We’re confused. We’ll we’re not really, but we can see how some people can work themselves into a lather trying to differentiate how marketing, advertising, public relations and communications in general all work together.

Is marketing advertising? We’ve heard some clients mutter as much recently.

Is a brand a logo? A recent pop poll of eleven year-olds says so.

And how actually does PR work for a business?

Before we try and answer these questions lets go back to basics – what is marketing? A classic text book definition is the systematic planning, implementation and control of a mix of business activities intended to bring together buyers and sellers for the mutually advantageous exchange or transfer of products.

Huh?

Our definition is marketing is the umbrella of all the communications functions for a businesses purpose (we think there’s two other umbrella’s in business, one for legal and one for finance, but its not our place to comment on these).

If you make goods or sell services then your purpose is to do just that. If you’re a not-for-profit or charity your purpose is to promote that cause (and in most cases raise funds to do so). In fact just about everything on earth has a business purpose.

And under the marketing umbrella comes all the disciplines and functions to help achieve the purpose such as advertising, PR, social media marketing, sales functions etc. etc. etc.

Capiche?

Then there’s a discipline called integrated marketing communication (IMC), which is all about consistency of message and how that message is used in the media. It’s a simple concept. It ensures that all forms of communications and messages are carefully linked together.

We like to think of it as new marketing – lets make marketing less about the functions and more about the message – the strategies on how to communicate those messages will naturally follow.

Zakazukha says goodbye old marketing, hello new marketing (IMC).

Good marketing is understanding that while all these functions need to work together for a business purpose, its the message that is the most important. What is your message, who are you going to tell and how are you going to tell them.

Advertising can promote a business purpose, PR can legitimise a business purpose, and branding is the image of a business purpose. Successful marketing is when the same message permeates through all these.

Could be on to something here.