The integration of marketing communications 399
they will be concerned with is the content of the
message.
A surge of interest by marketers in integrated
communications strategies, where promotional
messages are co-ordinated among advertising,
public relations and sales promotion efforts,
brings with it the implicit acknowledgement
that consumers assimilate data about popular
culture from many sources.
(Solomon and Englis, 1994)Equally, according to Lannon (1994):
Consumers receive impressions of brands from
a whole range of sources – first hand experi-
ence, impressions of where it can be bought, of
people who use it or people who do not, from
its role in cultural mores or rituals, from
movies, literature, television, editorial, news,
fashion, from its connections with events and
activities and finally from paid advertising
media.A parallel consideration is the fact that the
communicator desires to achieve a sense of
cohesion in the messages which he commu-
nicates. If, for example, advertising is saying
one thing about a brand and sales promotion
something different, a sense of dissonance may
be created, with the consumer left in some
confusion as to what the brand is really trying
to say.
There is little doubt that marketing com-
munications funds spent on a single commu-
nications message will achieve a far greater
impact than when a series of different or
contradictory messages are being sent out by
the brand. And, with the pressure on funds,
marketers desire to ensure that they are pre-
senting a clear and precise picture of their
products and services to the end consumer.
Few companies are specifically concerned
with issues of whether to spend their money
on advertising, sales promotion, public rela-
tions or elsewhere. They are concerned with
ensuring that they develop a cohesive market-
ing communications programme which most
effectively communicates their proposition to
the end consumer. The particular route of
communication is far less important than the
impact of the message. And, in budgetary
terms, companies need to consider where their
expenditure will best achieve their defined
objectives. The previous notions of separate
and distinct advertising, sales promotion, pub-
lic relations, and other budgets fails to appre-
ciate that the considerations of the overall
marketing communications budget need to be
addressed as a matter of priority.
However, at the heart of the debate is the
recognition that the consumer must be the
focus of all marketing communications activ-
ity. If we consider the Chartered Institute of
Marketing’s definition of marketing, we can
see that the primary need is the anticipation
and satisfaction of consumer wants and needs.
It is the development of an understanding of
the consumer and his or her wants and
needs that will ensure that marketing commu-
nications works effectively to achieve the
objectives defined for it. This represents a
fundamental change of focus. A shift from the
functional activity of creating marketing com-
munications campaigns to an attitudinal focus
in which the consumer’s needs are at the heart
of all marketing communications planning.
And, with it, a change from a focus from the
product itself to the ultimate satisfaction of the
end consumer. Of course, there are functional
implications. Above all else, there is an
increasing recognition that companies need to
identify what position their product or service
occupies in the minds of the consumer relative
to that of other products or services. Only
when they have gained that knowledge can
they begin the process of planning marketing
communications, either to alter or enhance
that position:
As choice becomes an ever greater factor for
consumers, both in the products they use and
the way they learn about those products, it is
increasingly clear that no marketer can rely on
advertising alone to deliver its message. Inte-
gration permits us to focus the power of all