Understanding the Functions of

Marketing and PRUse this work book to help you explain the functions of marketing and public relations. You should ensure you use additional examples to support your explanations.

MarketingExplain what market research is, how it can be carried out and why it could be important.

An audience has power over how successful a product will be. It is important that the entire industry is devoted to the audience.Market research is an organised plan to collect information for target markets and discover about what people want, need or believe. Market research is carried out to ensure that the project you are working within has enough research to be able to go ahead with it. It is there to find out what the majority of the public like and relate to. For example, if I was part of a Vogue fashion magazine, I would need to find out what the particular readers are interested in to then be able to sell the product in a way which the market would be attracted to and purchase. The magazine consists of highly priced fashion therefore I would need to research into people who earn and like to spend a lot of money. These will be the kinds of people who will buy the magazine. Such magazines would also need to know spending habits of the audience as this would have an effect on articles and advertising for different fashion clothing’s.

Tesco is also another good example; they have recently rebranded their value foods using different packaging. The purpose of this was because customers were not invited into buying the cheaper products of Tesco’s own brand because of the way that they looked. The re-branding is more attractive and consumers are more likely to buy them, even though the food and tastes are exactly the same.

The photographs I have placed to the right show the before and after designs of Tesco own value foods. As you can see the re branding really does make the products look instantly more appetising. The blue stripes that were used before to represent the brand have been thrown away and a new, inspiring design with colours used to interpret the actual food has been used. For example, here the copy and the images and designs used on the tin of beans are all different shades of orange. ‘’ The new label looks more upmarket, with colourful packaging featuring 1950s-style line drawings of kitchen equipment and food. Tesco has revamped some of the 550 products in the range, taking out MSG and hydrogenated fats, and promises they will taste better with the lemon curd "more lemony" and 33% more apple in the apple sauce.’’

Before After

Market research is a key factor to gain insight and support decision making, as well as to maintain competitiveness over competitors. The information used from the market research is to identify and analyse the market need, size and competition.

There are two major types of market research, Qualitative and Quantitative.

Quantitative research all about knowing how big or small the audience of the product is. It is about asking people to give their opinions on certain subjects in a structured way so that the company can produce hard facts and statistics to help understand the audience. To produce reliable statistical results, it’s important to survey people in large quantities to make sure there is a reasonable sample of your target market.NRS (National Readership Survey)This provides estimated readership and circulation figures for print media industry distribution system. It covers how many products get distributed and sold, and how much money is made.ABC(Audit Bureau of Circulations)It has 2 roles to manage and up hold standards which reflect media industry needs. These standards determine best practice in how media industry data is prepared and reported.Offer an audit and comply and service to check that data and processes meet these industry agreed standards. They produce figures on audience numbers for both print and digital formats.

Qualitative audience research helps understand your audience. The method measures information based on opinions and values as oppose to the statistical data that is formed in quantitative research.It is much more subjective and uses various different methods of collecting information. There are several different ways to get qualitative audience information. These include focus groups and mainly individual and in depth interviews as well as questionnaires.A focus group is to show the particular product and ask a group a series of questions to take part in an extended guided discussion. Questionnaires gather survey data by handing out surveys for their target market to fill out. Face to face interviews involves one person asking another a series of questions to gather data

Audience profiles are important and give detailed information about the audience. They are broken down into different categories; Socio-economic status, NRS social grades, lifestyle or physiographic, postcode and geodemographics, age and gender and mainstream or niche.

Explain market analysis. What is done and who could carry it out for you?

Market analysis is to determine the attractiveness of the market and to understand the evolving opportunities and threats that the business may face. The size of the market can be evaluated by looking at present and on-going sale figures if the product were to expand. The strengths, weaknesses opportunities and threats of a company can be identified using ‘SWOT analyses. This type of analysis is a structured method used to evaluate the points I have made previously. This analysis can be carried out for a product, a person, a place or industry. It helps specify the objective of the business or project and identifies the internal and external factors that are favourable and unfavourable to achieving that objective.

