Above and Below-the-line Promotion

Abstract

In terms of the general public perception of all of the marketing mix elements that a firm may employ, it is perhaps promotion that is the most high profile and prominent ‘P’ in the ‘4 Ps’. In fact to most lay people promotion is marketing, as it is the most visible aspect of the marketing process. Promotion is a part of a firm’s overall effort to communicate with consumers and others about its product or service offering. Both the company and the consumer have needs which they aim to fulfill — the profit-making company wishes to improve or maintain profits and market-share, and gain a better reputation than its competitors, and the consumer aims to reach his or her personal goals. The total product offering allows each party to move towards these goals, offering a ‘bundle of satisfactions’ which fulfill needs in an instrumental and a psychological sense. In the United Kingdom the phrase ‘marketing communications’ is generally preferred to the term promotion, this term often being reserved for a special branch of communications called below-the-line sales promotion.