Review of Marketing Communications for Radisson Hotel

Marketing Communications for Radisson Hotel 

 

CONTENTS

1. Introduction to the Project     
2. History and Background of Radisson Hotels                                                                  
3. Branding of the Radisson, its Services in Hospitality Sector                                       
4. Elements of Communication Mix                                                                                                   
5. Structure of Marketing Communications Plan                                                                                
6. Objective of the Communication Plan with Relevant Time Frames and Budget                           
7. Use of DAGMAR as Marketing Communications Model in relevance to Creative Campaign
8. Significance of the DAGMAR model in attaining Creative Campaign Objective                  
9. Benefits of Integrated Marketing Communications in Radisson Hotel       
10. Monitoring and Evaluation of Communication Campaign                                    
11. REFERENCES                                                                                                                                                          

1 Introduction to the Project

The hospitality industry includes a broad category of fields within the Service industry including restaurants, theme parks, lodging and additional fields within the tourism industry. The basic purpose of this project is to explore a wider understanding of the Communication mix, use of the Marketing Communication Plan in the hospitality and tourism industry, and various emerging concerns of Marketing Communications for a globalised company like Radisson. The project also explores the need of Integrated Marketing Communications for the attainment of the overall marketing objective of an organization.

Objectives of the Project

        i.            To explore the nature and need of the  Marketing Communication for Tourism and Hospitality based organization

      ii.            To analyze the various use of Communication  mix of  the company

    iii.            To identify the importance of Marketing Communication Plan for the successful operation of the Company in Hospitality sector.

    iv.            To understand the need of the Integrated Marketing Communication(IMC)  for attaining overall business strategy of an organization

Research Methodologies

This project makes an extensive use of secondary sources of data. The information has been collected through the official website of Radisson, news and articles related to the hospitality industry, news and journals of the company provided through various websites, reference books of Marketing Communications and so on.

2 History and Background of Radisson Hotels                   

                                                                       

Radisson Hotels is a major international hotel industry spanning across the globe with its services in more than 420 locations in 73 countries. The hotel empire marked its inception with the opening of the first Radisson Hotel in Minneapolis, Minnesota, US in 1909. The name “Radisson” was suggested by one N.H.Owen, a member of the Commercial Club, a Minneapolis business group that would eventually occupy two floors of the new hotel. Owen borrowed the name from the great and colorful French explorer of 17^th century Pierre-Espirit Radisson. The facilities were designed to provide a state-of-art service to the customers of the country. In 1962 the Radisson was acquired by Curt Carlson, a Minneapolis businessman and entrepreneur. The hotel is still owned by the Carlson estate.

Majority of the Radisson-branded hotels are located in the United States. While Radisson Blu is the brand name for Radisson hotels outside the United States, including those in Europe, Africa, and Asia. These are operated by Crlson Rezidor hotel Group in which Crlson is the main stakeholder. The company’s headquarters is located in Minnesota where the company first Hotel still exists. Initially the hotel employed 250 employees when it opened including 50 female employees. The hotel boasted two restaurants at the inception of the hotel. Beside the restaurant’s the hotel included six private dining rooms and a magnificent banquet hall. The Hotel marked its opening by organizing a gala dinner for a thousand guests.

With operations in more than 420 locations spanning over 73 countries, Radisson is where the world makes history, toasts special occasions, closes the deal and, marks special occasion. The hotel empire that initiated in 1909 at present has developed itself as a one of the most reputed brand of the world and identifies itself as the benchmark in the tourism and hospitality industry.

3 Branding of the Radisson, it’s Services in Hospitality Sector

Radisson offers a wide range of world-class amenities that set it apart from other hotels. The hotel offers fabulous service for organizing meetings, seminars and other business meets. Throughout the world, the hotel chains have variety of restaurants and bars that offers well prepared fresh cuisines. Radisson has plenty of services for its residents and travelers. The menus in Radisson are wide in nature, offering coffee, pastry, breakfast, lunch, dinner buffets, plus a-la-carte items to address the customized need of the customers.  Besides, the services and facilities offered by the hotel also depend upon the specific requirements of the customers of the particular host country. Customers enjoy access to various facilities like:

·         24 hours room service

·         Airport shuttle

·         Beauty parlor/barber shop

·         Business center

·         Concierge services

·         Gift shop

·         Health club with exercise facilities

·         Rooftop pool

·         Whirlpool

Besides, Radisson also offers customized services to address the varied and unique need of its customers. It makes use of some of the innovative service concepts like:

INTERNET INCLUDED: High speed internet facility is available to all the guests throughout the hotel.