Market analysis shows the way in which you would interpret your market research in order to provide the audience and market with the product that they want. It helps find out what peoples tastes and likeability are to find out what your particular audience actually is. It looks at the wider market and includes such things as how big your market is, market trend, growth rate, profitability, industry cost structure, distribution channels and key success factors and details. For example, if you were creating a rock magazine, you would analysis what already exists and what the market prefer or like to see in that type of magazine and too introduce to the company

what kind of competition there is on the market.

An example of market analysis would be used for things such as video games. Sports games are not very popular in this season running up to Christmas, more and more people want games that involve violence and guns like Call of Duty. Bringing out a new game at this point in time that would acquire aspects that are popular on the market and that the public are more interested in will sell better. It is all about thinking about your company or your analysis and how you can achieve the best product possible. The competition involved is high and you need to know what existing products are already out there and how well they are selling.

In my own perspective the release dates of call of duty and fifa could have been to close. This would have had an impact on the sales of the games. Customers are more likely to buy the first one that comes out and may not be able to afford the second one. While doing some research the launch of the Xbox one allowed sales for Fifa 14 to increase by a lot, making one of the bestselling games this year. ‘’ the company that tracks the sales of these games, the bundling of "FIFA 14" with Xbox One consoles was the difference maker. Last week, 63 percent of sales of the game were thanks to Microsoft's newest device.’’ As you can see the way in the market analysis has been done here is that FIFA 14 have carefully planned on how they were going to achieve targets and how they could compete against other games. The release of the Xbox one that included the bundling of Fifa 14 game would have been statistically scheduled to ensure the sales will increase.

Explain marketing strategy using examples.

A marketing strategy is an organized plan that combines all of the marketing goals of the project or product together. The marketing strategy should be drawn from the market research and focus on the right product mix in order to achieve the best quantity of sales and profit and to keep the business sustainable. The strategy is the basics and foundation for the marketing plan. A marketing strategy is composed of several components that consist of answers to a series of customer and product related questions.

This is one example of a marketing strategy1.    Market selection                    a.    Who are the customers or subset (segment) of customers you are targeting 2.    Product planning                        a.    What products are the companies going to design or OEM for the selected customers?                        b.     What are the products features uniquely targeting this market?                        c.    How will the product be package3.    Pricing                        a.    Pricing is a quantitative expression of the value of the product to the customer.                        b.    Pricing should be designed like a feature consistent with the use of the product.                        c.    What will you charge for and How much?                        d.    How will the customer pay and when?                        e.    See also the discussion of the Price/Features matrix4.    Place                        a.    Which channel, direct, wholesale or retail channels best moves and delivers

the product and its benefits to the selected market?5.    Promotion                        a.    Positioning:    What is the message that states the purpose and benefits of the product in the market and how it competes?                        b.    Selling:            Direct or indirect through others?                        c.    Communications                                                How will people be informed about your product, showing them how it can be useful, and persuading them to buy it?                                                What role should branding play?                        d.    Support and Service                                                How does the customer get help if needed to make the product work and replacing or repairing it when it’s broken?

The marketing strategy will describe how the business meets the requirements of the particular market. It must also meet the needs of the customer better than competitors’ products. The plan must enable a business to deliver its objectives.Each organisation and company will have a different strategy on how they market their products. This strategy will be used for each product the particular company produces to ensure that they meet all the requirements. A change in the marketing strategy will occur when sales are low and if the targets for achievements are not met. The change will allow the company to produce further products differently to achieve different and better sales. The strategy is the base of the product, therefore needs to be detailed including aspects on how to promote and advertise the product once it’s produced. Instead of pitching the product or services given the marketing strategy is there to tempt buyers and to provide them with the basics to make their own opinions and judgement on it.

‘’A strategy is a long-term plan to achieve certain objectives. A marketing strategy is therefore a marketing plan designed to achieve marketing objectives. For example, marketing objective may relate to becoming the market leader by delighting customers. The strategic plan therefore is the detailed planning involving marketing research, and then developing a marketing mix to delight customers. Every organisation needs to have clear marketing objectives, and the major route to achieving organisational goals will depend on strategy. It is important, therefore, to be clear about the difference between strategy and tactics.’’

