Integrated Marketing Communications

Integrated Marketing Communications Introduction Integrated marketing communication (IMC) is a development of current and customary strategies of marketing, to upgrade the correspondence of a steady message passing on the organizations brands to partners. Coupling different strategies together is added value in making successful correspondence as it tackles the individual advantages of each channel, which when consolidated together forms a clearer and greater effect than if utilized exclusively. To have the capacity to make progress through IMC, advertisers will recognize the limits around the promotional mix components and how the adequacy of the campaign message will be gotten a handle on by the gathering of people. Discussion Integrated Marketing Communications is a basic concept. It guarantees that all types of communications and messages are deliberately connected together. At its most fundamental level, Integrated Marketing Communications, or IMC, as well call it, implies coordinating all the limited time instruments, so they cooperate in agreement. Promotions is one of the Ps in the marketing mix. Promotion has its own blend of specialized tools. These specialized instruments work better in the event that they cooperate in amicability as opposed to in disconnection. Their entirety is more noteworthy than their parts furnishing they talk reliably with one voice constantly, unfailingly. This is upgraded when coordination goes past simply the essential specialized devices. There are different levels of coordination, for example, Horizontal, Vertical, Internal, External and Data joining. Here is the way they help to reinforce Integrated Communications. Brand Communication and Integrated Marketing Brand communication is an activity taken by associations to make their products and services famous among the end-clients. Brand communication goes far in promoting products and services among target buyers. The procedure includes recognizing people who are most appropriate to the buy of items or administrations (likewise called target customers) and advancing the brand among them through any of the accompanying means: Advertising Sales Promotion Public Relation Direct Marketing Personal Selling Social media, and so on Integrated marketing communication alludes to coordinating every one of the strategies for brand advancement to advance a specific item or administration among target clients. In incorporated showcasing correspondence, all parts of promoting correspondence cooperate for expanded deals and most extreme cost adequacy. Components of Integrated Marketing Communications The Foundation As the name recommends, this stage includes detailed examination of both the product and also target market. It is fundamental for advertisers to comprehend the brand, its offerings and end-clients. You have to know the necessities, states of mind and desires of the objective clients. Keep a close watch on contenders exercises. The Corporate Culture The elements of items and administrations should be in accordance with the work culture of the association. Each association has a vision and its imperative for the advertisers to remember the same before planning items and administrations. Give a chance to comprehend it with the assistance of a case. Association As vision is to advance green and clean world. Normally its items should be eco benevolent and biodegradable, in lines with the vision of the association. Brand Focus Brand Focus speaks to the corporate personality of the brand. Purchaser Experience Marketers need to concentrate on shopper encounter which alludes to what the clients feel about the item. A buyer is probably going to get an item which has great bundling and looks appealing. Items need to meet and surpass client desires. Communication Tools Communication devices incorporate different methods of advancing a specific brand, for example, publicizing, coordinate offering, advancing through web-based social networking, for example, Facebook, twitter, Orkut et cetera. Promotional Tools Brands are advanced through different special devices, for example, exchange advancements, individual offering et cetera. Associations need to reinforce their association with clients and outer customers. Integrated Tools Organizations need to keep a customary track on client criticisms and audits. You need particular programming like client relationship administration (CRM) which helps in measuring the adequacy of different coordinated advertising specialized instruments. Incorporated advertising correspondence empowers all parts of showcasing combine to work in congruity to advance a specific item or administration successfully among end-clients. Benefits of Integrated Marketing Communications Albeit Integrated Marketing Communications requires a considerable measure of efforts, it conveys many advantages. It can give competitive advantage, help sales and benefits, while sparing cash, time and stress. IMC wraps correspondences around clients and helps them travel through the different phases of the purchasing procedure. The association all the while combines its image, builds up a discourse and supports its association with clients. This Relationship Marketing concretes an obligation of devotion with clients which can shield them from the inescapable issue of competition. The capacity to keep a client forever is an intense competitive advantage. IMC additionally expands benefits through expanded viability. At its most essential level, a brought together message has more effect than an incoherent heap of messages. In a busy world, a predictable, and perfectly clear message has a superior shot of slicing through the commotion of more than five hundred business messages which hits clients every single day. At another level, introductory research proposes that images partook in promoting and regular postal mail help both publicizing mindfulness and mail shot reactions. So IMC can help deals by extending messages over a few specialized devices to make more roads for clients to wind up distinctly mindful, stimulated, and at last, to make a purchase. Integrated