GRAB & RUN: For the guests with no time for a sit-down breakfast, the hotel offers the Grab & Run takeaway breakfast. Tea and Coffee in disposable cups along with fresh fruits and energy bars are also available.

SUPER BREAKFAST: The Radisson super breakfast is an extensive buffet featuring a range of food items selected from the best of Continental, North European, and American Cuisine And so on.

4 Elements of Communication Mix

Marketers make the use of variety of tools to communicate with the customers and other stakeholders. The promotion mix is the marketer’s bag of tools for communicating with the customers and other stakeholders. Also known as marketing communications mix, it consists of specific blend of promotion tools: advertising, public relations, personal selling, sales promotion, and direct marketing tools that the company uses to communicate customer value and build customer relationships.

Various components of Communication mix are described below with the merits and demerits of each.

1)    Advertising

Advertising is a form of communication intended to promote the sale of the product or service to influence public opinion, to gain political support or to advance a particular cause. American Marketing Association defines advertising as: “any paid form of non-personal presentation of ideas, goods or services by an identified sponsor”.

Advertising in relation to marketing mix can be identified as a competitive act. It is not part of the product but an act of persuasion. It is the part of the total benefit consumer derives through use of product or services. It is paid for and is done by an identified sponsor. As such, advertising is a mass communication process of persuading the prospects by convincing them to buy products or services with increased satisfaction to the consumers and profits to the sponsors.

Advantages of Advertising:

Advertising is mass communication in nature so its coverage is wide. Also it is very informative and persuasive in nature. It ensures the current market and helps to develop new market hence stabilizing sales-turnover.

Disadvantages of Advertising:

Advertising has a little capacity to reach a selected audience. These are rigid and sometime unbelievable. Most people take advertisement as being influential and conditional in nature.

2)    Public relation

Building good relations with the company’s various publics by obtaining favorable publicity, building up good corporate image, and handling or heading off unfavorable rumors, stories, and events is another important component of marketing communication mix. The British Institute of Public Relation (BIPR) defines Public Relation as: “a planned and sustained effort to establish and maintain goodwill and mutual understanding between the organization and public”. It is the art of analyzing trends, predicting their consequences, counseling organizational leaders, and implementing planned program of action which will serve both the organization and the public interest. Hence public relation is aimed in maintain a good relation between a company and its public consisting of: press, employees, customers, stockholders, local community, suppliers, government and so on.

Advantages:

Public relation is regarded as being more credible then advertising as public do not realize that the institution paid directly or indirectly for them. Also it is low in cost in contrast to advertisements. These build the image of the company and are targeted to specific group of people and thus more effective.

Disadvantages:

The results of public relation techniques are difficult to measure. Also the problem may arise in the creation of newsworthy stories regarding the organization. Again the selection of appropriate media for releasing of the information may be problematic sometimes.

3)    Personal Selling

Personal selling makes the use of sales force to sell the product via facing the customers face-to-face. The sellers promote the product through the use of their attitude, appearance and specialist knowledge about the product. The sales force provide with the information about the use of the product. Generally products with relatively high prices, or with complex features, are often sold via personal selling.

Advantages:

An advantage with personal selling is that it draws high customer attention and ensures interactivity. It makes the use of customized message to create a persuasive impact on the target. Also it ensures a high potential for the development of relationship with the customer.

Disadvantages:

 Personal is labor intensive in nature requiring the employment of extensive time and thus are costly in nature. It has access to limited customers at a time and thus is expensive.

4)    Sales Promotion

Sales promotion is the most short-term of the promotion mix tools. It makes the use of the short-term incentives to encourage the purchase or sale of a product or service. It often works closely with personal selling and advertising and offers the customers a reason to buy now. Sales promotion tools are used by most organizations, including manufacturers, distributors, retailers, and not-for-profit institutions. They are targeted towards final buyers, retailers and wholesalers, business customers and members of the sales force. Sales promotion is basically targeted with two objectives:

i)                    Trade promotions: getting retailers to carry new items and more inventory, buy ahead, or promote the company’s products.

ii)                  Consumer promotions: urge short-term customers buying or to enhance customer brand involvement.