The photograph I have introduced above shows another example of a marketing strategy, except this marking strategy is for a new web site. Internet marketing strategies involve many different techniques which all revolve around the website. ‘’As so much of modern life revolves around technology; Internet marketing has been shown to offer small and medium scale businesses, the highest returns on investment when compared to television, radio, events, sponsorship and direct mail marketing methods.’’

Why is advertising so important to an organisation? Use examples to help you explain.

Advertising is always evolving and expanding. You will see advertisements everywhere you go being a new one each time. Advertising is one of the most important aspects to an organisation. It helps keep the consumers informed of what new product that particular company has brought out. For example, somebody may be watching television at home and an advert for a new fragrance will come on. You cannot smell the fragrance when watching the

advert, so this can potentially make it very difficult for fragrance companies to advertise. They may go and ask a shop about that particular fragrance just because its new, and its produced by ‘Hugo Boss’ that you’ve heard of before. The customer may like it or not, but advertisement always brings people to be intrigued and want to try it out. Advertisement helps spread awareness about products or services that are of some use to a consumer or potential buyer.To the left here I have included a photograph/poster of the Malibu Alcoholic drink advert. The advert is simple and has very little copy or information in about the drink. The bottle is shown to show buyers what it looks like so if they are looking for it, they know what to go for. From experience I know exactly what Malibu tastes like, I can tell from this advertisement poster that the images and colours they have used really does emphasise the taste. The way which they have used the images to look like a swirly face almost interprets what alcohol can do to you, in a good way. Alcohol advertisement is difficult as there are lots of restrictions on what you can and can’t do. This

is because they cannot show any creation or signs of ‘getting drunk’. The colours used are really powerful together as the contrast between the yellow and green creates a really fruity, smooth feel.The main aim of advertising is to sell. There are many different types of advertising which are channelized through different means of mass media. They are shown through billboards, posters, leaflets, television/film, and animation. These messages sent across are meant to give suggestions to the consumer to buy the product or services; therefore they need to be appealing. In an organisation its soul aim is to make sure that the goods are sold with the intention of making a profit. The consumer will only purchase the product when they actually know about their existence. If I was to create a something such as a book which will be sold in many different retail stores, without advertising the end consumer may not even know that the book even exists. Harry potter for example, the series of books are extremely popular amongst many different people. If J.K Rowling was to release a new book without anything from events to posters harry potter fans may not even realise it is actually out there. The author is missing out on sales as well as consumers and fans are missing out on something they love.It is a form or marketing communication to encourage, persuade or even manipulate an audience.Types of advertisingTelevision advertising/ music media advertisingInfomercialsRadio advertisingOnline AdvertisingNew mediaProduct placementsPress advertisingBillboardsIn store advertisingCoffee cup advertisingStreet advertisingSheltered outdoor advertisingCelebrity branding

What is brand promotion and what methods could you use to promote a brand?

Brand promotion is designed to inform, remind, persuade and influence customers to increase the awareness of the product, customer loyalty, competitiveness, sales and overall company value. Organisations use brand promotion to show what exactly is for sale, keeping the image alive for consumers. They also use brand promotion to not only just show the goods or services to people but to emphasise that they offer something that somewhere else or something else may not. For example, a department store may have a special 10 per cent off on cosmetics and fragrances where as another may not, or may even have something different such as 3 for 2 on gift sets like Boots. You as the customer are automatically going to go for the better deal depending on what your needs are. Companies do this by identifying what is special while promoting the brand.

Another example would include a Rimmel London foundation manufactory where as they say that their foundation lasts 25 hours. Leaders within a marketing team will develop a different campaign based on each of the key selling points. In this case the selling point is that the make-up lasts 25 hours, which is a persuasive technique to drive consumers to buy the product rather than another which may not have branding promotion.

