiver’s reactions after seeing, hearing, or reading the message

•          Feedback – part of the receiver’s response that is communicated back to the sender  

•          Noise – unplanned distortion or interference

Successful communication is accomplished when the marketer selects an appropriate source, develops an effective message or appeal that is encoded properly, and then selects the channels or media that will best reach the target audience so that the message can be effectively decoded and delivered.

Marketers are very interested in feedback, that part of the receiver’s response that is communicated back to the sender. Feedback, which may take a variety of forms, closes the loop in the communications flow and lets the sender monitor how the intended message is being decoded and received.

Identifying Target Audience

The marketing communications process begins with identifying the audience that will be the focus of the firm’s advertising and promotional efforts.  The target audience may consist of individuals, groups, niche markets, market segments, or a mass audience:

•      Individuals – those with specific needs for whom a message must be specifically tailored

•      Small groups – multiple people in the audience who are involved in the purchase decision such as families or people who members of a buying center

•   Niche markets – smaller,  well-defined markets consisting of customers who have similar needs

•    Market segments – broader classes of people who have similar needs and can be reached with similar messages

•       Mass markets – markets consisting of large numbers of potential customers

The Response Process

The most important aspect of developing effective communication programs involves understanding the response process the receiver may go through in moving toward a specific behavior (like purchasing a product) and how the promotional efforts of the marketer influence consumer responses. In many instances, the marketer’s only objective may be to create awareness of the company or brand name, which may trigger interest in the product. In other situations, the marketer may want to convey detailed information to change consumers’ knowledge of and attitudes toward the brand and ultimately change their behavior.

The four models of the response process are:

•          AIDA model – developed to depict the stages in the personal selling process

•          Hierarchy of effects model – shows the process by which advertising works

•          Innovation adoption model – shows the stages a consumers passes through in the process of adopting a new product

•          Information processing model – a model of the process through which a consumer must pass to be influenced by advertising

Alternative Response Hierarchies

Michael Ray has developed a model of information processing that identifies three alternative orderings of the three stages based on perceived product differentiation and product involvement.  The three alternative hierarchies include:

•    The Standard Learning Hierarchy = learnà feelà do sequence.  The consumer is viewed as an active participant and this sequence is likely when there is much differentiation among brands and the consumer is highly involved in the purchase process.

•  The Dissonance/Attribution Hierarchy = doà feelà learn sequence.   Occurs when consumers must choose between two alternatives that are similar in quality but are complex and may have unknown attributes.  Focus of mass media should be on reducing dissonance after purchase.

•   Low involvement Hierarchy = learnà –àdo àfeel sequence.  Occurs when involvement in the purchase decision is low, there are minimal differences among brand alternatives, and mass-media advertising is important.

The cognitive response approach

The cognitive response approach has been widely used in research by both academicians and advertising practitioners. Its focus has been to determine the types of responses evoked by an advertising message and how these responses relate to attitudes toward the ad, brand attitudes, and purchase intentions. The three basic categories of cognitive responses which the researchers have identified are:

•          Product/message thoughts

•          Source-oriented thoughts

•          Ad execution thoughts

The cognitive response approach examines the thoughts evoked by a message and how they shape the receiver’s ultimate acceptance or rejection of the communication. The elaboration likelihood model of attitude formation and change recognizes two forms of message processing, the central and peripheral routes to persuasion, which are a function of the receiver’s motivation and ability to process a message. There are three critical intermediate effects between advertising and purchase including cognition, affect, and experience. Those responsible for planning the IMC program should learn as much as possible about their target audience and how it may respond to advertising and other forms of marketing communications. 

Chapter 4 Summary

Chapter 4 Summary

Perspectives on Consumer Behaviour

This chapter deals with the field of consumer behaviour and examined its relevance to promotional strategy. Consumer behaviour is best viewed as the process and activities that people engage in when searching for, selecting, purchasing, using, evaluating, and disposing of products and services to satisfy their needs and desires.

A five-stage model of the consumer decision-making process consists of problem recognition, information search, alternative evaluation, purchase, and post purchase evaluation. Internal psychological processes that influence the consumer decision-making process include motivation, perception, attitude formation and change, and integration processes.

This was followed by in-depth discussion of each stage.

Problem Recognition & Motivation

Various sources of problem recognition, both internal and external, were discussed. The sources are:

·         Out of stock

·         Dissatisfaction

·         New Needs/Wants

·         Related Products/Purchases

·         Marketer-Induced Problem Recognition

·         New Products

Information Search & Perception

The second stage in the consumer decision-making process is information search. Once consumers perceive a problem or need that can be satisfied by the purchase of a product or service, they begin to search for information needed to make a purchase decision.