Advantages:

A well designed sales promotion helps create a product differentiation. It stabilizes the current sales and helps increase sales by driving customer decision-making. Sometimes it also works as an important tool to motivate employees.

Disadvantages:

For quality products, the uses of sales promotion tools make give a negative impact to the brand name. Also sale promotion is short-term in nature and customer switching might be high when a company does not offer sales promotion incentives.

5)    Direct Marketing

Direct marketing involves connecting directly with targeted individual customers to both obtain an immediate response and cultivate lasting customer relationships.  With the emergence of communication technology as the dominant force in the life-style of the people, many companies nowadays focus on the extensive use of direct marketing channels. For most of the company’s direct marketing is a supplemental channel or medium. But for many other companies today-such as ebay.com, amazon.com direct marketing is a complete way of doing business. Direct marketing is extensive in nature as it makes the use of traditional favorites such as direct mail, catalogs, and telemarketing to the internet and other new digital approaches.

Advantages:

The major merit with direct marketing is that it enables a flexible targeting with regard to the message and geographical area. It also enjoys the advantage of cost-effectiveness and a mechanism to build effective relationship.

Disadvantages:

Most of the people regard direct-marketing as a junk mail as people associate the company using direct mails being of lower status and quality. It also has a low reach and is restricted in some countries. For e.g.: restriction in use of fliers and street advertising in some legislation.

5 Structure of Marketing Communications Plan

Most often companies fail to integrate the various communication channels that they use in daily basis. The message delivered by advertisement may be different than that to be delivered by personal selling as these are executed by different departments. i.e.: advertisement department and sales management respectively. As such a need to integrate different tools of communication to deliver a clear, consistent, and compelling message about the organization is needed and this is ensured by the use of well integrated marketing communication plan.

Marketing communications involves a carefully integrating and coordinating the company’s many communications channels to deliver a clear, consistent, and compelling message about the organization and its products. Today most of the companies make the use of the integrated marketing communications.

Developing of Effective Marketing Communication

Structure of relevant communications plan is as follows:

1)    Identify the Target Audience

Target audience may be current users or potential buyers, those who make buying decisions or those who influence it. The target audience may be individual, groups, special publics, or the general public. Overall process of Communication is developed taking into consideration of the target audience. For a company like Radisson, current customers and the prospective customers are the target customers.

2)    Determining the Communication Objectives

Development of appropriate communication objective is essential. In many cases Radisson will seek to achieve a purchase response. However purchase response may not be the only objective. The target audience generally may be in any of the stage of the purchase making process: awareness, knowledge, liking, preference, conviction, and purchase. Identification of the stage in which the customer is in regarding to the purchase decision and thus designing of the appropriate communication objective should be done.

3)    Designing a Message

After defining appropriate/desired audience response, the organization works to identify an effective message. The message should be designed in a way to get Attention, hold Interest, arouse Desire, and obtain Action, as given by AIDA model. Only few messages are successful in moving the customer from attention to action stage. As such message must be developed via identification of desired qualities and the clear understanding of meaning and method of delivery. Tactful and wise identification of Message content, Message structure and Message format is vital in designing of message.

4)    Choosing Media

The communicator must identify what model/channel of communication is essential for effective delivery of the intended message. Generally the channel may be-Personal and                       Non-personal.

                  In Personal communication channels two or more people communicate directly with each                     other. The model may be face-to-face, via phone, through email and so on. These method                     are effective as the generate response and allow personal addressing.

                  While Non-personal communication channels carry messages without personal contact or                     feedback, they make use of major media, atmosphere or event for transmission of message.

                 5)    Selecting the Message Source

                 In many cases the target audience derives the meaning out of the message depending upon                    the credibility of the message source. The image of the communicator is vital in influencing                  the perception of the target audience regarding the message. So basically most of the                               companies make use of the endorsement by the veteran professionals in a particular field                    for delivery of the message effectively. For e.g.: making use of celebrity endorsements-                        athletes, actors, musician, actors etc.

