Page 115 - DMGT507_SALES AND PROMOTIONS MANAGEMENT

Unit 6: Introduction to Integrated Marketing Communication

6.1 IMC as an Integral Part of Marketing Mix Notes

Different marketing and communication functions are generally managed as totally separate
entities and such companies do not realise that marketing communication tools should be
coordinated for communication effectiveness and present a consistent image to target markets.
Many companies recognise the need for increased strategic coordination of different promotional
elements. Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC) is an attempt to coordinate various
marketing and promotional activities to make marketing communication to target customers
more effective and efficient. The first definition of IMC by American Association of Advertising
Agencies says:
"… a concept of marketing communications planning that recognises the added value of a comprehensive
plan that evaluates the strategic roles of a variety of communication disciplines - for example, general
advertising, direct response, sales promotion, and public relations - and combines these disciplines to
provide clarity, consistency, and maximum communications impact."
Don E. Schultz, "Integrated Marketing Communications:
Maybe Definition is in the Point of View," Marketing News January 18, 1993.
However, Don E. Schultz advocates for an even broader perspective that considers "all sources of
brand and company contact that a customer or prospect has with a product or service. It requires firms to
develop a total marketing communications strategy that recognises how all of a firm's marketing
activities, not just promotion, communicate with its customers.
To fully appreciate IMC perspective, one has to look through the consumer's eyes. Many
consumers' views of advertising include not only the advertising in TV, print, and other media
but they also consider door-to-door selling, shopping bags, and even community sponsored
events as advertising. The perceptions of consumers about a company's image, its products, or
services depend on a number of other elements than promotion alone. Besides advertising,
personal selling, sales promotion, PR/publicity, direct marketing, and messages on the Internet
etc., other elements such as, package design, price of the product or service, selected distribution
outlets, displays, news reports, word-of-mouth, gossip, experts' opinions, and financial reports
also communicate powerfully.
All such communications, whether sponsored or not, create an integrated product in consumer's
mind. This means that consumers, on their own, integrate all brand-related messages originating
from the company or any other source and this determines their perception of the company.
The objectives of integrated marketing communications are to coordinate all of a company's
marketing and promotional efforts to project and reinforce a consistent, unified image of the
company or its brands to the market-place. The IMC approach is an attempt to improve over the
traditional method of treating promotion elements as totally separate activities. IMC is an
increasingly helping company to develop most suitable and effective methods to contact
customers and other interested groups.
Thomas R. Duncan and Sandra E. Moriarty have called IMC as one of the "new generation"
marketing approaches being used by companies to better focus their marketing efforts in
acquiring, retaining, and developing relationships with customers and other stakeholders. A
very important and fundamental reason, besides others, is the value of strategically integrating
different elements of communications functions and take advantage of the resulting synergy
among different tools in developing more effective and efficient marketing communication
programmes. Experts say that IMC is one of the easiest ways to maximise return on investment
in marketing and promotion. Tom Duncan and Steve Everett report that applying IMC in practice
is tough as it leads to turf wars between departments and though companies want to adopt this,
they do not know how to do it.

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