Brand awareness is a primary objective within this strategy of marketing. Consumers will not be able to purchase something that they do not know exists. For a company to expand and to boost sales they need to bombard the public with messages and information about what’s for sale and what the company stands for. The more brand promotion and advertisement that a company has for its products, more and more people are going to recognise it. I know from past experience that Rimmel London’s big brand promotion scheme is ‘Get the London Look’ with an appearance of model Kate Moss. Hearing the quote and seeing the model allows me to instantly realise that it is Rimmel London. It helps you to identify the brand.

There are many different ways you can use brand promotion.

One of the most recent that we have seen is the Innocent smoothies brand promotion. The releases of the bottles include a minute woolly hat this is placed on the lids of all the products. The hat represents warmth for old people in the winter where it states a percentage of the money made will go to that charity. This is also another way of promoting a brand. The hats are very appealing and bring new consumers to buy the product as well as the loyal customers.

The idea of compare the meerkat has adapted extremely well to the public. It has become a very well-known car insurance company. After insuring a car with compare the market you can collect meerkat fluffy toys which are a very good way to promote the brand. Meerkats are almost the foreground of the organisation as it is original and creative.

Running an event is also a good way to promote your brand. Around easter time Tesco ran an easter egg hunt around the store. The game consisted of numbers and co-ordinates on where you needed to go to fill in the spaces on a sheet to achieve a quote. Once the quote was finalised you won chocolate.

The promotion of a brand is finding the unique selling point in order to sell more units. That is the basic fundamental idea behind advertising.

Public RelationsWhat are some of the key principals involved in managing the message?

Public relations are all about managing the spread of information between an individual person or an organisation and the public. It may include aspects such as gaining exposure to audiences by using topics of public interest and news items that do not require a direct payment.An example of managing the message would be ‘’Every little helps’’ quote from Tesco or ‘’I’m lovin’ it’’ created by McDonalds. The quote that has been used for years and years with very little change from

Tesco shows connotations that the store is your friend which you are initially helping out by shopping there. As well as the store helping you out, with the impression of every little bit of savings that Tesco have on rollbacks of items and foods. Whereas realistically the company just want customers to shop there as they just want your money and business.

The quote used by McDonalds is massive and is well known worldwide. The idea of the quote makes you think that you love the foods that are sold at McDonalds when really you hate to love them. We know how bad fast foods are for your health yet the public still buy it. The food is enjoyable and the quote gives you the mentality to actually go and buy it without thinking about the badness.

Public relation relies on making your business known about by the public in the particular way that you want it to. This can be achieved by managing the businesses image and the information that you decide to give out for the public eye to see, like the logos. Public relations differs from marketing and advertising because your audience usually receives the message you send out about your business third party – such as a newspaper or magazine you have recently sent an article that includes a positive mention of your product. On the fashion pages of a magazine or newspaper you would see specific items of clothing that are either been worn by a model or just been placed on the page. Where the product is from and the price is always stated. Because of this you can build up more credibility for your brand as it is no direct sell for your business as advertising is.

Customers and consumers are more likely to believe a third party than coming from the company itself. An advert may be produced in television form for make-up, which you have only seen ‘’on the model’’. Blogs are very good ways of seeing if adverts are actually telling the truth. Make-up and fashion blogs have real people experimenting and analysing different products and giving their own opinions on them. This is a third party review which will either be positive or negative. Public relations are crucial for engaging, informing and building a relationship with target customers as well as staff, suppliers and other companies that you may do business with.

‘’Publicity stunts: Anything from dressing up and handing out samples on a high street to a carefully

orchestrated campaign costing tens of thousands of pounds. Read more in our guide on how to get your business into the press. Takes ingenuity and often guts too, but can often get more publicity than conventional

means. Cost depends entirely on what you to spend, which is a large bonus. Should be accompanied by press releases so you have the best chance of local

papers giving you coverage for anything you do.’’

What is positive publicity? Find an example of it to help explain.

