EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Integrated Marketing Communication is a marketing concept that ensures all forms of

communication and messages are carefully linked together. At its most basic level, Integrated
Marketing Communication or IMC means integrating all the promotional tools, so that they work
together in harmony. Promotion is one of the Ps in the marketing mix. Promotion has its own mix
of communication tools. All of these communication tools work better if they work together in
harmony rather than in isolation. Their sum is greater than their parts - providing they speak
consistently with one voice all the time, every time. Integrated Marketing Communication is the
concept that makes all the marketing tools to work together as a unified force rather than work in
isolation. It makes the use of entire marketing efforts in the form of advertising, public relation,
personal selling, sales promotion, internet marketing , direct marketing in order to generate
maximum impact on the target audience at the minimum cost.

Title of the Project:

Study of the effectiveness of Online Marketing on Integrated Marketing Communication.

Tools of IMC:

Advertising refers to "the means of providing the most persuasive possible selling message to the
right prospects at the lowest possible cost". Kotler and Armstrong (2003), provide an alternative
definition: "Advertising is any paid form of non personal presentation and promotion of ideas,
goods and services through mass media such as newspapers, magazines, television or radio by an
identified sponsor".

Sales Promotion is the Demand-stimulating activity designed to boost the sales of a product or
service. It may include an advertising campaign, increased PR activity, a free-sample campaign,
offering free gifts or trading stamps, arranging demonstrations or exhibitions, setting up
competitions with attractive prizes, temporary price reductions, door-to-door calling,
telemarketing, and personal letters on other methods. More than any other element of the
promotional mix, sales promotion is about action.

Public Relations programs are a planned communication effort by an organization to contribute to

generally favorable attitudes and opinions toward an organization and its products. It is a
communication function that seeks to build good relationships with consumers, stockholders, and
legislators. The advantages of publicity are low cost, and credibility (particularly if the publicity
is aired in between news stories like on evening TV news casts). New technologies such as
weblogs, web cameras, web affiliates, and convergence (phone-camera posting of pictures and
videos to websites) are changing the cost structure.

Personal Selling is oral communication with potential buyers of a product with the intention of
making a sale. The personal selling may focus initially on developing a relationship with the
potential buyer, but will always ultimately end with an attempt to "close the sale. According to
American Marketing Association, Personal selling is the personal or impersonal process of
assisting or persuading a prospective customer to buy a product or service and to act favorable
upon an idea that has commercial significance to the seller. Apart from the above, a new tool is
being emerged in the contemporary market scenario and that is named as online marketing.

Benefits of IMC:

 Although Integrated Marketing Communication requires a lot of effort, it delivers many

benefits. It can create competitive advantage, boost sales and profits, while saving money,
time and stress.
 IMC wraps communication around customers and helps them move through the various
stages of the buying process. The organization simultaneously consolidates its image,
develops a dialogue and nurtures its relationship with customers. This 'Relationship
Marketing' cements a bond of loyalty with customers which can protect them from the
inevitable onslaught of competition. The ability to keep a customer for life is a powerful
competitive advantage.
 IMC can boost sales by stretching messages across several communication tools to create
more avenues for customers to become aware, aroused, an ultimately, to make a purchase.

Limitations of IMC:

 In addition to the usual resistance to change and the special problems of communicating
with a wide variety of target audiences, there are many other obstacles which restrict IMC.
These include: Functional Silos; Stifled Creativity; Time Scale Conflicts and a lack of
Management know-how.
 Some organizational structures isolate communication, data, and even managers from each
other. For example the PR department often doesn't report to marketing. The sales force
rarely meets the advertising or sales promotion people and so on.
 IMC can restrict creativity. No more wild and wacky sales promotions unless they fit into
the overall marketing communication strategy. The joy of rampant creativity may be
stifled, but the creative challenge may be greater and ultimately more satisfying when
operating within a tighter, integrated, creative brief.

INTRODUCTION

Integrated marketing communication (IMC) is an approach used by organizations to brand and

coordinate their communication efforts. The American Association of Advertising Agencies
defines IMC as "a concept that recognizes the added value of a comprehensive plan that evaluates
the strategic roles of a variety of communication disciplines, and combines these disciplines to
provide clarity, consistency and maximum communication impact." The primary idea behind an
IMC strategy is to create a seamless experience for consumers across different aspects of the
marketing mix. The brand's core image and messaging are reinforced as each marketing
communication channel works together in unity, rather than in isolation.

IMC blends various promotional tools and communication/marketing/advertising services and

techniques to maximize profit. IMC is ultimately achieved through concise and consistent
messaging that fosters familiarity and consumer affinity. Effective IMC messages and images are
meaningful and useful to consumers, messaging and branding consistency - a proven IMC concept
- yield customer satisfaction and loyalty.

ONLINE MARKETING

Online Marketing is the art and science of selling products and/or services over digital networks,
such as the Internet and cellular phone networks. The art of online marketing involves finding the
right online marketing mix of strategies that appeals to your target market and will actually
translate into sales. The science of online marketing is the research and analysis that goes into both
choosing the online marketing strategies to use and measuring the success of those online
marketing strategies. Online marketing uses internet to deliver promotional marketing messages
to consumers. It includes email marketing, search engine marketing, social media marketing, many
types of display advertising (including web banner advertising), and mobile advertising. Like other
advertising media, online advertising frequently involves both a publisher, who integrates
advertisements into its online content, and an advertiser, who provides the advertisements to be
displayed on the publisher's content. Other potential participants include advertising agencies that
help generate and place the ad copy, an ad server who technologically delivers the ad and tracks
statistics, and advertising affiliates who do independent promotional work for the advertiser.