                6)    Collecting Feedback

                The most vital part of the whole communication process lies in feedback as it involves                          identifying of the effectiveness of the process. The communicator must research the effect                    of the message on the target audience. Collecting response regarding whether the audience                    remember the message, how many time they saw it, what do they recall about a message is                  important.

Feedback on marketing communication process may provide findings regarding changes needed in the promotion programs or in the product offerings.  For e.g.: The hotel may identify the how the particular customer selected Radisson by letting them fill a survey form and collecting feedback from the same.

6 Objective of the Communication Plan with Relevant Time Frames and Budget

For a company with a global operation identification of appropriate communication plan and the deployment of optimum budget is a vital thing. Radisson hotel may make use of the methods of establishing of an effective communication plan depending on various factors.  Those factors may be based on: objective to be attained, coverage expectations, stage of product life cycle, age of the company and so on. Basically the most common type of the budgeting methods is described below.

1.     The Percentage of Sales method

This method involves setting the promotion budget at a certain percentage of current or forecasted sales or as a percentage of the unit sales price. There are variations in the use of this model. The percentage may be based on last year’s sales or on the estimated sales for the coming period or the combination of these two. Under this method the advertising funds required are equal to rupee sales multiplied by the expected percentage.  Though this method makes a wrong assumption of advertising based on sales and ignores long-term planning, it provides users with following advantages.

Merits:

Percentage of sales method is consistent with the standard accounting practices. This method of allocating budget is simple as it does not involve any mathematical complexities. It is practical method as it is based on affordability.

2.     Objective and Task method

This method involves developing of the promotion budget by:

·         defining of the objectives

·         determining the tasks that must be performed to achieve these objectives and

·         estimating the costs of performing these tasks.

The sum of these costs is the proposed promotion budget. Basically this method is gaining ground as it directs the attention to the objectives to be attained by the marketing program, the role that the advertising is to play in attaining such objectives and works on the fact that advertising plays vital role in stimulating demand and is not the result of sales. Though users sometimes find this method as irrelevant and unscientific, this method is popular because of the following merits:

Merits:

This method is based and driven by objectives. Review of costs based in the attainment of objectives can be done in a regular basis. Also this method focuses on individualistic approach as it considers particular objectives which are different based on company needs.

3.     Competitive Parity Method

Companies these days determine the promotion budget to match the competitor’s outlays. They monitor competitors advertising or get industry promotion spending estimates from publications or trade associations, and then set their budgets based on the industry average. Basically the company has to collect relevant, up-to-date and authentic information about the competitor’s appropriation in terms of sales figures, ratios and percentages of advertising costs and sales. This method is not based on logic as it does not consider the company specific needs. Also the budget may be unfit to the company because of various factors like size of the company with regard to its competitors. In spite of these demerits the method is still popular because of following advantages.

Merits:

This method makes a benchmark with the leader in the market and is also favored as it is simple in nature as it does not involve complex mathematical calculations and estimates. Also this method kills the competitive wars by maintaining the parity in the appropriation levels.

4.     Affordability Method

This method involves setting of the promotion budget at the level the company can afford. The company thinks in terms of its ability to spend depending on the prevailing business conditions and the resources as its command. Under this method the company promotional budget is related either to the company profits or the assets. For e.g.: the company may decide 15 percent of its profit or 5 percent of its liquid assets for the advertising purpose. This method is often criticized as it is short-sighted and underestimates the opportunity that may arise during the operation of the business also this method underestimates the power of advertising this modern age of marketing. In spite of these flaws, this method provides the users with following advantages:

Merits:

Simply this method is simple, practical and realistic in nature. This method believes in its ability to spend rather than having some calculated appropriations. The budget need for the promotion can be altered base in the need thus enhancing flexibility.

7 Use of DAGMAR as Marketing Communications Model in relevance to Creative Campaign

DAGMAR as Marketing Communications Model

In 1961 Russel Colley developed an approach called Defining Advertising Goals for Measured Advertising Results (DAGMAR).

The major thesis of DAGMAR model is that communications effects are the logical basis for advertising goals and objectives, against which success and failure of advertisement should be measured. As such, the objectives of the communication process should be based on attaining of activities in the favor of the organization, by the customers. For a company like Radisson where activities must be justified by objectives, use of DAGMAR approach is an appropriate one.

