Advertising
Any paid form of nonpersonal presentation and promotion of ideas, goods, or services by an identified sponsor.

Advertising agency
A marketing services firm that assists companies in planning, preparing, implementing, and evaluating all or portions of their advertising programs. (530)

Affordable method
Setting the promotion budget at the level management thinks the company can afford. (519)

Competitive-parity method
Setting the promotion budget to match competitors' outlays. (520)

Direct marketing
Direct communications with carefully targeted individual consumers to obtain an immediate response. (508)

Integrated marketing communications (IMC)
The concept under which a company carefully integrates and coordinates its many communications channels to deliver a clear, consistent, and compelling message about the organization and its products or services. (510)

Marketing communications mix (promotion mix)
The specific mix of advertising, personal selling, sales promotion, and public relations a company uses to pursue its advertising and marketing objectives.

Objective-and-task method
Developing the promotion budget by (1) defining specific objectives, (2) determining the tasks that must be performed to achieve these objectives, and (3) estimating the costs of performing these tasks. The sum of these costs is the proposed promotion budget. (520)

Public relations
Building good relations with the company's various publics by obtaining favourable publicity, building a good corporate image, and handling or heading off unfavourable rumours, stories, and events. Major PR tools include press relations, product publicity, corporate communications, lobbying, and public service.

Personal selling
Personal presentation by the firm's sales force for the purpose of making sales and building customer relationships.

Percentage-of-sales method
Setting the promotion budget at a certain percentage of current or forecasted sales or as a percentage of the unit sales price. (520)

Push strategy
A promotion strategy that calls for using the sales force and trade promotion to push the product through channels. The producer promotes the product to wholesalers, the wholesalers promote to retailers, and the retailers promote to consumers.

Pull strategy
A promotion strategy that calls for spending a lot on advertising and consumer promotion to build consumer demand. If the strategy is successful, consumers will ask their retailers for the product, the retailers will ask the wholesalers, and the wholesalers will ask the producers. (516)

Sales promotion
Short-term incentives to encourage the purchase or sale of a product or service.