The initial search effort often consists of an attempt to scan information stored in memory to recall past experiences and/or knowledge regarding various purchase alternatives. This information retrieval is referred to as internal search. For many routine, repetitive purchases, previously acquired information that is stored in memory (such as past performance or outcomes from using a brand) is sufficient for comparing alternatives and making a choice.

If the internal search does not yield enough information, the consumer will seek additional information by engaging in external search. External sources of information include:

o   Personal sources, such as friends, relatives, or co-workers.

o   Marketer-controlled (commercial) sources, such as information from advertising,

o   Salespeople, or point-of-purchase displays and the Internet.

o   Public sources, including articles in magazines or newspapers and reports on TV.

o   Personal experience, such as actually handling, examining, or testing the product.

Alternative Evaluation & Attitude Formation

After acquiring information during the information search stage of the decision process, the consumer moves to alternative evaluation. In this stage, the consumer compares the various brands or products and services one has identified as being capable of solving the consumption problem and satisfying the needs or motives that initiated the decision process.

The various brands identified as purchase options to be considered during the alternative evaluation process are referred to as the consumer’s evoked set.

Purchase Decision & Integration

At some point in the buying process, the consumer must stop searching for and evaluating information about alternative brands in the evoked set and makes a purchase decision. As an outcome of the alternative evaluation stage, the consumer may develop a purchase intention or predisposition to buy a certain brand. Purchase intentions are generally based on a matching of purchase motives with attributes or characteristics of brands under consideration. Their formation involves many of the personal sub-processes discussed in this chapter, including motivation, perception, attitude formation and integration.

A purchase decision is not the same as an actual purchase. Once a consumer chooses which brand to buy, he or she must still implement the decision and make the actual purchase. Additional decisions may be needed, such as when to buy, where to buy, and how much money to spend. Often, there is a time delay between the formation of a purchase intention or decision and the actual purchase, particularly for highly involved and complex purchases such as automobiles, personal computers, and consumer durables.

Post-purchase Evaluation & Learning

The consumer decision process does not end with the purchase. After using the product or service, the consumer compares the level of performance with expectations and is either satisfied or dissatisfied. Satisfaction occurs when the consumer’s expectations are either met or exceeded; dissatisfaction results when performance is below expectations. The post-purchase evaluation process is important because the feedback acquired from actual use of a product will influence the likelihood of future purchases.

Positive performance means the brand is retained in the evoked set and increases the likelihood it will be purchased again. Unfavorable outcomes may lead the consumer to form negative attitudes toward the brand, lessening the likelihood it will be purchased again or even eliminating it from the consumer’s evoked set.

The decision process model views consumer behaviour primarily from a cognitive orientation. The chapter considered other perspectives by examining various approaches to consumer learning and their implications for advertising and promotion. Behavioural learning theories such as classical conditioning and operant (instrumental) conditioning were dis-cussed. Problems with behavioural learning theories were noted, and the alternative perspective of cognitive learning was discussed.

The chapter also examined relevant external factors that influence consumer decision making.

Culture, subculture, social class, reference groups, and situational determinants were discussed, along with their implications for the development of promotional strategies and programs. The chapter concluded with an introduction to alternative perspectives on the study of consumer behaviour. 

Kanmingam Phungshok - Introduction

Chapter 6 by Shashank Singh

Ch 6 summary from Pujarini Ghosh

VALS by Abhijeet Mishra and Pujarini Ghosh

Vals from Pujarini Ghosh

Chapter 7 by Debasish Brahma

Chapter 7 by Debasish Brahma from Pujarini Ghosh

Introduction by Debasish Brahma

Introduction by Shashank Singh

Chapter 2 Summary by Kanmingam Phungshok

Chapter 2 from Kanmingam Phungshok

Importance of Brand Image by Pujarini Ghosh

: Good Morning Sir, I have been pondering upon the importance of IMC for a firm and a few questions seem to trouble me quite a bit.

: Go ahead Amar, you can ask me anything about IMC and I will be more than happy to clear your doubts.

: Sir, why is a corporate’s image so vitally important?

: Amar, before talking about its importance, tell me what you understand by a corporate’s image or a brand image.

: Brand image is the current view of the customers about a brand. It can be defined as a unique brand of associations with in the mind of target customers. It signifies what the brand presently stands for. It is a set of beliefs held out by a specific brand. (Brand image is the over-all impression in consumers’ minds that is formed from all sources.)

