Kotler Summary – Chapter 20: Designing

and Managing Integrated Marketing

Communications
A View of the Communication Process
The marketing communications mix (promotions mix) consists of five
modes:

1. Advertising
2. Sales Promotion
3. Public relations and publicity
4. Personal selling – face to face intervention
5. Direct Marketing – mail, telephone or fax

We now view communications as the management of the customer buying

process over time. To communicate effectively marketers need to
understand the fundamental elements underlying effective
communications. Sender and receiver are two elements that represent the
major parties; message and media represent communication
tools; encoding, decoding, response and feedback represent
communication functions; and noise is random and competing messages.
For the message to be effective, the senders encoding process must mesh
with the receivers decoding process.

The sender’s task is to get his message through to the target audience.
These are potential problems:

1. Selective audience – people are bombarded by too many messages,

so hard to get their attention
2. Selective distortion – people twist message to hear what they want.
Add things that are not there (amplification) and ignore things that are
there (leveling)
3. Selective recall – difficult to get message in person’s long term
memory

Fiske and Hartley outline for effective communication.

1. The greater the monopoly of communication source, the greater the

recipient’s change or effect in favor of the source.
2. Communication effects are greatest when message is in line with
receiver’s existing opinions, beliefs, and dispositions. ⇒ resonate

Kotler Summary – Chapter 20: Designing and Managing Integrated Marketing Communications
 3. Communication can produce the most effective shifts on unfamiliar,
peripheral issues, which do not lie at the center of the recipient’s
value system. ⇒ new
4. Communication is more likely to be effective where the source is
believed to have expertise, high status, or likeability. -> expert
5. The social context group or reference group will mediate the
communication and influence whether or not the communication is
accepted.

Developing Effective Communications

1. Identify the Target Audience

o Image Analysis – need to assess the audience’s current
image (the set of beliefs, ideas, and impressions that a person
holds regarding an object. People’s attitudes and actions
toward an object are highly conditioned by that object’s image)
of your company or products
o Familiarity scale—Never Heard of, Heard of Only, Know a
Little Bit, Know a Fair Amount, Know Very Well.
o Favorability scale: Very Unfavorable, Somewhat Unfavorable,
Indifferent, Somewhat Favorable, Very favorable.
o Semantic Differential – a tool used to research the specific
content of its image. This involves the following steps.
 Develop a set of relevant dimensions – get customers to
identify the dimensions they would use in thinking about
a project. For example, people think about health care
when you ask about a hospital
 Reduce the set of relevant dimensions
 Administer the instrument to a sample of respondents –
respondents rate dimensions on a scale
 Average the results
 Check on the image variance
2. Determining the Communication Objectives – the marketer is
seeking responses from target audience:
o cognitive – put something in consumers mind
o affective – change consumers mind
o behavioral – get the consumer to act

Response hierarchy model – different models for consumer

response stages. All the models assume that the buyer passes
through responses in listed order (see book for illustrated model).

Kotler Summary – Chapter 20: Designing and Managing Integrated Marketing Communications
 3. Designing the Message – after defining desired audience response,
develop an effective message. The message should gain attention,
hold interest, arouse desire, and elicit action.

Formulating Message requires solving four problems:

1. Message Content – what to say to the target audience. In

determining the best message, want appeal, theme, idea or unique
selling proposition.
o Rational appeal—appeal to audience’s self-interest.
o Emotional appeal—attempt to stir up negative or positive
emotions that motivate purchase.
o Moral appeal—directed at what is right and proper.
2. Message Structure – structure and content of message. How to say
message.
o Stimulus Ambiguity – Best ads ask questions and let
audience to reach conclusions.
o Two sided arguments – praise products advantages and
shortcomings. Appropriate when product must overcome some
sort of negativity. Tend to work better with an educated
audience
o One sided arguments – only praise product. Work best with
audiences that are initially predisposed to the communicator’s
position.
3. Message Format – how to say it symbolically. Also physical format
of message, i.e.: headlines, copy, illustration, color, and sounds are
all important.
4. Message Source – who should say message. Messages delivered
by attractive or popular sources achieve higher attention and recall.
o Credibility – spokesperson must be credible. Individual should
be exhibit expertise, trustworthiness, and likeability.

Selecting The Communication Channels – must select effective

channels of communication. There are two types of communication
channels:

Personal Communication Channel

Involves 2 or more persons communicating directly with each other.
Provides opportunity for individualizing the presentation and feedback.
Further distinctions are:

 Advocate Channels – company sales people contacting the target

market
 Expert Channels – consist of independent experts making
statements to target buyers.

Kotler Summary – Chapter 20: Designing and Managing Integrated Marketing Communications
  Social Channels – consist of neighbors friends etc, talking to target
market.