According to the DAGMAR approach the communication task of advertisement is to gain brand awareness, comprehension, conviction, and action (ACCA).

·   Awareness:

The advertising makes consumer aware of the existence of the brand or company. It makes target customer aware of the products offering of the organization and other details and features of the company.

·   Comprehension:

 The advertising Makes consumer understand what the brand is and what it will do to the consumer. It makes people aware about the product features and its use.

·   Conviction:

 The advertising develops a mental disposition (tendency) among consumers to buy the product. This stage is considered important as a strong conviction may result in purchase decision.

·   Action:

The advertising makes the consumers to buy the product. This is the ultimate aim of any advertising campaign.

DAGMAR model seems to be realistic as it makes an assumption based on the hypothesis that the percentage of target audience decreases as the company advances to ACTION oriented activities. The advertising goals need to be set according to these tasks. The goals are always set in specific and measurable terms. For example, a firm may set its advertising goals for its brand in the following terms:

·         Make 75 percent of the consumers aware of the brand.

·         Make 50 percent of the consumers fully understand the brand attributes and attitude towards the brand.

·         Make 25 percent of the consumers develop positive feelings, judgment, and attitude toward the brand.

·         Make 10 percent of the consumers actually purchase the brand.

        

Basically the effectiveness testing of the model is simple and easy to access as it makes an assumption that the target audience goes on decreasing on the percentage basis as the company develops campaign relating to inducing a purchase decision.

In the effective testing, the performance of the advertisement tested on the achievement of these tasks. The DAGMAR test uses conventional tools and techniques of consumer research to find out whether the advertising campaign has been successful in achieving the predetermined goals.

BRAND AWARENESS

Assessment about the general awareness of the product is essential. Identifying of the following is essential:

·   What brand name comes first to your mind when you think of a (product)?

·   What brands are you aware in this category of product?

·   In this product category what are your other favorite brands?

COMPREHENSION       

·   Have you ever bought this …? (Brand)?

·   Have you ever used the …. (Brand)?

·   When I say this … (brand) what is the first association that comes to your mind?

·   To what extent do you agree or disagree with the following statements. (Scaled format. Agree/disagree format)

·   It is very convenient to use this brand.

·   It solves my problem

·   It provides a great deal of benefits.

·   It has very attractive packaging.

CONVICTION

It involves the identification of the feeling, judgments, and attitude of the target customers about the particular product. Use of design scaled responses (E.g. extremely to least) can be done to identify the customer’s response.

·   What type of feelings does this brand give you?

·   Warmth, Fun, Excitement, Security, Social approval, Self respect.

·   How favorable is your attitude toward…. (Brand)? Scaled responses

·   How well does this …. (Brand) satisfy your need? Scaled responses

·   How likely are you to recommend this brand to others? Scaled responses

·   How good a value is this brand for you? Scaled responses

·   What do you like best about this brand? Open ended

·   What is the most unique (feature and benefit) in this brand? Open ended

·   What advantage does this brand offer to you that other brands don’t? Open ended

ACTION

To what extent do you agree/disagree to the following statements? (Agree/disagree format)

·   I always buy this brand.

·   I usually buy this brand.

·   I buy this brand once in a while.

8 Significance of the DAGMAR model in attaining Creative Campaign Objective

Basically DAGMAR approach of marketing communication is based on the approach of communication as being based in: communicate rather than sell. By determining if the consumer had sufficient knowledge of a product and its benefits by creating clear, specific objectives that are discussed within an advertisement, advertisers would be able to tell if their selling points made a difference in the consumer’s decision-making process. This model is a process of establishing goals for an ad campaign such that it is possible to determine whether or not the goals have been met.  Basically this model can be referred as the descendant of AIDA advertising formula and is considered to be more popular and comprehensive than AIDA. Developed for the measurement of advertising effectiveness it maps the state of mind that the consumer passes through.

Important parts of the DAGMAR model are the:

- Definitions of the Target audience: to whom the message is targeted to, and

-Objectives: goals of the advertising message.

Characteristics of objectives

1.Concrete, measurable tasks

DAGMAR model makes an assumption of concrete and easy to measure advertisement goals. The objectives are well defined and are measurable in nature.