: Yes, you are right, Amar. Brand image is the impression in the consumers' minds of a brand's total personality - both real and imaginary qualities as well as shortcomings. Brand image is developed over time through advertising campaigns with a consistent theme, and is authenticated through the consumers' direct experience. Advertising, consumer promotions, trade promotions, personal selling, the company’s website and other marketing activities, all affect consumer perceptions of the firm. A strong brand image creates a major advantage for any product or service. A company’s image has a bottom line that can even be assigned a value in financial terms. Advertising managers and other marketing experts are expected to create messages that not only sell product in the short term, but also build the firm’s image over time. A strong IMC foundation combines understanding of the firm’s image and brands with assessment of consumer and business buyer behaviours. Then the marketing team can prepare consistent messages designed to reach all of the individuals who might purchase a company’s goods and services. When the image of an organization or one of its brands is somehow tarnished, sales revenues and profits can plummet. Rebuilding or revitalizing an image is a very difficult task.

 : But specifically how does a corporate’s image mould the consumer perspective?

: From a consumer’s perspective, the corporate image serves several useful functions, which include:

•         Providing assurance regarding purchase decisions of familiar products in unfamiliar settings
•         Giving assurance about the purchase when the buyer has little or no previous experience with the product or service
•         Reducing research time in purchase decisions
•       Providing psychological reinforcement and social acceptance of purchases

: So, is it because the brand image helps consumers’ make purchase decisions with or without prior experience with a particular product/service of the brand that the brand image is so important for the corporate?

: You are absolutely correct Amar. Let me illustrate with an example, in India the image of the Tatas is associated with highest levels of quality and ethics. So consumers intend to associate quality with the wide array of its product/service offerings – starting from Tata Salt and Tata Tea to Tata Indigo and Tata Nano to a Raga or Fast Track watch to a dinner or a night’s stay at the Taj. However this is just one aspect of the importance of a strong image for a company. Can you think of other ways in which the image of a brand can be important for the company?

: I can guess, Sir, can the company use its brand image to extend consumers’ feeling to the new products that it brings to the market?

: Yes, you are right, take the example of the initial hype with the Tata Nano – it was a mere reflection of the brand image which was imposed onto the product prior to any first-hand experience of consumers with the product itself.

: Sir, can a strong positive brand image lead to consumer loyalty and hence frequent repurchases?


: Yes indeed it can, continuing with the Tata example, if you were given a choice of buying Tata Tea and 502 Pataka Chai, would you not be motivated to buy the Tata brand more frequently?

: Indeed, I would. And it also gives the Tatas the ability to charge a slight premium or fee for its tea over its competitors. That would lead to a direct impact on its revenue. I never thought that a strong brand image could result in a direct revenue enhancement.

: Yes, but that is not all, there are other benefits that a company can derive from a strong brand image like:

•        Higher level of channel power
•         More favourable rating by financial observers and analysts
•        The ability to attract quality employees

Tell me Amar, would you not like to join the Tata group when they come for your campus recruitments?

: I would be more than willing to and I want to thank you Sir, for throwing so much light on the topic and clearing my doubts.

: I am happy that now you realise the importance of Brand image for a company. You can always contact me if you have any further doubts.

: Thank you Sir, bye.



: Take care, Amar.

