Elements of Competitive Marketing - Essay Example

Lecturer: CRITIQUE OF AN ARTIFACT OF A MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS CAMPAIGN Introduction Marketing is animportant tool that is used to build a pool of customer base whose attention is drawn to a particular product or service through the use of different strategies and methods. As much as the act of marketing has changed over the years in form, structure, strategy and method, Stern (1996) noted that the place of communication and how important communication is in making the overall goal of marketing complete has not changed for a very long time. Meanwhile, there are many different ways that marketers have used to communicate their products and services to potential and existing customers, including the use of posters. Advertisements have also been found by Gronhaug, Kvitastein and Gronmo (1991) to come in many different forms and versions. This however does not mean that any form of poster at all can be selected for any product or service. Proctor, Proctor and Papasolomou-Doukakis (2002) indicated that there are several factors that ought to be considered in designing a poster for advertisement purposes. Because the factors are many, different writers and reviewers have tried to discuss some of the most salient factors at one point in literature or the other. In this paper, various works of literature are reviewed, based on which four important thematic factors that ought to be considered when undertaking marketing communications campaign have been discussed. To ensure practicality, the literature and factors have been used to critique a specific artifact in the form of poster for a Masters degree. At the end of the paper, the strengths and weaknesses of the attached advertisement are going to be identified as they apply to the four thematic factors considered. Elements of Competitive Marketing Shankar (1999) stated that “consumers interact with advertising for a variety of reasons whilst different groups show varying degrees of understanding towards the function and purpose of advertising” (p. 5). The understanding that this claim gives is that any piece of advertisement must factor in the different needs of customers, noting that not every consumer will be looking for exactly the same thing from a piece of advertisement. When advertisement is seen as a tool or component of marketing, then the advertiser would want to achieve this task of satisfying the varying needs of customers by incorporating very elementary factors of competitive marketing (Shankar, 1999). In competitive marketing, there are four major elements that a marketer would want to give emphasis to and these are place, product/service, price and promotion. To make a piece of poster for a Masters degree satisfy the needs of as many recipients as possible, the designer of the poster must take into consideration all these four elements and once this is done, there can be the assurance that a recipient whose major area of need is about the place where the programme is taking place is satisfied. The same applies to a recipient whose emphasis is on price, promotion or the kind of product or service available. With reference to the poster attached, it can be said that there were some attempts to undertake competitive marketing with the poster. For example in terms of place, mention is made of Karachi. However, there was no way that this was used in a competitive way by telling the recipient why the fact that the programme is at Karachi offers any advantage over competitors except for saying the place is centrally located. In terms of product and service, there is much emphasis on what the entire programme is about as the manner headline alone makes it clear that the programme is a business and IT programme. The courses offered are also very specific. One sees a high sense of competitiveness about the product and service as the poster spells out specific reason why a person has to choose CAMS. Some of the reasons mentioned include the fact that CAMS is focused on achievement and also giving specific success rate associated with CAMS. On price, virtually nothing is mentioned at all. This is a major weakness of the poster because introducing a price related term such as “affordable”, “scholarship”, and “executive” would have given the recipient much information that answers needs and questions on pricing. There is a bit of element of promotion as the poster indicates that there is publicity of the programme on Facebook. Elements of Strategic marketing Hirschman and Thompson (1997) admonished advertisers to appreciate the fact that any piece of marketing communications campaign such as a poster is actually an independent marketing tool. This means that every piece of poster that is carried must have the ability of embodying the entire strategic position of the company or organisation it is seeking to advertise. Meanwhile, companies and organisations take strategic positions by identifying their unique strategy option. In effect, a poster can be critiqued on the lines of possessing elements of strategic marketing if it clearly incorporates the components of strategic options, which are cost leadership, differentiation and focus strategy. At every point in time, the poster must be in a position to throwing light on one of these as the overall position of the company or organisation is. Stern (1996) argued that the advantage of making the strategic option of the organisation or company reflect in the advertisement is that customers always have one of the three perceptive areas namely cost, focus and differentiation that they look for in a product or service. Therefore, incorporating elements of strategic marketing gives the customer an outright opportunity to make decisions on which perceptive area to select. This is indeed a very important exercise to be observed by the advertiser as Proctor, Proctor and Papasolomou-Doukakis (2002) warned that “consumers’ perceptions and interpretations are not under the control of the advertisers and, therefore, the latter are only liable for a literal interpretation of their advertisements.” With reference to the poster that is being critiqued, it would be noted that it uses the focus strategy to drum home a message to the recipient as to how the programmes offered at CAMS focus on specific needs of the MBA prospect. Examples of these means by which the advertisement focuses on the specific needs of the modern day MBA prospect is the fact that it announces the presence of weekend courses, which are very important for prospective students who may also be working on full time or part time basis and so may not see full time enrolment as conducive. What is more, mention is made of the achievement rate of the university and the fact that there are courses at all levels of education. In fact the fact that the poster is loud on the 90% success rate is a major merit because success rate in terms of job market opportunities after Masters Programme remain a major concern for most prospective students. Given the fact that there are many Masters Programmes in the system today, it is important that a poster for