Startup Advertising and Promotion - Essay Example

Advertising ID] Advertising I’ll cook for you Introduction/ Situation Assessment/ Recommendation The memo aims to make recommendation about Darla’s venture ‘I’ll cook for you’ particularly in the area of advertising the business features. Considering the needs and resources of Darla it is recommended that she should hire an advertising agency in order to create awareness about her upcoming venture. This is recommended primarily on the basis of the fact that currently Darla is facing the recognition issues. She expects that her services of cooked food would be well accepted by her customers. However, reaching to the target market is the most significant task for her business startup. Moreover, she is worried about persuading people to try her new venture which actually indicates that she needs proper advertising campaign. Darla would be offering her services to the working individuals, elderly neighbors and people who are advised to take healthy meals instead of regular restaurant food. In favor of startup advertising expenses Darla has already acquired a loan of £10,000. This amount would be enough for her to hire an advertising agency though later on she will have to invest more since advertising agencies with better services are usually expensive. She will gain a significant return of investment because the advertising agency will help Darla in recognizing distinctive needs of her target customers. She will be facilitated by marketing experts who actually know how to create awareness about a new business (Koekemoer, 2004). However, if Darla fails to hire an advertising agency then she will have to conduct the entire advertising campaign herself which includes creative designing, media concepts, group selection etc. (Koekemoer, 2004). This will require more monetary support whereas Darla would not be able to reach mass population. Hence her future profits, company sales and market share will be greatly influenced. Moreover, in-house marketing campaign will not facilitate Darla in facing the intense market competition. Rationale for Recommendation As discussed above that Darla’s primary concern is to create awareness about ‘I’ll cook for you’ products and services. She can achieve this objective through the diverse advertising functions of different agencies (Gunelius, 2014): Advertising agencies have an ultimate goal of building brand awareness in the minds of consumers. They will help Darla in better positioning of her food services. Marketers have a clear idea about different features of branding. Moreover, they select such media techniques which facilitate their client in reaching to maximum population. Professionally built advertisements are found highly effective in creating the image of company’s products. This will also help Darla in competing with other companies offering same services. Research indicates that companies usually involve consumers in the development of advertising content which helps them in communicating the product features and building brand loyalty (Debora, 2013). Researchers have also argued that brand awareness is the most essential element for any business because it communicates the existence of a business (Macdonald, 2003). Customers cannot purchase goods especially food until they are aware about the brand. However, selecting the option of advertising agencies will also create certain issues for Darla and her business project. For instance, she will have to allocate significantly larger proportion of the marketing budget to advertising agency (Koekemoer, 2004). This might also influence her to take further loans from the financial institutions. But on the other hand the benefits gained by the planned and organized advertising campaign will be far more than the amount spent on advertisements. In comparison to this if we analyze the other alternative i.e. the in-house advertising then Darla will have to perform following advertising tasks on her own (Pride, 2012): Identifying and analyzing the target market: Darla has somewhat identified her target audience i.e. professionals, old age neighbors and individuals who are recommended to eat nutritious food only. But in order to analyze the target market Darla will require expert’s help which she cannot gain while executing an in-house advertising campaign. Advertising objectives: Darla will have to conduct further study on the differentiating characteristics of her consumers so as to formulate the advertising objectives. Creating advertisement content: Not every advertisement is appropriate for every individual which suggests that advertisement concept is prepared in accordance to the target market. Media plan: Currently there are different media options available including electronic media, print media, social media etc. Darla will have to decide on her own that which media plan will better perform to create customer awareness about her business. Creating an in-house advertising campaign will help Darla in communicating the profound features of her products and services while also maintaining long term profitable relationship with the consumers. But on the other side it will increase business challenges for Darla as presently she does not have any experience in marketing or advertising. Hence hiring an advertising agency for creating product awareness is the most suitable alternative for her. Steps to hire an Advertising Agency In order to hire an advertising agency for creating customer awareness Darla will have to first consider the types of different agencies operating in the market. Subsequently she will have to decide what services she need to obtain from the hired agency. Here, the marketing budget will play an important role since she will have to see different fee structures while selecting the one which best suites her requirements and budget. Finally, Darla will have to evaluate the agency’s performance in order to hire it on long term basis or to contact another advertising agency. Types of Advertising Agencies: Primarily there are six types of advertising agencies including Full Service Agency which provides a complete advertising package to their clients staring from planning up to advertisement’s effectiveness evaluation. Then there are Full Service Specialty Agencies which function only in a particular business area, for instance, they offer specialized services for healthcare tourism etc. Media Buying Service Agencies only facilitate their clients in the media matters. A la carte Agencies offer logos, taglines or any other creative services. Independent Creative Boutiques help their clients in creative execution of the advertising content. Finally the Freelance Consultants help people in different areas of marketing while charging some fee (Ogden, 2010). Selection Criteria: Darla should choose the Full Service Agency in order to conduct her advertising campaign. Here, the selection criteria would be her needs and resources, for instance, she currently needs to build consumer awareness while planning, creating, producing the advertisement content. Full Service Agency will also help her in media placement and evaluation of the campaign’s effectiveness. Relevant Experience: Darla has significant interest and experience in cooking which will help her in creating consumer awareness while also gaining trust of her customers. Moreover, her degree in nutrition will further facilitate in developing a better advertising campaign. Services Description: She will have to obtain all the fundamental advertising services from the hired agency including planning, organizing, executions, media selection, evaluation etc. Darla should focus on television advertisement since that will create significantly more awareness among the consumers. Fee Structure: Different advertising agencies charge differently for the advertising functions. This is primarily dependent upon their service area and the geographical location. Some agencies have media rebates while others charge in percentage. Recently some advertising agencies have also formulated a monthly fee structure (Chitty, 2011). Performance Evaluation: An advertising agency’s services are sometimes evaluated on informal basis especially when the company is operating on a low budget. However, Darla can use formal reporting method in order to evaluate her agency. Here, she will have to assess the advertising effectiveness against the accounts performance, sales, agency recommendations, demonstrations etc. (Belch, 2003). References Belch, GE & Belch, MA 2003, Advertising and promotion: an integrated marketing communications perspective, Tata McGraw-Hill, New Delhi. Chitty, W 2011, Integrated marketing communication, Cengage Learning South Melbourne, Vic. Thompson, DV & Malaviya, P 2013, Consumer-Generated Ads: Does Awareness of Advertising Co-Creation Help or Hurt Persuasion?. Journal of Marketing, vol. 77, no. 3, pp. 33-47. Gunelius, S 2014, How to Create Vocal Brand Advocates, Entrepreneur Media Inc, Irvine, viewed 27 April 2014, < http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/203018> Koekemoer, L & Bird, S 2004, Marketing communications, Juta Academic, Lansdowne, South Africa. Macdonald, E & Sharp, B 2003, ‘Management Perceptions of the Importance of Brand Awareness as an Indication of Advertising Effectiveness’ Marketing Bulletin, vol. 14, no. 2, pp. 1-15. Ogden, JR & Rarick, S 2010, The entrepreneurs guide to advertising, Praeger, Santa Barbara, Calif. Pride, WM, Hughes, RJ & Kapoor, JR 2012, Business, Cengage Learning, Mason, OH, South-Western. Read More