Positive publicity is raising the profile of those who really make a difference. From a marketing point of view publicity is one component of advertising and promotion. Publicity is an act to grab the attention of the media to gain visibility within the public sector. The organisation needs the compliment of the media to ensure that they gain this visibility. It requires doing something for the good of others or something that is just great. A good way to catch the media’s attention would be to create a publicity stunt. A good example of that would be an event for a book publishing or film. These events catch the medias eyes which then focus on letting the public

know. The bigger and better the event the more media there will possibly be, which will then achieve more publicity.

A good example of positive publicity would show that David Emanuel’s profile has risen greatly in the past few weeks from his appearance on ‘I’m a celebrity get me out of here’. He came second place with Kian at first. The reality

show has given him the chance to express himself as a real person and as you can tell by the votes received for him, the public enjoy watching him and getting to know him. David is a royal fashion designer who was not well known in the celebrity sector of the community. Becoming a part of the show that is extremely popular, has gained him fans that he never had. The particular parts of the show which were aired on national television portray the goodness that he gave within the camp, illustrating positive publicity through the media. His status is now higher than ever.

Another good example would be when KFC brought out the grilled chicken frenzy which brought good publicity in 2009. The fast food restaurants were offering free meals of the grilled chicken as a way to try and get ‘every person to try it, whatever it took’. The grilled chicken frenzy achieved increasing sales after hopes of luring health-conscious customers to purchase the food. The results of the grilled chicken applied results which were described ‘transformational’ for a brand which has struggled in the past. After the media and the promotions of the new meal and deal that they were offering the company expanded its grilled chicken menu due to the likeability and demands of new and old customers of KFC.

From this marketing perspective the publicity involved is one component of promotion, leading to marketing. It is part of the promotional mix.

Publicity draws on various different key themes which include birth, love and death which have particular areas of interest as they are aspects that are presented in our own human lives. In theory any press is good press. The quote is describes situations where bad behaviour of people involved in a specific company or brand has resulted in positive results due to the coverage of fame and publicity.In public relations terms, what is spin? Find an example to help you with your response.

Spin is where a certain slant on a story has been used in order to change someone’s/the public’s perception of it. It is achieved through an interpretation of an event or campaign trying to persuade the community and public opinion in favour or against a certain organisation or public figure. Spin implies highly manipulative and misleading tactics.

Spin includes aspects such as ‘Buying bad news. The announcing of one popular product or person at the same time as several unpopular things in the public eye is a way to hope that the media will focus on only the one popular aspect, gaining all of publicity.

Politian’s are often accused by their opponents of claiming to be honest and seek the truth while using spin tactics to manipulate the public’s opinion.

The biggest recent example here in the UK is the coalition spinning our economic situation as wholly the responsibility of the last government. This I consider to be an example of 'if you say it loud enough often enough people will come to believe it' politics.

Why might a person or a company engage in damage limitation? Using an example will improve your grade.

Every company will have a Public Relations damage control plan. This includes all different various aspects that help you or your company through a negative time in the media or in the public’s eyes. Mistakes happen and it’s imperative for a business to have a plan of action in place so that it can be executed quickly and swiftly and to protect their company’s reputation. The organisation of handling a crisis within a company or organisation can sometimes even improve the reputation.

Nat west banking has recently just been in the media due to its downfall and crashes that happened to all Nat west bankers on what is described as ‘the busiest online shopping day’ of the year. Customers of Nat west were not able to use their cards from 6pm that the next morning. People were not happy at all and some made complaints that they couldn’t even drive to work due to not been able to put any petrol in. A mistake that was made when the customer’s cards were working properly again was that the balances shown on the accounts of

customers were incorrect. Some were showing a hell of a lot less money in then there was the day before, despite not been able to spend any money on it and some even had an overdraft on accounts that were not even able to actually have an overdraft. As well as bank cards there were also problems on the websites. Nat west addressed the situation promptly whom said the technical issue had now been fully resolved. The attempt to take a quick and decisive action is a good idea as it runs through the news cycle quicker, making sure that Nat west banking were not in the media eye for long for negative reasons. A quick response illustrates that the company is concerned, proactive and in control of the situation at hand. Nat west were aware of how bad the situation was and promised all customers that anyone left out of pocket as a result of the failure would be compensated. When it comes to negative publicity the public and media will be most interested on how the particular company is involved and how it will affect the company in the future. In this case, Nat west have introduced their statement to the public which entails what they have done to ameliorate the issue and what steps that is taking to do so.Nat west quoted

"We need to put our customers' needs at the centre of all we do. It will take time, but we are investing heavily in building IT systems our customers can rely on.