MBA students would have the assurance that it is not just one of the schools that guarantees a certificate at the end of the day but success with jobs. Principles of Strategic design Quite apart from the marketing aspects of a piece of advertisement produced via the use of visual media such as poster, Iyer, Soberman and Villas-Boas (2005) noted that it is important for considerations on design to be done. This is because Proctor, Proctor and Papasolomou-Doukakis (2002) have said that “post-modern advertisements are closely related to the visual media” (p. 35). What this means is that in a post-modern advertisement, the kind of design that is put up can actually have the potential of either attracting or distracting recipients. On the part of Benham (1972), the design actually serves as the first point of call for the recipient and that as to whether people are going to be attracted to the poster to find out what it contains in terms of competitive marketing or strategic marketing, the poster must follow basic elements of strategic design. Touching on some of these elements of strategic design, Soberman (2005) noted that core principles and elements of design that have to do with colour, legibility, space, emphasis, balance, and dominance must all be considered in the designing of the poster containing the advertisement so that the overall effect that the design can have on the marketing of the product or service is that it will make it attractive enough to catch the attention of people to it. By focusing on the poster attached, it can be said that the designers did well to follow as many of the principles and elements of design, which make up strategic designing as possible. For example, there was very good use of colour by ensuring that not too much hot colours, which have been identified not to be effective in educational advertisements were used (Iyer, Soberman and Villas-Boas, 2005). Noting that MBA programs have been associated with securing white collar jobs, the designers were very tactical in giving the collar of the bearer on the poster a white collar. This alone speaks volumes in marketing terms for the university. In terms of emphasis, different styles including colour and shape were used to draw emphasis on specific aspects of the university’s MBA such as courses offered, people to contact and reasons to choose CAM. The space on the poster was well utilised as the poster does not show a words and designs that have been cramped together even though so much was said on the poster. In terms of legibility however, the poster would have a negative criticism because most of the things written on it are not legible at all. Because the user of the poster will not read the poster as a course book but may merely have a sight at it, it important to make the writing very legible so that from afar, some of the most important messages on the poster can be read to draw attention for further reading. Ethical Consideration Soberman (2005) makes mention of the need for advertisers to ensure that the advertisements they put up do not invade the ethical freedoms of consumers. This means that the need for ethical considerations to be made when putting up posters as a marketing communication campaign is crucial. As far as educational posters are concerned, issues of race, gender and religion can be pointed to as some areas that could easily be abused in terms of ethics. However, nothing of this nature is seen in the poster that has been attached. One area that the poster will earn much praise in terms of ethical consideration has to do with the fact that in selecting a dominant picture to use, the face of the person in the picture was not shown. Even though one may argue that the dressing of the person depicts a male, it is common knowledge that the dress code of the person, which was coat and flying tie with shirt with white collar is used by both men and women. Indeed, the ethical considerations made in the poster can be translated into marketing benefits in terms of attracting people from all segments of the market. Once this is done, the market base of the company will be expanded. Conclusion The essay has been used to establish the fact that the most important consideration that a marketer has to make when undertaking a communication campaign is to ensure that the piece of advertisement material selected can get the kind of results that is expected. With reference to the four thematic factors that were used to critique the poster, it can be said that the makers of the poster took into consideration most of the most salient factors that are needed to make their marketing communication campaign have the qualities of standing out and attracting attention. Based on this, the poster can be credited to be one which is result-oriented. However, there are some other areas that could be improved about the poster to make it even more competitive in appeal and purpose. As already noted by Cady (2006), the advertiser, when designing a piece of work must assume to be in the minds of all other competitors. This way, the advertiser will be provoked to put up a piece of work that can possibly not be contested or competed against in terms of how result-oriented it is. By critically examining the poster, it would be noted that the focus of the advertisers was more on strategic marketing rather than competitive marketing. For this reason, the poster has all the elements that are needed to set the university’s programme apart from what other competitors have to offer. However, this was not done with a lot of emphasis on what the university has to offer that others may not have to offer. Should these have been incorporated; the poster would have been more powerful than it currently is though it can be given an overall score of 86%. References Benham, L. (1972) ‘The effect of advertising on the price of eyeglasses’, Journal of Law and Economics, Vol. 15, No. 2, October, pp. 337–352. Cady, J. (2006) ‘An estimate of the price effects of the restrictions on drug price advertising’, Economic Inquiry, Vol. 14, No. 4, pp. 493–510. Gronhaug K., Kvitastein O. and Gronmo S. (1991). “Factors Moderating Advertising Effectiveness as Reflected in 333 Tested Advertisements.” Journal of advertising Research. Vol. 23 No. 4; pp. 42-65 Hirschman E. C. and Thompson C. J. (1997). “Why Media Matter: Toward a Richer Understanding of Consumers’ Relationships with Advertising and Mass Media.” Journal of Advertising. Vol. 26. No. 1; pp. 43-74 Iyer, G. K., Soberman, D. A. and Villas-Boas, J. M. (2005) ‘The Targeting of Advertising’, Marketing Science, in press. Proctor S, Proctor T and Papasolomou-Doukakis (2002). “A post-modern perspective on advertisements and their analysis.” Journal of Marketing Communications. Vol. 8 No. 1; pp. 31-44. Shankar A. (1999). “Advertising’s imbroglio.” Journal of Marketing Communications, vol. 5 No. 1; pp. 1–15. Soberman D. (2005). “The Complexity of Media Planning today.” Brand Management. Vol. 12 No. 6; pp. 420-429 Stern B.B (1996). “Textual Analysis in Advertising Research: Construction and Deconstruction of Meanings.” Journal of Advertising. Vol. 25 No. 3; pp 61-80. Read More