Advertising, promotion, packaging and branding

Advertising, promotion, packaging and branding are important marketing tools which are used to make products and services more desirable and hence increase sales and profits.
Any form of publicity is advertising. There are two main forms of advertising although in practice the two are inter-related.
The informational aspect of advertising involves providing information about products, services, or about important issues. For example, the government provides information about the dangers of cigarette smoking, which is an example of informative advertising.
Persuasive advertising goes further and uses a persuasive message, for example by:

• showing a famous personality (e.g. Gary Lineker) using the product
• comparing the advantages of one product with another
• using sex appeal.

There are a number of processes involved in producing effective advertising, including:

• identifying the most appropriate market segments to target the advertising
• choosing the best possible media, e.g. television, radio, posters etc
• projecting the right message in the adverts
• getting the timing of the advertisements right
• tracking the effectiveness of the advertising, e.g. checking to see how many people can recall the advert and its message.

Advertising is just one way of promoting a product. Promotion is the business of communicating with customers. There are a number of ways of promoting products and services, including:

• in-store promotion e.g. giving away free samples in a supermarket
• publicity in the media, competitions, and sponsorship
• PR - public relations activities - i.e. presenting the public image of a company to a wide audience
• presenting products in attractive packaging
• creating an attractive brand for a product....