2.Target audience

For a global company like Radisson, operating in a cut-throat competition, use of the DAGMAR approach identifies the target customer in a well defined way. The Percentage approach of setting the target audience in each model signifies the target audience statistics as the step of communication progresses.

3.Benchmark and degree of change sought

The model is clear and candid in terms of the standard of goals that is needed to be achieved through the model. It well represents the notion of the change that is needed to be adopted for the effectiveness of the communication campaign.

4.Specified time period to achieve objectives

DAGMAR model clearly states the goal to be achieved and the method of attaining of the goals with regard to an available time frame. Goals are based on time frame and are clearly stated.

 Criticisms of DAGMAR

Though DAGMAR model is mostly referred as the most popular, comprehensive and widely used method of marketing communications model, it has also been identified as having some short-fallings.

  Some of the drawbacks of DAGMAR model are as follows:

·   Sales objectives undermined

-Most of the activities of the companies like Radisson needs to be justified in terms of the sales figure. DAGMAR approach makes a focus on the communicative approach rather than selling approach. It undermines the selling focus of an advertising campaign.

·   Problem with response hierarchy

DAGMAR approach is also identified as being erroneous regarding to the response hierarchy. Sometime the hierarchy may not be followed as stated.

·   Practicality and cost hurdles

Users find problems with the use of the DAGMAR approach as its lags appropriate way of implementation. Also the cost factor is one of the major barriers for the implementation of the model as this is referred to as the most expensive way of marketing communication.

9 Benefits of Integrated Marketing Communications in Radisson Hotel

Consumers today are bombarded with a huge number of commercial messages from a board range of sources. Consumers take these messages coming from different sources as a part of single message about the company. As such conflicting messages from these varied sources can result in confused company images, brand positions, and customer relationships.

The messages about the company and its products come from different sources within the company. For e.g.: Personal selling communications are developed by sales management while advertising messages are executed by advertising department. Though marketers are clear about the sources and the messages that particular source wants to convey, customers regard these as being same. Thus the need of Integrated Marketing Communications developed.  Integrated marketing communications involves carefully integrating and coordinating the company’s many communications channels to deliver a clear, consistent, and compelling message about the organization and its products. Today company makes use of diverse communications channels to deliver clear, consistent, and compelling messages about the organization and its brands.

Sales promotion

Advertising

Personal selling

Public relations

Direct Marketing

 

Consistent, clear and compelling company and brand messages

 

Integrated Marketing Communications calls for recognition of all touch points where the customers may encounter the company and its brands. Each touch point will deliver a message. The company wants to deliver a consistent and positive message with each contact. As such IMC leads to a total marketing communication strategy aimed at building strong customer relationships by showing how the company and its products can help customers solve their problems.

For a global Hotel giant like Radisson, Integrated Marketing Approach can benefit it a lot. The specific advantages of IMC in the context of Radisson Hotel are as follows:

·         Although IMC requires a lot of effort, it can create many advantages like: develop competitive advantages, boost sales and profit, while saving money, time and stress at the same time.

·         IMC consolidates the communication campaign and helps the customer move them through various stages of the buying process. It helps the company to created, develop and nurture its relationship with customers.

·         IMC helps a hospitality based company like Radisson to strength the “Relationship Marketing”. It can protect them from the inevitable fierce competition.

·         IMC delivers unified messages. This ensures the effectiveness of the message delivered. A consistent, consolidated and simple message has a better chance of cutting through the advertising clutter of the industry as a whole and thus delivers a vital impact in favor of the company.

·         IMC can also help company like Radisson to boost sales by stretching  messages across several communications tools to create more avenues for customers to become aware, aroused, and ultimately, to make a purchase.

·         IMC ensures more consistent and credible message. This helps to reinforce the company product offerings and image in the mind of the customers.

·         Consistent image and relevant, useful, messages help nurture long term relationships with customers. Hence, customer database can identify precisely which customers need what information and when. This will also reduce the cost of processing information and side-by-side building a string relationship.

·         IMC ensures efficiency in terms of use of the time and money. It eliminates duplication in areas of use advertising, reduction of advertising fees, time cost etc thus reducing stress and workload.