messages additionally help purchasers by giving convenient updates, refreshed data and exceptional offers which, when displayed in an arranged succession, help them move serenely through the phases of their purchasing procedure and this lessens their hopelessness of decision in a mind boggling and occupied world. IMC additionally makes messages more reliable and in this manner more strong. Office expenses are lessened by utilizing a individual organization for all correspondences and regardless of the possibility that there are a few offices, time is spared when gatherings unite every one of the offices for briefings, imaginative sessions, strategic or key arranging. This lessens workload and consequent anxiety levels one of the many advantages of IMC. Barriers Regardless of its many advantages, Integrated Marketing Communications, or IMC, has numerous barriers. Notwithstanding the standard imperviousness to change and the unique issues of speaking with a wide assortment of target gatherings of people, there are numerous different hindrances which limit IMC. These include: Functional Silos; Stifled Creativity; Time Scale Conflicts and an absence of Management know-how. Take useful storehouses. Unbending hierarchical structures are swarmed with managers who secure both their financial plans and their energy base. Tragically, some hierarchical structures detach correspondences, information, and even supervisors from each other. For instance the PR sector frequently doesnt answer to promoting. The business drive seldom meet the publicizing or deals advancement individuals et cetera. And the greater part of this can be exasperated by turf wars or interior power fights where particular managers oppose having some of their choices (and spending plans) decided or even affected by somebody from another department. IMC can confine imagination. Not any more wild and wacky deals advancements unless they fit into the general showcasing interchanges procedure. The delight of uncontrolled inventiveness might be smothered, however the innovative test might be more prominent and at last all the more fulfilling when working inside a more tightly, incorporated, imaginative brief. Include diverse time scales into an inventive brief and youll see Time Horizons give one more hindrance to IMC. For instance, picture publicizing, intended to sustain the brand over the more drawn out term, may strife with shorter term promoting or deals advancements intended to lift quarterly deals. However the two targets can be suited inside a general IMC if precisely arranged. However, this sort of arranging is not normal. A review in 1995, uncovered that most directors need mastery in IMC. Be that as it may, its chiefs, as well as organizations. There is a multiplication of single train offices. There give off an impression of being not very many individuals who have genuine experience of all the promoting correspondences disciplines. This absence of know how is then intensified by an absence of duty. The Shift from Fragmented to Integrated Marketing Communications Preceding the development of integrated marketing communication amid the 1990s, mass interchanges-the act of relaying data to substantial portions of the populace through TV, radio, and other media-dominated promoting.   Publicists communicated their offerings and strategic offers with little respect for the assorted needs, tastes, and estimations of purchasers. Frequently, this one size fits all approach was expensive and uninformative because of the absence of devices for measuring brings about terms of offers. Be that as it may, as techniques for gathering and breaking down consumer information through single-source innovation, for example, store scanners enhanced, advertisers were progressively ready to connect limited time exercises with customer buying designs. Organizations likewise started to scale back their operations and grow promoting errands inside their associations. Promoting organizations were additionally anticipated that would comprehend and give all showcasing capacities, not simply publicizing, for their customers. Today, corporate marketing spending plans are distributed toward exchange advancements, customer advancements, marking, advertising, and promoting. The allotment of correspondence spending plans far from broad communications and conventional promoting has raised the significance of IMC significance for viable showcasing. Presently, promoting is seen more as a two-path discussion amongst advertisers and purchasers. This move in the publicizing and media businesses can be condensed by the accompanying business sector patterns: a move from broad communications promoting to different types of correspondence the developing ubiquity of more particular (specialty) media, which considers individualized examples of utilization and expanded division of shopper tastes and inclinations the move from a maker commanded market to a retailer-ruled, shopper controlled market the developing utilization of information based promoting rather than general-center publicizing and showcasing more prominent business responsibility, especially in promoting execution based remuneration inside associations, which expands deals and advantages in organizations boundless Internet get to and more noteworthy online accessibility of merchandise and ventures a bigger concentrate on creating showcasing correspondences exercises that deliver an incentive for target gatherings of people while expanding advantages and decreasing ex penses The Tools of Integrated Marketing Communications The IMC procedure by and large starts with an incorporated showcasing interchanges arrange for that depicts the diverse sorts of promoting, publicizing, and deals instruments that will be utilized amid crusades. These are to a great extent limited time instruments, which incorporate everything from site improvement (SEO) strategies and pennant notices to online courses and websites. Integrated marketing communication components, for example, daily papers, announcements, and magazines may likewise be utilized to educate and induce buyers. Advertisers should