Basic Marketing: A Global Managerial Approach

Perreault−McCarthy: Basic

Marketing: A

Global−Managerial

Approach, 14/e

16. Advertising and Sales
    Promotion

Text © The McGraw−Hill

Companies, 2002

480 Chapter 16

alone. By contrast, sales promotion tends to be more
action-oriented.
Sales promotion spending is big and growing. This
approach is especially important in prompting action—
by customers, middlemen, or salespeople. There are
many different types of sales promotion, and it is a prob-
lem area in many firms because it is difficult for a firm to
develop expertise with all of the possibilities.

Advertising and sales promotion are often important

parts of a promotion blend—but in most blends personal

selling also plays an important role. Further, promotion

is only a part of the total marketing mix a marketing

manager must develop to satisfy target customers. So to

broaden your understanding of the four Ps and how they

fit together, in the next two chapters we’ll go into more

detail on the role of Price in strategy decisions.

Questions and Problems

1. Identify the strategy decisions a marketing manager
   must make in the advertising area.


2. Discuss the relation of advertising objectives to
   marketing strategy planning and the kinds of adver-
   tising actually needed. Illustrate.


3. List several media that might be effective for reach-
   ing consumers in a developing nation with low per
   capita income and a high level of illiteracy. Briefly
   discuss the limitations and advantages of each
   medium you suggest.


4. Give three examples where advertising to middle-
   men might be necessary. What are the objective(s)
   of such advertising?


5. What does it mean to say that “money is invested in
   advertising”? Is all advertising an investment? Illus-
   trate.


6. Find advertisements to final consumers that illus-
   trate the following types of advertising: (a)
   institutional, (b)pioneering, (c)competitive, and
   (d)reminder. What objective(s) does each of these
   ads have? List the needs each ad appeals to.


7. Describe the type of media that might be most suit-
   able for promoting: (a)tomato soup, (b)greeting
   cards, (c)a business component material, and (d)
   playground equipment. Specify any assumptions
   necessary to obtain a definite answer.


8. Briefly discuss some of the pros and cons an adver-
   tising manager for a producer of sports equipment
   might want to think about in deciding whether to
   advertise on the Internet.


9. Discuss the use of testimonials in advertising.
   Which of the four AIDA steps might testimonials
   accomplish? Are they suitable for all types of
   products? If not, for which types are they most
   suitable?


10. Find a magazine ad that you think does a particu-
    larly good job of communicating to the target
    audience. Would the ad communicate well to

an audience in another country? Explain your

thinking.

11. Johnson & Johnson sells its baby shampoo in many
    different countries. Do you think baby shampoo would
    be a good product for Johnson & Johnson to advertise
    with a single global message? Explain your thinking.


12. Discuss the future of smaller advertising agencies
    now that many of the largest are merging to form
    mega-agencies.


13. Does advertising cost too much? How can this be
    measured?


14. How would your local newspaper be affected if lo-
    cal supermarkets switched their weekly advertising
    and instead used a service that delivered weekly,
    freestanding ads directly to each home?


15. Is it unfair to advertise to children? Is it unfair to ad-
    vertise to less-educated or less-experienced people
    of any age? Is it unfair to advertise for “unnecessary”
    products? Is it unfair to criticize a competitor’s prod-
    uct in an ad?


16. Explain why P&G and other consumer packaged
    goods firms are trying to cut back on some types of
    sales promotion like coupons for consumers and
    short-term trade promotions such as “buy a case and
    get a case free.”


17. Discuss some ways that a firm can link its sales pro-
    motion activities to its advertising and personal
    selling efforts—so that all of its promotion efforts
    result in an integrated effort.


18. Indicate the type of sales promotion that a producer
    might use in each of the following situations and
    briefly explain your reasons:
    a. A firm has developed an improved razor blade
    and obtained distribution, but customers are not
    motivated to buy it.
    b. A competitor is about to do a test market for a
    new brand and wants to track sales in test market
    areas to fine tune its marketing mix.