Selecciones - Webs

522
Part Five Developing the Integrated Marketing Communications Program
Belch: Advertising and
Promotion, Sixth Edition
V. Developing the
Integrated Marketing
Communications Program
16. Sales Promotion © The McGraw−Hill
Companies, 2003
reinforced WD-40’s image as a multipurpose problem solver and also encouraged consumers
to visit the company’s website to enter their uses.
Nonfranchise-building (non-FB) promotions are designed to accelerate the purchase
decision process and generate an immediate increase in sales. These activities do
not communicate information about a brand’s unique features or the benefits of using it,
so they do not contribute to the building of brand identity and image. Price-off deals,
bonus packs, and rebates or refunds are examples of non-FB sales promotion techniques.
Trade promotions receive the most criticism for being nonfranchise building—
for good reason. First, many of the promotional discounts and allowances given to the
trade are never passed on to consumers. Most trade promotions that are forwarded
through the channels reach consumers in the form of lower prices or special deals and
lead them to buy on the basis of price rather than brand equity.
Many specialists in the promotional area stress the need for marketers to use sales
promotion tools to build a franchise and create long-term continuity in their promotional
programs. Whereas non-FB promotions merely borrow customers from other
brands, well-planned CFB activities can convert consumers to loyal customers. Shortterm
non-FB promotions have their place in a firm’s promotional mix, particularly
when competitive developments call for them. But their limitations must be recognized
when a long-term marketing strategy for a brand is developed.
Consumer-Oriented Sales Promotion
In this section, we examine the various
sales promotion tools and techniques
marketers can use to influence
consumers. We study the consumer-oriented promotions shown in Figure 16-1 and
discuss their advantages and limitations. First, we consider some objectives marketers
have for sales promotion programs targeted to the consumer market.
Objectives of Consumer-Oriented Sales Promotion
As the use of sales promotion techniques continues to increase, companies must consider
what they hope to accomplish through their consumer promotions and how they
interact with other promotional activities such as advertising, direct marketing, and
personal selling. When marketers implement sales promotion programs without considering
their long-term cumulative effect on the brand’s image and position in the
marketplace, they often do little more than create short-term spikes in the sales curve.
Not all sales promotion activities are designed to achieve the same objectives. As
with any promotional mix element, marketers must plan consumer promotions by conducting
a situation analysis and determining sales promotion’s specific role in the integrated
marketing communications program. They must decide what the promotion is
designed to accomplish and to whom it should be targeted. Setting clearly defined
objectives and measurable goals for their sales promotion programs forces managers
to think beyond the short-term sales fix (although this can be one goal).
While the basic goal of most consumer-oriented sales promotion programs is to
induce purchase of a brand, the marketer may have a number of different objectives
for both new and established brands—for example, obtaining trial and repurchase,
increasing consumption of an established brand, defending current customers, targeting
a specific market segment, or enhancing advertising and marketing efforts.
Obtaining Trial and Repurchase One of the most important uses of sales
promotion techniques is to encourage consumers to try a new product or service. While
thousands of new products are introduced to the market every year, as many as 90 percent
of them fail within the first year. Many of these failures are due to the fact that the
new product or brand lacks the promotional support needed either to encourage initial
trial by enough consumers or to induce enough of those trying the brand to repurchase
it. Many new brands are merely new versions of an existing product without unique
benefits, so advertising alone cannot induce trial. Sales promotion tools have become
an important part of new brand introduction strategies; the level of initial trial can be
increased through techniques such as sampling, couponing, and refund offers.
The success of a new brand depends not only on getting initial trial but also on
inducing a reasonable percentage of people who try the brand to repurchase it and