likewise settle on the fitting mix of customary and advanced correspondences for their intended interest group to fabricate a solid brand-buyer relationship. Notwithstanding the brands special blend, it is critical that advertisers guarantee their informing is steady and credible over all correspondence channels.Integrated Marketing Communication is characterized as the coordination and reconciliation of all advertising specialized instrument, roads and sources inside an organization into consistent program that augment the effect on client and flip side clients at a negligible cost. This reconciliation influences all firm business-to-business, showcasing channel, client centered, and inside coordinated correspondences. Incorporated Marketing Communications is an administration idea that is intended to make all parts of showcasing correspondence, for example, publicizing, deals advancement, advertising, individual offering and direct promoting cooperate as a bound together compel, instead of allowing each to work in disconnection. Additionally, it goes about as a forceful promoting arrangement since it sets and tracks advertising methodology that catches and uses broad measure of client data. It likewise guarantees that all types of correspondences and messages are precisely connected together to accomplish particular target. Advertising Advertising has four qualities: it is powerful in nature; it is non-individual; it is paid for by a recognized support; and it is dispersed through mass channels of correspondence. Publicizing messages may advance the reception of merchandise, administrations, people, or thoughts. Since the business message is scattered through the broad communications-instead of individual offering-it is seen as a substantially less expensive method for achieving shoppers. Be that as it may, its non-individual nature implies it does not have the capacity to tailor the business message to the message beneficiary and, all the more critically, really get the deal. Accordingly, promoting impacts are best measured as far as expanding mindfulness and changing dispositions and suppositions, not making deals. Public Relations (PR) Advertising is characterized as an administration capacity which recognizes, builds up, and keeps up commonly valuable connections between an association and general society whereupon its prosperity or disappointment depends. Though promoting is a restricted correspondence from sender (the advertiser) to the beneficiary (the shopper or the retail exchange), advertising considers numerous gatherings of people (purchasers, representatives, providers, sellers, and so forth.) and utilizations two-path correspondence to screen input and conform both its message and the associations activities for greatest advantage. Sales Promotions (SP) Sales promotion are immediate actuations that offer additional impetuses to improve or quicken the items development from maker to buyer. Deals advancements might be coordinated at the customer or the exchange. Buyer advancements, for example, coupons, examining, premiums, sweepstakes, value (packs that offer more noteworthy amount or lower cost than ordinary), minimal effort financing arrangements, and refunds are buy impetuses in that they prompt item trial and energize repurchase. Personal Selling (PS) Individual offering incorporates all individual to-individual contact with clients with the reason for acquainting the item with the client, persuading him or her of the items esteem, and bringing the deal to a close. The part of individual offering changes from association to association, contingent upon the nature and size of the organization, the industry, and the items or administrations it is promoting. Direct Marketing (DM) Coordinate promoting, the most established type of showcasing, is the way toward discussing specifically with target clients to energize reaction by phone, mail, electronic means, or individual visit. Clients of direct showcasing incorporate retailers, wholesalers, makers, and specialist organizations, and they utilize an assortment of techniques including regular postal mail, telemarketing, coordinate reaction promoting, online PC shopping administrations, link shopping systems, and infomercials. Emerging Tools of Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) Sponsorships (Event Marketing) Sponsorships, consolidate publicizing and deals advancements with advertising. Sponsorships increment consciousness of an organization or item, fabricate unwaveringness with a particular target crowd, help separate an item from its rivals, give marketing openings, show responsibility to a group or ethnic gathering, or effect all that really matters. Like promoting, sponsorships are started to assemble long haul affiliations. Associations in some cases contrast sponsorships and promoting by utilizing gross impressions or cost-per-thousand estimations. Social Media Marketing The idea of web-based social networking marketing fundamentally alludes to the way toward advancing business or sites through web-based social networking channels. It is a capable promoting medium that is characterizing the way individuals are imparting. It is one of the altogether minimal effort special strategies that give organizations extensive quantities of connections and gigantic measure of activity. Organizations figure out how to get huge consideration and that truly works for the business. Online networking promoting is a powerful technique connected by dynamic organizations for offering their items/administrations or for simply distributing content for commercial income. Internet Marketing Internet Marketing likewise alluded to as i-promoting, web-marketing, online marketing or e-Marketing, is the marketing of items or administrations over the Internet. The Internet has conveyed media to a worldwide gathering of people. The intuitive way of Internet advertising as far as giving moment reactions and inspiring reactions are the one of a kind characteristics of the medium. Mobile Marketing Portable Marketing includes speaking with the customer by means of cell (or versatile) gadget, either to send a