10 Monitoring and Evaluation of Communication Campaign

Integrated marketing communication(IMC) is integration and coordination of various communication tools and messages to make communication more effective, promotional tools complimenting each other, bringing synergy. Each tool is supporting and matching to other tool. Each message is supporting the other message that company is transmitting.

Integrated marketing communication is coordination and integration of various marketing tools, avenues and sources with in the company into the seamless program that maximizes the impact on the consumers and other end user at minimal cost.-Kenneth E. Clow, Donald Baack

Marketing mix is the starting point of integrated marketing communication.

It is integration of communication mix with marketing mix.

Monitoring or evaluating of communication campaign refers to the managerial exercise aimed  at relating the communication campaign results to the established standards of performances and objectives so as to assess the real value of the communication campaign performance.  This method or process is sometimes also referred to as communication campaign research. It is an attempt to know whether the message designed properly s reached the greatest number of prospects at a least cost.  In other words, it is an attempt to measure whether the time, talents and the treasure invested in the creative activity has resulted in attaining the goals of profit maximization to the campaigner and the maximization of  the satisfaction to the customer.

Basically the need of Monitoring and Evaluating of the Communication Campaign can be identifies as follows:

·         To make sound future decisions

·         To keep in touch with the new trends

·         To identify the future modifications  needed for the campaign

·         To know the point of saturation of  campaign( not too much)

·         To satisfy the expectations of the top level management

Generally, Communication Campaign effectiveness  can be assessed in the following ways:

1)      PRE-TESTING METHODS

Pre-testing is done prior to the beginning of the communication campaign. The purpose is to select the best method of communication of the message making the use of the appropriate combination of the marketing mix and the communication mix. Some of the methods of the pre-testing are:

·         Check-list method:

This method identifies whether all the requirements for the creation of the effective communication campaign has been attained or not. A typical check-list provides with the rating scale or basis for the ranking ads in terms of the characteristics.

·         Opinion Test:

This method obtains the preference of a sample group of typical prospective customers of the particular product or the service for an communication campaign. The members rate the campaign on the basis of the various features of the campaign like: proportion of the communication mix used, proportion of the marketing mix used, budget and so on.

·         Inquiry Test:

This method involves making use of  two or more communication campaign at a same time , in a limited scale, to access which is the most effective in terms of the maximum inquiries for the offers made. communication campaign are keyed in advance so that the inquiries can be credited to a particular feature of the campaign, for e.g: message, product, its features, cost and so on. The response on each campaign is counted and the one with the maximum response in  taken into consideration.

2)    POST-TESTING METHODS

Post-testing is the evaluation of the communication campaign once the campaign is fully executed. It is the after analysis of the campaign. Basically the methods of  the post-testing are:

·         Inquiry Test:

In inquiry test, the number of the consumers inquiries produced by communication campaign is considered as the measure of its communication effectiveness. Therefore, the number of inquiries is the test of effectiveness which can be produced only when the communication campaign succeeds in attracting and retaining reader or viewer. This method is popular as a evaluation tool as it: provides good response, is easy to operate and provides detailed information. However this method is costly, time consuming and the chances of biased information is high.

·         Recognition Test:

Recognition is a matter of identifying something as having seen or heard before.it is based on the memory of the respondent. It attempts to measure the effectiveness of the communication campaign by determining the number of the respondents who have gone through the communication campaign. To arrive at results, a survey of viewer or listener of the campaign is conducted by a band of  interviewers. The feature of the particular one from the communication mix that is identified by the respondents is adjudged as the best.  This method is easy for administration, and gives a real picture of the campaign successful.

·         Sales Test:

This method is practiced under a controlled and simulated environment. It attempts to establish direct relationship between one or more variables and sales of a product or services. It facilitates the testing of one communication campaign against the another. The advantage of this method is that it is realistic and thus measure the selling power of the campaign. However this method is often criticized as being costly and time-consuming.

REFERENCES

Websites:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radisson_Hotels

http://www.radisson.com/

http://www.radissonblu.com

http://www.clubcarlson.com/

http://www.parkinn.com/

Books:

Kotler, P., Kellar, Koshy, & Jha (2007), Marketing Management. New Delhi: Pearson Education

Blyth, J. (2003). Marketing Communication. Pearson Education

Ricky W. Griffin, Management, biztantra, 2009