"I'm sorry for the inconvenience we caused our customers. We know we have to do better.

"I will be outlining plans in the New Year for making RBS the bank that our customers and the UK need it to be.

"This will include an outline of where we intend to invest for the future."

Customer services director Susan Allen told Sky News: "We know it was a very busy time of people doing their shopping before Christmas.

"Clearly, we deeply apologise for the inconvenience we've caused."

Ignoring the situation or been tight lipped about a public ordeal can do as much damage to the reputation as the situation itself. Nat west have come forward and addressed their mistakes in an open and candid way to help regain the public’s trust and help mitigate any damage that has already occurred. Been open and honest and making sure that there is someone available for further questions comments or concerns are a good effort to keep your company up.http://www.syvretmedia.co.uk/crisis-pr.aspxhttp://www.bitesizepr.com/whats-your-companys-pr-damage-control-plan/Strategies are used in companies and businesses in case of any damage within the company. Certain things can easily just be accidents or silly mistakes, which can be very crucial if presented to the public in the wrong way.What benefit could there be to an organisation to create an event? Use an example of a marketing or PR event to support your responses.

An event can do your business justice. Meeting new people is all part of your business growth and whichever industry that you work in, getting the business in front of the right people by face to face conversation can be a very critical part to its intermediate growth. These events vary in all different types all depending on which type of business that you want to increase. The event could all be down to what you want to gain from the business covering groups of specific people or it could just be a good time for you personally. The decision of the time of the event is also all up to the business owners and marketers themselves, the need to think about the effect that the event will have if it is aired in the morning, afternoon or evening and if certain people can make it.

The beneficial factors for your business all depend on the services, the network offers and other businesses who attend and the extent of your own actual involvement in the project.

The events purpose is to increase the company or organisations brand awareness which can generate new sale leads allowing you to gain a foothold in a new area on industry. From events

you can also apply beneficial relationships by passing on sale referrals with contacts that often share common interests or are facing similar work issues.

An extreme event that was produced by Samsung for the new launching of the Samsung wave phone. The team of Samsung and the marketing agency Jack Morton had developed a digital event that was shown live in Barcelona’s mobile work congress. The show consisted of live actors who kept the crowd engaged

and excited as well as a 360 degree digital cube that was created surrounding the public. The HD projectors illuminated the walls to demonstrate the graphics available on the new smartphones.

‘’ Over the next four days, the MWC will witness some of the most exciting moments that may become a scale to overtake. As we begin with the initial sessions on Day One, two significant observations are that devices are going to be the most important factor from a mobility point of view and the focus, so far, has been on possibilities posed by ‘video delivery’ and ‘video platforms’ in a telecom-enabled economy.’’

As you can see the event is huge and gathered together hundreds of people all over the world. Mobiles are growing more and more and they are forever expanding. To ensure that your mobile company achieves the best set of sales up against competitors you need to make sure that that events are going to have a big impact on people. Something out of the ordinary like the Samsung wave event shows that originality is something that works with the public.What is lobbying and who is most likely to be influenced by it?

Lobbying is the act in which they attempt to influence decisions made by officials in the government. It is the practice of individuals who try and change the decisions and opinions of MP’s and Lords. Methods of doing this act can vary and range from letters, presentations or even providing briefing material to members.

Individual members of the public, groups of constituents, local businesses, organised pressure groups and commercial organisations can all lobby an MP or a Lord of parliament.

In business it’s the act in which they take to persuade government leaders to create legislation or conduct an activity that will initially help a particular organisation. It is a method of communication that allows you to freely analyse your decision as a lobbyist if you strongly support the decision makers. They do this to try and get them to make decisions that suit the lobbyist.