LITERATURE REVIEW
 Warren J. Keeyan, Global Marketing Management, USA, Prentice-Hall of India Pvt. Ltd.,
2002, pg. no. 3 A revolutionary development in the shift to the strategic concept of
marketing is in the marketing objective – from profit to consumer benefits. There is a
growing recognition that profits are a reward for performance (defined as satisfying
customers in socially responsible or acceptable ways). To compete in today’s market, it is
necessary to have an employee team committed to continuing innovation and to producing
quality products. In other words, marketing must focus on the customers and deliver value
by creating consumer benefits. This change is revolutionary idea that is accepted today by
a vanguard minority marketing practitioners.
 According to Kotler & Armstrong (2003), there are five traditional IMC elements quoted
as Advertising, Sales Promotion, Direct marketing, Personal selling and Publicity/Public
relations. According to Institute of Practitioners in Advertising (IPA), Advertising refers
to "the means of providing the most persuasive possible selling message to the right
prospects at the lowest possible cost". Kotler and Armstrong (2003), provide an alternative
definition: "Advertising is any paid form of non-personal presentation and promotion of
ideas, goods and services through mass media such as newspapers, magazines, television
or radio by an identified sponsor".
 Kaplan and Haenlein (2010) define social media as ―a group of Internet-based
applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0, which
facilitates the creation and exchange of user-generated content. It consists of different
Internet applications such as blogs, social networking sites, content communities,
collaborative projects, virtual game worlds and social worlds. Russell S. Winer (2009)
affirms that many companies today are using some or all of the new media to develop
targeted campaigns that reach specific segments and engage their customers to a much
greater extent than traditional media.

OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY:

 To understand the importance of Integrated Marketing Communication.

 To understand the importance of Online advertising in changing market scenario.
 To understand the reasons for growing popularity of online marketing.
 To analyze the effectiveness of online marketing as compared to traditional marketing
tools.

SCOPE OF THE STUDY:

The study aims to understand the massive contribution of Online marketing as a part of Integrated
Marketing Communication and to know its splendid efforts towards promotion in practice and also
to find out some challenges in using online marketing as a tool of integrated marketing
communication. The recommendations of this research can be used to frame an appropriate
Integrated Marketing Communication strategy in which companies can give special consideration
to online marketing along with the other traditional tools of IMC.

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY:

RESEARCH DESIGN:

I used a descriptive type of research. It is one which includes surveys and fact finding, enquiries
of different kind. The major purpose of such research is description of the state of affairs, as it
exists at present.

SAMPLE DESIGN:

Sample Unit:

Sample Size: Sample size refers to the number of respondents.

Sample Technique: Sample technique refers to the technique or procedure would adopt in
selecting items for the sample. For my research used convenience sampling method.
Sampling Area:

DATA COLLECTION:

Sources: A research design is one, which simplifies the framework of plan for the study and adds
itself in the quick collection and analysis of the data. Data sources are:

Primary data: For the purpose of collecting primary data, the researcher has adopted the method
of survey. Survey can be telephonic, by mail personal and by the diary. For the purpose of collected
detailed information, researcher has chosen survey based on personal interview by means of
questionnaire. A questionnaire was prepared for the respondents, where their views were collected.

Secondary data: The secondary data those which have been collected for some purpose other than
the problem in hand and passed through the statistical process. In other words, data that are not
originally collected rather obtained from published and unpublished sources. The secondary data
has been collected through various sources:

 Internet
 Books
 Newspaper
 Brochure
 Journals
 Websites

Tools: I have used Questionnaire, as the research instrument to conduct the market survey.

DATA ANALYSIS:

Statistical Tools: To analyze data collected through structured questionnaire researcher used
statistical software SPSS and Ms-Excel Add-In Data Analysis. Statistical tools used for the
analysis are Mean, Median & mode, Standard deviation, Skewness & Kurtosis.
REFERANCE

Philip Kotler & Kevin Lane Keller, Marketing Management, New Delhi, Pearson Education, 2006,
pg. no. 537

Philip Kotler & Kevin Lane Keller, Marketing Management, New Delhi, Pearson Education, 2006,
pg. no. 52

Warren J. Keeyan, Global Marketing Management, USA, Prentice-Hall of India Pvt. Ltd., 2002,
pg. no. 3

Verma, D. P. S. and Varma, G. 2003. On-line pricing: concept, methods and current practices,
Journal of Services Research. Gurgaon, Vol. 3, Issue. 1, pg. no. 135-156

Kothari, C. R.; (1973). Research Methodology methods and Techniques. 2nd edition. Wiley
Eastern Ltd. New Delhi.

Applied Statistics In Business And Economics By David P. Doane, Lori E. Seward.

http://multimediamarketing.com/mkc/marketingcommunications/

https://simplehq.co/integrated-marketing/

http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/integrated-marketing-communications-IMC.html

https://neilpatel.com/what-is-online-marketing/

https://www.thebalance.com/internet-marketing-101-1794591

https://www.techopedia.com/definition/26363/online-marketing