straightforward showcasing message, to acquaint them with another group of onlookers support based crusade or to permit them to visit a versatile site. Conclusion The rise of integrated marketing communication (IMC) has turned into a important case of development in the area of marketing. It has affected thinking and acting among a wide range of organizations and associations confronting the substances of rivalry in an open economy. From the earliest starting point of the 1990s IMC turned into a genuine intriguing issue in the field of promoting. Four phases of IMC have been recognized, beginning from strategic coordination to budgetary and key reconciliation. Be that as it may, the greater part of firms are tied down in the primary stages and not very many have moved to a vital level. One conclusion is that there are obstructions to creating IMC from strategies to technique. Integrated marketing communication is a way to deal with arranging communications that gives your independent company the possibility to show signs of improvement results from your campaigns and decrease promoting costs. By incorporating tools, for example, publicizing, direct mail, web-based social networking, telemarketing and deals advancement, you give clearness, consistency and greatest interchanges affect. An integrated campaign helps you give clients data in the configuration they incline toward. Buyers and business clients can indicate in the event that they need to get item data through email, direct mail, instant message or phone. Coordination guarantees they get a similar data in all interchanges. You can likewise address the issues of clients who scan the Internet for item data by incorporating your web architecture and substance with different correspondences. In the customary approach to deal with marketing communication, organizations and their agencies plan different campaigns for publicizing, press relations, coordinate advertising and sales promotion. Coordinated campaigns utilize a similar promotion apparatuses to fortify each other and enhance showcasing viability. In a coordinated crusade, you can utilize promoting to bring issues to light of a product and produce leads for the business compel. By conveying a similar data in official statements and highlight articles, you fortify the messages in the promoting. You can then utilize post office based mail or email to catch up request from the promoting or press crusades and furnish prospects with more data. Integrated Marketing Communications Integrated Marketing Communications INTEGRATED MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS: ISSUES Introduction The emergence of integrated marketing communications (IMC) has become one of the most significant examples of development in the marketing discipline (Kitchen, 2003). Because of the realities of competition in an open economy it has influenced thinking and acting among corporate organisations, Some 20 years ago academics and professionals discussed theory and practice of business communication but without considering the idea of integration as a realistic approach to reach a competitive strategic position for the company. Some early attempts in the beginning of the 1980s initiated academic interest and articles appeared in the academic literature (Dyer, 1982; Coulson-Thomas, 1983). From the beginning of the 1990s IMC became a real hot topic in the field of marketing (Caywood et al., 1991; Miller and Rose, 1994; Kitchen and Schultz, 1997, 1998, 1999). Twenty years ago, 75 percent of marketing budgets went to advertising in the US. Today, 50 percent goes into trade promotions, 25 percent into consumer promotions and less than 25 percent into advertising (Kitchen, 2003). The allocation of communication budgets away from mass media and traditional advertising has obviously promoted IMC in recognition and importance for effective marketing. The emergence of IT has greatly chang ed the media landscape, contributed to an extensive deregulation of markets and individualized patterns of consumption and increased the segmentation of consumer tastes and preferences (Eagle and Kitchen, 2000; Kitchen, 2003). Four stages of IMC have been identified by Kitchen and Schultz (2000) starting from tactical coordination of promotional elements, redefining the scope of marketing communications, application of information technology to financial and strategic integration. They found that the majority of firms are still operating in the first two stages, some are moving into stage three and very few have moved to stage four. One fact is that there are barriers to developing IMC from tactics to strategy. If we accept that communication is the foundation of all human relationship (Duncan, 2002) we also have to accept that only strategically oriented integrated brand communications can help business to reach a sustainable competitive position. My main purpose, thus, is to systematically review the literature of the marketing concept Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) by identifying key debates within the academic research, summarize them and propose opportunities for further research. LITERATURE REVIEW Communication is the process by which individuals share meaning. This means that each participant must fully understand each other otherwise no dialogue will occur. Only through knowledge and understanding of the communication process are the actors likely to achieve their objectives of influencing attitudes, knowledge and/or behaviors to persuade, which is one of the most prominent reasons why organizations need to communicate (Fill, 1999). With increasing worldwide interest in the emergent concept and field of IMC it is important to investigate its theoretical foundations. An English exile in Paris Thomas Hobbes produced his major work: Leviathan in April 1651 (Hobbes, 1651, pp. 46-8). He argued that our cognizance, i.e the thinking, such as beliefs (Peter,J.P., Olson,J.C., Gruert, K.G. 1999) of the world are really of the pressures materially exerted on us by external motions (or signals from the environment). Also our passions are influenced by material motions. Men are therefore