CHAPTER 3-ORGANISING FOR ADVERTISING AND PROMOTION by Abhijeet Mishra

Every company wants that the product it makes appeals to the consumer and enters the evoked set of the consumer. For this to occur every firm needs to develop a comprehensive advertising and promotion campaign. There are many parties that take part in the development of any such program. Such parties can be from within the organization as well as from outside the firm. The development, execution and administration of an advertising and promotion program is a tricky and lengthy job which needs to be managed at every stage. This is the reason why this process of developing an Integrated Marketing communication includes participation from advertiser (client agency), ad agencies, media agencies, specialized marketing communication firms and providers of collateral services.  Firms use three types of system to organize themselves internally for any communications campaign. The first is the centralized system in which advertisement is also treated as a different vertical under marketing like market research, sales etc. headed by a single person for every brand that company has. The advantage of such system is lower personnel requirement and more top management involvement whereas the disadvantages are lower involvement with the overall marketing goals and longer response times. The decentralized is followed by companies like P&G where everything about a brand starting from advertisement and promotion to sales is managed by a brand manager. The advantages of such system are concentrated managerial attention and more rapid response to problems whereas the disadvantages include ineffective decision making, internal conflicts and lack of authority. Many firms have in-house advertising agency which offers the advantage of being cost effective, control and increased coordination but have the disadvantage of lacking experience, objectivity and flexibility. Many firms use advertising firms to develop and execute their communication program. This type of agencies can take up several of forms such as full service agencies, creative boutiques and media buying houses. These type of firms offer their clients a full range of marketing, communications, and promotions services, including planning, creating, and producing the advertising; performing research; and selecting media. A creative boutique is an agency that provides only creative services. These specialized companies have developed in response to some clients ‘desires to use only the creative talent of an outside provider while maintaining the other functions internally. The client may seek outside creative talent because it believes an extra creative effort is required or because its own employees do not have sufficient skills in this regard. Media buying services are independent companies that specialize in the buying of media, particularly radio and television time. There are different types through which agency can be charged. They are commission systems, percentage charges and fee and cost based system. Recently Agencies are being evaluated on both financial and qualitative aspects, and some clients are using incentive-based compensation systems that tie agency compensation to performance measures such as sales and market share. Now marketing has taken a very integrated approach where apart from mass media there are several other techniques being developed to woo the customer. As a reason of this apart from using ad agencies firms are using the services of other specialist service providers such as direct marketing agencies, sales and promotion agencies, public relation firms and interactive agencies. Now it depends upon a marketer whether he wants to employ different agencies specializing in different activities or he wants that the integrated marketing communication be developed by a single ad agency which provides all these service under one roof. Recent studies have found that most marketers believe it is their responsibility, not the ad agencies, to set strategy for and coordinate IMC campaigns. The lack of a broad perspective and specialized skills in non-advertising areas is seen as the major barrier to agencies’ increased involvement in integrated marketing communications.

Chapter 1 from Pujarini Ghosh

Introductory Video - Pujarini Ghosh

Integrated Marketing vs. Integrated Marketing Communication by Abhijeet Mishra

As MBA students we are generally taught ‘Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC)’ in our respective colleges but there is another concept which has been there for years but its importance has been realized lately and it is known as ‘Integrated Marketing (IM)’. Now looking at Integrated Marketing one might confuse it with ‘Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC)’ but there are subtle differences between the two. Integrated Marketing Communication is a concept of marketing communication planning that recognizes the added value of a comprehensive plan that evaluates the strategic roles of a variety of communication disciplines – general advertising, direct response, sales promotion, public relations – and combines these disciplines to provide clarity, consistency, and maximum communication impact. It deals with integrating different communication mediums so that the brand message remains consistent across different media and the media planning is done in such a way that the different mediums complement each other. IMC is based on the concept that every medium has its strengths and that strength must be utilized cleverly. For e.g. TV is the best medium when it comes to communicating the emotional content of the brand and print is best at creating knowledge about the brand. A TV commercial (TVC) cant be converted into a print or a OOH but the print must be designed in such a manner that it complements the TVC. This leads the target audience to be exposed to various communication media each of which reflects the brand values or strengthens the brand equity. So overall IMC can lead to optimal spends and with proper media-neutral planning, can provide a bigger impact.

When it comes to Integrated Marketing it is a much holistic discipline of which IMC is a subset. An Integrated Marketing campaign requires and generally consists of an IMC plan. Integrated Marketing is generally adopted to answer a marketing objective and executing a marketing strategy whereas IMC deals with the communication part of the campaign and has the objective of communicating the brand value and the essence of the campaign in an efficient manner using different medium. The main objective of Integrated Marketing is that apart from communication it also integrates various other marketing disciplines so that whatever the brand does be it sponsoring an event or going for experiential marketing it must reflect the values that the brand stands for. Integrated marketing not only deals with external marketing where it deals with customers but also deals with internal marketing where the employees need to be communicated about the brand values. If a brand like Coca Cola stands for spreading happiness, whatever it does must reflect it be it the happiness vending machine, happiness truck, Coke studio, and  the people working for Coca Cola brand must also believe in the fact that coca cola stands for spreading happiness.This is the real achievement of Integrated Marketing and the brand must do something to promote this feeling within its employees as well. If a company stands for providing superior services ,then the way it selects its employees also comes under the scanner and the way it selects those people who will provide the service also reflects how serious the brand is about its promises which in turn will transcend to the consumers and will create huge brand equity. So in simpler terms we can say Integrated Marketing means integrating all the marketing tools , processes , discipline the brand is using so that all of them collectively communicate the same brand values in a different manner and complement each other so as to create a long lasting impact on the consumers along with better brand recall and loyalty.

Abhijeet Mishra_Introduction

Introduction by Sourojit Ghose