7 Reasons Why Marketing is More Than Advertising
Most of the time we will use these terms interchangeably, not aware of their separate uses.
On the surface, we may link these terms to a wide range of activities that promote a specific message and expand the awareness of a brand or product/service. However, in order to truly maximize your company’s promotional efficiency and effectiveness you will need to understand the nuances that distinguish these processes from one another.
To provide a more clear picture of what separates these distinct activities, we have gathered the following 7 reasons as to why marketing is much more important than advertising.
Advertising is only one component of marketing
In a nutshell, advertising can be considered as a single element of marketing among the larger mix of marketing activities. Advertising is significant as companies can position themselves ahead of the game in exposing their brand to a large group of audiences through paid content. However, focusing all your energy on this one activity is not enough to build a lasting brand value for any business. This is significant as companies can specifically tailor their promotional content towards their intended users and platforms. A number of advertising techniques can elevate brand awareness and holds the power to positively influence a consumer’s purchasing decision, however, companies hold no guarantee that advertising alone will achieve this.
Employing a series of marketing activities is much more crucial than just advertising, with processes such as marketing research, content marketing, search engine optimization, website development, social media marketing, and public relations efforts will allow you to convert existing information on your customers into actual leads, at a fraction of the cost. By adopting a number of marketing activities, you can increase the likelihood of delivering a well-executed advertising campaign that will not manipulate your customers but attract them to your brand.
Need for a marketing plan
Advertising allows businesses to choose a specific communication channel/s and pay to place their brand’s messages on their chosen platforms. However, before you spend a penny, we advise you to determine exactly what you are trying to achieve.
In order for an advertising campaign to be successful a comprehensive and strategic marketing plan is imperative. Thus, take your time to outline your step-by-step marketing plan and define your goals aligned to your overarching business objectives. This starts from your unique value proposition and your vision as this is what will engage your audience to differentiate your brand to other companies.
Ads are ineffective in comparison
As marketing is most successful when it develops the customer-to-business relationship, all marketing processes must be sensitive and relevant to consumer preferences, trends, and behaviors. A customer plays an important role in shaping the way businesses send messages to consumers and thus Ads that do not have the customer in mind are already doomed to fail.
In recent decades, Ads have become an intrusive force for most consumers. Adblockers are being used to skip an overwhelming number of Ads, with customers developing a low tolerance for intrusive Ads. Social media Ads, Banners, Google Ads, and YouTube Ads have already accumulated quite a high level of annoyance by the general public, proving that advertising alone is not going to be effective, truly now and long the way into the future.
Builds the Brand’s Reputation
A brand’s reputation is vital to the growth and maintenance of a company. Yet, building your brand’s reputation and corporate culture is far more than simply looking good on the front cover of a magazine. Marketing plays a major role in the progressive and continuous process of building brand equity. It involves effective communication, branding strategies, CSR and PR strategies to make sure your brand identity is being upheld to the highest standard possible.
Although advertising can be used as one tool to improve the image of the business and gain exposure from a large array of potential clients, this practice is highly expensive and does not provide the most appropriate avenue for marketers to actually achieve the expectations of customers to improve your company’s reputation. Generating a positive image and corporate reputation is a principal asset for any business, as this is what really matters in building brand value and growing retention rates in the long term.
Building a lasting brand value
Marketing is not just about promoting your product and services benefits to the public. Marketing is a strategic process, and as such works with a variety of components to promote your unique value as an organization or vendor. Through segmentation your business can create lasting value to your target audience keeping them connected to your business. What makes a business stand out is the everlasting impact and value that a brand can convey to its audience. Only marketing facilitates this exchange and helps maintain relevance in the market.
Facilitates exchange and engagement
Businesses that are not able to build quality relationships with their consumers will fail to satisfy and retain their customers in the long term. A loyal customer base is proof of a successful and sustainable marketing campaign. Defining and pursuing customer wants and needs should stand at the forefront of any exchange between your business and customers and this is what will advance engagement, motivation, intent to purchase, and eventually, sales.
Finding the right balance
Advertising strategies can be affordable to easily implemented globally to gain media attraction and social media exposure and in terms of building corporate publicity, advertising is a key tool. Channeling all of your resources into advertising may produce the results you want but at what cost?
If executed poorly, it could be thousands or in the most extreme cases, millions of dollars of wasted expenditure. That is why every company must find their own exclusive balance between advertising and marketing in their own means as both used effectively can give you a better chance of success. If used effectively, both advertising and marketing can work hand in hand to multiply your leads and drive traffic towards your business.
If you require any consultation regarding your current marketing strategy get in contact with our experienced team.