mostly influenced by internal material perceptions of an external material world (Hobbes, 1651, p. 52). While not accepting his thesis wholeheartedly, it is evident that we live in a material world (Lansley, 1993) one which supports the perspective that men are expected to be influenced by external motions. However, the outcomes associated with the Hobbesian metaphor suggest that conditions now are quite different from those early years a position supported by the communications revolution taking place in the twentieth century alone. The opinion that we are influenced by external motions gains credence when standard models of consumer behaviour are considered (Kotler, 1992, pp. 161-4). Such models describe consumer behaviour as a black box of consumer characteristics and decision-making processes. The black box is influenced by inputs consisting of environmental characteristics (social, economic, technological, political and cultural) and marketing characteristics (product, price, promotion, and place). These may lead to attitudinal change (i.e. brand loyalties and behavioural tendencies) and ultimately to actions in the form of product, brand, and store choice, timing, and amount.Clearly, such communications are not alone in their attempts to influence thinking or behaviour. So what is occurring within the black box? Marketing communicators are aiming to progress consumers through the cognitive, affective, and behavioural stages of decision making as exemplified by, for example, the AIDA model (Strong, 1925) which asserts that, for advertising to work, it must be effective through four distinct stages: Attention. The consumer must notice the communication. Interest. The consumer must be drawn to take in the message which is being communicated. Desire. The consumer must want to acquire the product or service which is the subject of the communication. Action. The consumer must make the purchase. There are many other communication models all of which describe promotional communication in terms of altered cognitions, emotional feelings, or behavioural tendencies towards a firm and/or its products or services. Marketing communications does not and cannot operate in a vacuum of its own making. Consumers perceive social reality in a number of ways in which , the least being, by social interaction with others (Berger and Luckman, 1991). Media content and other forms of promotion, together with knowledge derived from a diversity of origins, and social interaction, form a constructed view of temporal existence within consumer minds. Consumers make use of, and are not just affected by, promotional activity. Marketing communications are limited in the effects they can have on consumer minds (Katz, 1987). But, undoubtedly, in order for marketing communications to have an effect on consumer minds, they have to reach the sense organs of the person(s) to be affected. However, what happens after is debatable. Most consumers are continually bombarded with communications virtually every waking moment of the day. On an average day this may amount to over 2,000 exposures (Kotler, 1988). The majority of such exposures are screened out either by lack of interest or sensory overload. Messages may be distorted or twisted to fit with pre-existent cognitive structures (Cartwright, 1972), i.e. recipients of communications may twist them to fit in with their existing knowledge or information base. Selectivity in memory retention is evident dependent on the extent to which elaboration and message rehearsal take place in receivers. Thus communication systems are very essential in affecting consumer opinions. By a communication system Shannon and Weaver meant a system essentially contained five parts: An information source which produces a message or sequence of messages to be communicated to a receiving terminal. The message may be of various types. A transmitter which operates on the message to produce a signal suitable for transmission over the channel. The channel is merely the medium used to transmit the signal from transmitter to receiver. The receiver, reconstructing the message from the signal. The destination is the person for whom the message is intended (Shannon and Weaver, 1949, p. 3). Shannon and Weaver classified communication systems into three main categories: discrete, continuous and mixed. By a discrete system they meant one in which both the message and the signal are a sequence of discrete symbols, for instance telegraphy. A continuous system is one in which the message and signal both are treated as continuous functions, e.g. radio or television. A mixed system is one in which both discrete and continuous variables appear, e.g. transmission of speech. Related to the broad subject or communication, Warren (1949) identified, problems at three levels.Level 1 The technical problem how accurately the symbols of communication can be transmitted. Level 2 The semantic problem how precisely the transmitted symbols convey the desired meaning and Level 3The effectiveness problem how effectively the received meaning does affect conduct in the desired way. Figure 1 shows a communication system, where the information source selects a desired message out of a set of possible messages. The selected messages may consist of written or spoken words, or of pictures, music, etc. The message is changed by the transmitter into the signal, which is sent over the channel to the receiver. The kinds of questions which Shannon seeks to ask concerning such a communication system are: How to measure amount of information? How to measure the capacity of a communication channel? The action of the transmitter in changing the message into the signal often involves a coding process. When the coding process is as efficient as possible, at what rate can the channel convey information? What are the general characteristics of noise and how can undesirable effects of noise be minimized or eliminated? If the signal being transmitted (as in written speech, telegraphy) how does this fact affect the problem? Shannon and Weaver developed what is now accepted as the basic model of communications. It is a sequential and