Steps to stimulate personal influence – influence is very important to

potential buyers

1. Identify influential individuals and devote extra effort.

2. Create opinion leaders by supplying certain people with the product
on attractive terms
3. Work through community influentials, disc jockeys, class presidents,
etc.
4. Use influential people in testimonial advertising.
5. Develop advertising that has high conversation value
6. Develop word of mouth referral channels
7. Establish an electronic forum

Non-personal Communication Channels

Carry message without personal contact.
Media; Events; Atmospheres—packaged environment, i.e.: elegant hotels
are furnished extravagantly
Promotions
Establishing a Total Promotion Budget – how to decide on budget. Four
methods:

1. Affordable method – What the company can afford. Ignores role of

promotion as an investment.
2. Percentage of Sales method – Poor because views sales as
determiner of promotion rather than a result. Leads to budget set by
the availability of funds rather than by market opportunities.
3. Competitive parity method – achieves share of voice parity with
their competitors. Should not base your spending on competitors
spending, doesn’t make sense.
4. Objective and Task method – most desirable method. Develop
budget by defining specific objectives, tasks that must be performed
to achieve objectives, and the costs of the respective tasks.

Deciding on Promotion Mix – distributing the total promotion dollars

between these promotional tools:

1. Advertising – some distinctive qualities are:

o Public presentation – adv. is highly public mode of
communication
o Persuasiveness – is a persuasive medium that allow seller to
repeat a message many times

Kotler Summary – Chapter 20: Designing and Managing Integrated Marketing Communications
 o Amplified expressiveness – dramatize the product and the
company through art, color and sound
o Impersonality – is not as compelling as company sales rep.
o Advertorials – print ads designed to look like newspaper article
o Infomercials
2. Sales Promotion – diverse. Offer three distinctive benefits. Use sales
promotions to create a stronger and quicker response. Effects are
useful for short run strategy.
o Communication – gain attention and usually provide info that
leads consumer to product
o Incentive – incorporate concession or inducement that gives
value to customer
o Invitation – include distinct invitation to engage in the
transaction now.
3. Public Relations and Publicity
o High credibility – news stories and features add authenticity
and credibility
o Ability to catch buyers of guard –
o Dramatization – like advert., has ability for dramatizing a
company or product
4. Personal Selling – most cost effective tool at later stages of the
buying process. Three distinctive benefits:
o Personal confrontation – interactive relationship between two
people
o Cultivation – allows relationships to exist between buyers and
sellers
o Response – makes buyer feel obligated to listen to sales talk,
even if response is a polite ‘no thank you’
5. Direct marketing – there are different forms, but they all share these
characteristics:
o non-public – message addressed to specific person
o Customized – message can be customized to appeal to the
addressed individual
o Up-to-Date – message can be prepared very quickly for
delivery
o Interactive – can be altered depending on person’s response

Factors in setting the promotion mix – must consider several factors

when setting promotion mix

1. Type of Product Market – promotional tool utilization varies

between consumer and business markets. Business markets
concentrate on personal selling, while consumer markets concentrate
on advertising. However, advertising can help business markets:
o awareness building

Kotler Summary – Chapter 20: Designing and Managing Integrated Marketing Communications
 o comprehension building- explain new features and their uses
o efficient reminding
o lead generation – ads and brochures can generate leads for
sales
o reassurance – reminds customer how to use product and
reassure them about purchase
2. Personal selling can improve consumer markets:
o increased stock position – persuade dealers to take more stock
and devote more shelf space to product
o enthusiasm building
o missionary selling – sales reps can sign up more dealers to
carry company’s brands
3. Push vs. Pull Strategy
Push strategy – involves manufacturer marketing activities (sales
force and trade promotion) directed at channel intermediaries. Goal is
to induce the intermediary to order and carry the product and
promote it to end users. Appropriate where there is low brand loyalty
in a category, brand choice is made in the store, product is an
impulse item or product benefits are well understood.
Pull strategy – involves marketing activities (advertising and
consumer promotion) directed at end users. Purpose is to induce
them to ask intermediary for the product and thus induce the
intermediary to order the product from the manufacturer. Appropriate
when there is high brand loyalty and high involvement in the
category, people perceive differences between brands, and people
choose the brand before they go to the store.

Company Market Rank – top ranking brands derive more benefit from
advertising than sales promotion

Measuring the Promotion’s Results – after implementing the promotional

plan, communicator must measure its impact on the target audience.
Collect feedback from audience about recognizing or recalling the
message, how many times they saw it, what points they recall, how they
felt about the message, and their previous and current attitudes toward the
product and company. Should also collect behavioral measures of
audience’s response, such as how many people bought the product, liked
it, and talked to other about it.

Managing and Coordinating Integrated Marketing Communications

– integrate all communication disciplines for better clarity, consistency and
maximization of communication. This is an innovative idea.

Kotler Summary – Chapter 20: Designing and Managing Integrated Marketing Communications