Everyone wants to master promotion. The world is awash with promotion gurus. We all tend to refer to them with a noteworthy ease and confidence, even though most of the time we are not experts in promotion, or even close. What are the most common mistakes in understanding the practice and theory of promotion?
Shaping promotion
There is clearly a common tendency to use the concept of sales as a confusing mixture of public relations, advertising or media planning. Despite the extent to which marketing has evolved and developed, some people still fail to understand the nature of marketing and only see it in its extreme manifestations. Others believe that promotion is a creative field and that if you think creatively you can develop memorable advertising.
- Promotion is still confused with communication
This common mistake is again the result of a poor understanding of promotion. Marketers are often thought of as being responsible for creating adverts, logos and slogans. Individuals often see only the top of the iceberg, forgetting that there is a product, a value and a distribution strategy before considering advertising.
Underestimating or overestimating the role of the seller
On the one hand, the marketer is often seen as a necessary person in the company, however, his role is uncertain and ends up doing everything (marketing, advertising, public relations, customer care, account management, etc.). On the other hand, we would be faced with the other extreme, where the marketer is a powerful creature who knows everything and eclipses everyone else.
Market segmentation
Segmentation is still done intuitively, at least at the small business level, despite the vast resources and consultancy services available for researching customer segments.Promotion for promotion's sake
This is often a point I encounter on too many occasions to not mention. Individuals (again, small business owners are the same old sinners) do marketing as a result of everyone else doing it because they detect that they should because it's a modern factor to do so.
Of course, the above list is not exhaustive; it simply points out many of the attitudes that lead to obscurity on the promotional battlefield.
The list of attitudes that can lead to obfuscation in the promotional battlefield is not only a good one, but also a good one.
We should always remember that the promotion business has one transparent goal: to increase the profitability of the business. We should always bear in mind that the promotion business has a transparent goal: to increase the profitability of the company. Promotion is even as necessary as any other job in the company: if a product has a deliberate defect, we may blame the assembly department, but once the product has not been sold for production reasons, it is usually the promotion department that has to take responsibility.