linear model, which has survived for decades and appears in somewhat different shapes in common literature in the field of marketing communications. However, the model is essentially a one-step model of communication and is oversimplified since communications do not necessarily occur in a single step. The linear model of communications emphasizes the transmission of signals, ideas and information primarily through symbols. As we have seen the linear model focuses on transmission effectiveness and efficiency and emphasizes measurability. Holm (2002) found that 70-80 percent of relevant literature in the field of marketing communications during the 1990s is based on the linear, process-oriented perspective on communication theory. We assume that communication is intentional and a deliberate effort to bring about response. We also assume that communication is a transactional process between two and more parties whereby meaning is exchanged through the intentional use of symbols. This means that all those involved in the process must share a common view of what the symbols and signs actually mean. This, then, means that a senders and a receivers field of experience, understanding and interpretation to a certain extent must overlap. This requires a somewhat different and developed theoretical approach to marketing communications, a qualitative approach, which pays attention to the reader, to the listener and the viewer since meaning can only be derived socially (Blythe, 2000). Meaning, signs, symbols, syntactic and culture become essential elements in the developing of communications. The linear, process-oriented model and its components are straightforward, but it is the quality of the linkages between the vario us elements in the process that determine whether the communication will be successful (Fill, 2002). However, this crucial perspective on communications is focused by only 20-30 percent of the relevant literature in the field of marketing communications. IMC as a concept has gained recognition on an international scale during the 1990s. Thus its widespread use is comparatively recent. Let us assume that the ultimate purpose of marketing is to deliver a higher standard of living (Kotler, 2003). If we use a more limited definition we could say that marketing is a societal process by which individuals and groups obtain what they need and want through creating, offering and freely exchanging products and services of value with others (Kotler, 2003, p. 9). The keyword is value, which can be defined as a ratio between benefits and costs, between what the customer gets and what he/she gives. To increase greater customer participation the marketer can use several combinations of methods, all aiming to raise benefits and reduce costs. It is then evident that the main purpose of marketing communication is to affect the consumers conception of value and of the relation between benefits and costs. Defining IMC, Smith et al. (1999) distinguishes three definitions: Management and control of all market communications. Ensuring that the brand positioning, personality and messages are delivered synergistically across every element of communication and are delivered from a single consistent strategy. The strategic analysis, choice, implementation and control of all elements of marketing communications which efficiently (best use of resources), economically (minimum costs) and effectively (maximum results) influence transactions between an organization and its existing and potential customers, consumers and clients. In order to reach a better understanding of the full meaning and process of IMC Smith et al. (1999) have developed a tool which is supposed to show marketing integration as occurring at one or more of seven levels. They distinguish the following levels and corresponding degrees of integration. Vertical objectives integration. It means that communication objectives fit with marketing objectives and the overall corporate objectives. Horizontal/functional integration. Marketing communications activities fit well with other business functions of manufacturing, operations and human resource management. Marketing mix integration. The marketing mix of product, price and place decisions is consistent with the promotion decisions, e.g. with the required communication messages. Communications mix integration. All the 12 communications tools are being used to guide the customer/consumer/client through each stage of the buying process and all of them portray a consistent message. Creative design integration. The creative design and execution is uniform and consistent with the chosen positioning of the product. Internal/external integration. All internal departments and all external employed agencies are working together to an agreed plan and strategy. Financial integration. The budget is being used in the most effective and efficient way ensuring that economies of scale are achieved and that long-term investment is optimized. Smith et al. claim that the most important and fundamental level is that of vertical integration of objectives and activities and that no effective marketing communication objective can be formulated, which is not directly linked to specific marketing objectives and to relevant corporate objectives. All these levels contain specific critical issues which might occur during the process and need to be solved. One of the most essential tasks is to make sure that goals on different levels and character are mutually achievable. Objectives for profitability must be consistent with objectives for growth, for gaining increasing market share and for certain social responsibilities and to broader societal concerns. Goals and strategies must deal with industry threats and take into consideration risks of competitive response. When it comes to communication and implementation it must be sure that the goals are well understood and accepted by the key implementers. The emergence of the internet and new information technology has led many companies to reconsider their key factors to competitive success. Porter (2001) states that some companies have used internet technology to shift the basis of competition away from quality, features and service toward price, making it harder for anyone in the ir industry to reach profitability. Porter has pointed out how internet influences industry structure. Some of his findings are: differences among competitors are reduced; competition migrates to price; geographic market widens increasing the number of competitors; new substitution threats are created by the proliferation of internet; standardization of products reduces differentiation; reduced barriers to entry shifts power to suppliers; traditional powerful channels are eliminated; end-users bargaining power is increased through reduced switching costs; difficult to keep internet applications from new entrants; and the internet can expand the market by making the industry more efficient. Evidently, these and other factors must be taken into consideration when developing marketing communication. However, the most essential difference, from a communicative perspective, is not the changing set of tools. More important is to adjust objectives and strategies to changing marketing and communication realities. As we can see, IMC is a more complex issue. It is the art of uniting a senders purposes and goals with the carefully selected receivers prerequisites of interpretation and preunderstanding, to develop a creative strategy, where content and form of the messages are congruent and to optimize the selection of channels. The process has obvious similarities with classic methodology of rhetoric (Vossius, 1990). Thus IMC has become a strategic issue and should, therefore, be treated in accordance with the nature of strategy and strategic decisions. The characteristics commonly associated with the concept of strategy and strategic decisions are, first, that strategy is concerned with the long-term direction of an organization or a company. Second, strategic decisions are likely about to gain some competitive advantage. Third, strategic decisions are concerned with the scope of the organizations activities. It is to do with what owners and managements want the organization to be like and to be about. This could and should include important decisions about visions, product range, withdrawal from or entering markets. Johnson and Scholes (2002) claim that strategy can be seen as the matching or resources and activities or an organization to the environment in which it operates, sometimes known as the search for strategic fit. Besides identifying strengths and weaknesses, threats and opportunities in the business environment it would be seen as important to achieve the correct positioning of the company including the organization of the three concepts identity, profile and image. Questions concerning the connection between these concepts are of the utmost importance for the organizations relations to its market, for its ability to develop, maintain and increase a competitive position (Holm, 1998). There are many tactics at the marketers disposal when using the elements of the communications mix in order to maximize the impact of the communications activities. The basics of this is the four-way division into advertising, public relations, sales promotion and personal selling (Blythe, 2000). Traditionally, the tools of marketing communications are around 12-20. Collectively, these are referred to as the promotional mix (Blythe, 2000; Burnett and Moriarity, 1998; Fill, 1999; Kitchen, 2003; Kotler, 2003; Pickton and Broderick, 2001; Smith et al., 1999). In order to illustrate the complexity of the communication process, we must add a number of tools of varying importance and of different character, both personal and mass marketing communications. On a macro level, the scope of marketing should include ideologies, political as well as commercially oriented. Examples like the Nazi era in Germany (The Ministry of Propaganda systematically used sports events like the Olympic Games, as large-scale event marketing. Music, opera, art, architecture, uniforms, badges, flags, exhibitions, film, literature, education and parades were all used as communications tools in order to sell a political ideology). We find similar examples in the former Soviet Union and in todays North Korea. However, increasing need and opportunities to reach the single individual consumer, buyer, guest, client, visitor, patient or voter, leads to the search for more sophisticated and in several situations critical tools. It is of utmost importance to widen the methodo logical perspective and take into consideration tools of particular interest in a one-to-one marketing perspective. The numerous tools and the uncountable possible combinations illustrate the complexity of IMC and that decisions concerning IMC is a strategic issue mainly consisting of principals and guidelines rather than instructions on a tactical level, mostly handled by advertising agencies (Schroeder, 2002; Percy et al., 2002) and account executives. Also on a macro level, we can distinguish three factors which have fundamentally changed the conditions for IMC; deregulations of markets, globalization of the economy and individualization of the consumption. The emergence of new information technology can be considered as the dominating underlying factor. Communication has always been built upon three different systems sound, image and writing. All these systems have been depending on technological development. Up till now no technology has been able to transmit all systems, at t he most two. Gutenberg produced writing and image. Sound film came 1929, based on sound technology and photography. The numeric revolution handle the three systems and has become a fourth system, the digital system which itself has had tremendous economic and social consequences. Previously, the three communication systems were separate. The IT-revolution has made a total communicative integration possible, which in its turn has changed business structures. Three large business areas are now integrated: telephony, television and the computer industry. The importance of specialization has decreased and differences between previously separate cultures as publishing, film industry and music industry have diminished. Fusions have brought the three spheres together and they have become the heavy industry of our time. The development of the industrial revolution took around 200 years. The new technology has reached practically all over the world in 20 years. However, communication remains as one of the most human of activities. We can, again, define communication as a transactional process between two or more parties whereby meaning is exchanged through the intentional use of symbols (Engel et al., 1994). Notice the key elements: communication is intentional; a deliberate effort is made to bring about a response. It is a transaction and the participants are all involved in the process and it is symbolic where words, pictures, music and other stimulants are used to convey thoughts (Blythe, 2000). Computer-based systems have revolutionized communications. Computer-based communications include data based systems and web sites. We can argue that technological development has put good old days far behind. The competitive arena of today bears little resemblance to that of the mid-1990s (Blythe, 2000, p.10). Non-differentiated mass markets rarely exist today. A number of factors have emerged and interact in such a way that the environment for c ommunication strategy is radically changed. Engel et al. (1994) claimed that appealing to unidentified individuals in a mass market is increasingly becoming a dead end. One fundamental consequence is that the traditional emphasis on heavyweight mass communication campaigns (so-called above-the-line), has been replaced by more direct and highly targeted promotional activities using direct marketing and other tools aimed to reach the smallest of all target groups, the single individual. Conclusions The primary goal of IMC is to affect the perception of value and behavior through directed communication. The development and diffusion of IMC is closely associated with fast technological advancement and of a rapidly globalizing and deregulations of markets and individualization of consumption patterns. This has emphasized the need to adjust objectives and strategies to changing marketing and communication realities. In the rapidly changing and highly competitive world of the twenty-first century only strategically oriented IMC can help business to move forward. However, Kitchen and Schultz (2000) have found that a majority of firms have remained on a level mainly dealing with tactical coordination of promotional elements and that very few, a handful in todays world, have moved to financial and strategic integration. We can assume that the theoretical and methodological perspectives and frameworks are influenced by educational background and tradition. On a tactical level marketing, communication is handled by professionally skilled account executives, art directors and copy directors with very limited competence and experience from strategic management. A study of the current educational program, specially designed for management on strategic level, shows that communication theory and methodology takes up approximately 3 percent of total time. The rest of the time is devoted to strategic planning, applied management, financial analysis, marketing, politics and economics. This educational structure has remained during at least the last two decades. A main conclusion we can draw is that those who have strategic and tactic responsibility for IMC live in separate educational, cultural, intellectual and empirical spheres. Those responsible for strategic management decisions possess, at the best, strategic management ability but lack insight and awareness concerning communication theory and method. And those professionally skilled in communication lack relevant skills concerning strategic management, theoretically and empirically. If we imagine these two spheres as areas, we can easily notice that the intersection field is very small. A study of relevant literature published during the 1990s shows that a simplified theoretical perspective on communication as process oriented, sequential and linear is dominating 70-80 percent of the books, thereby overlooking the complexity of communication. Different educational cultures might be an essential obstacle to move IMC from tactics to strategy. A study of leading Swedish schools and institutes in the fields of management shows that approximately only 3 percent of total time is devoted to communication theory and methodology. The study also shows that the education programs of the leading marketing communications schools contain less than 10 percent of leadership and strategic management while more 90 percent is aimed at communication theory, various techniques, advertising, art, copy and account executive training. A concluding remark is that the concept of IMC is dominated by a simplified and insufficient theoretical perspective and handled by professionals with skills on a technical and tactical level. This indicates that there is a gap between two cultural, intellectual and empirical spheres. Opportunities for further research. Based on various researches by scholars in the field, I would encourage more research to be carried out in this aspect of marketing. It is a matter of common interest for academics, professional schools and practitioners on strategic and tactical levels to close the gap in order to move IMC from tactics to strategy. This can be achieved by international research and reconsidering educational programs regarding management, marketing and marketing communications. REFERENCES Berger, P., Luckman, T. (1991), The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge, Penguin, New York, NY, pp.56-7. Blythe, J. (2000), Marketing Communications, Pearson Education, Edinburgh, Financial Times/Prentice-Hall, Burnett, J., Moriarity, S. (1998), Introduction to Marketing Communications, An Integrated Approach, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ. Cartwright, D. (1972), Some Principles of Mass Persuasion, Human Relations, Cohen, J.B., New York, NY, Vol. 2 No.3, pp.253-67;. 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