What’s the dif­fer­ence? Marketing vs ad­vert­ising

Ad­vert­ising is the targeted dis­tri­bu­tion of messages as paid ads on various media, in order to promote a product or service. Marketing, on the other hand, refers to a wide spectrum of strategies and activ­it­ies that are meant to meet the needs and desires of customers and build long-term con­nec­tions with them. Ad­vert­ising is one of many different kinds of marketing activ­it­ies. In this article, we’ll explain in depth some of the dif­fer­ences between marketing and ad­vert­ising.

What is marketing?

The term marketing includes many different areas, processes and activ­it­ies that are all focused on promoting and selling products or services. The marketing process starts with market research, which will form the found­a­tion of your marketing strategy. Your marketing strategy should be based on these four prin­ciples, the four Ps of marketing:

• Product: The product or service that’s being offered should be designed to meet the needs or desires of your target group.
• Price: The price of your product or service should be low enough that your target group can afford it but high enough to make a profit.
• Place: The place where your product or service is offered should be easily ac­cess­ible for your target group and conducive to making sales.
• Promotion: You should promote your product or service in a way that gets the attention of your target group.

Marketing goals will vary from brand to brand and campaign to campaign. Some possible goals are, for example, in­creas­ing sales, boosting brand awareness or con­nect­ing with your customer base. Marketing is one of the most important factors in the success of a company or brand.

What is ad­vert­ising?

Ad­vert­ising is an important sub­cat­egory of marketing that aims to make potential customers aware of a brand, product or service, in order to persuade them to buy or use it. A defining char­ac­ter­ist­ic of ad­vert­ising is that you need to pay for it – think, for example, of TV and radio ads, bill­boards, banner ads online and social media campaigns.

Ad­vert­ising is used to convey a targeted message about a brand, product or service at a specific time. The content of any given ad­vert­ising will vary based on target group, medium and purpose. It might be in­form­at­ive, en­ter­tain­ing or emo­tion­ally appealing as a means of capturing the attention and interest of your target group.

What is marketing vs ad­vert­ising?

Marketing consists of a number of different activ­it­ies. Ad­vert­ising is one of these marketing activ­it­ies and acts as part of a marketing strategy. It’s a product of the marketing process or the result of that process that’s shown to the outside world. That’s why the terms marketing and ad­vert­ising are fre­quently (if in­cor­rectly!) used in­ter­change­ably.

While ad­vert­ising is a more short-term marketing activity, marketing is about un­der­stand­ing your customers and de­vel­op­ing a long-term strategy for in­creas­ing their sat­is­fac­tion and loyalty.

What kinds of marketing are there?

There are many different kinds of marketing. We make the general dis­tinc­tion between tra­di­tion­al and online marketing. However, tra­di­tion­al and online marketing can be combined with each other in a marketing mix. In­di­vidu­al marketing strategies can also differ in their goals, target groups, strategies and the media and platforms they use. Here are some of the most common kinds of marketing:

• Digital marketing refers to any marketing strategies that are im­ple­men­ted on digital channels, including search engine marketing (SEM), news­let­ter marketing, content marketing and social media marketing.
• Content marketing is a form of digital marketing in which high-quality and in­form­at­ive content is created and published in order to draw a target group to a website and win them over for a product or brand.
• Social media marketing is a type of digital marketing that takes place on social media platforms. It’s es­pe­cially popular among ecommerce companies.
• In­flu­en­cer marketing also takes place on social media. It involves identi­fy­ing relevant in­flu­en­cers for a brand or company and in­teg­rat­ing them into the marketing and com­mu­nic­a­tion strategy.
• With inbound marketing you don’t approach potential customers directly, and instead get their attention through useful content. It requires that customers are already looking for certain products.
• Outbound marketing refers to a marketing strategy in which customers are shown ads on various channels, even if they haven’t expressed an interest in making a purchase.
• Mul­tichan­nel marketing uses various channels such as email, social media, search engine marketing and print media in order to reach a larger audience.
• Om­ni­chan­nel marketing uses digital, analogue and physical channels to interact with customers. Unlike with mul­tichan­nel marketing, these different areas overlap smoothly with each other.
• Word-of-mouth marketing is when products or services are recommend by customers to other customers. It includes literal word-of-mouth re­com­mend­a­tions in person as well as digital referrals.
• Viral marketing works similarly to word-of-mouth marketing in that it relies on people spreading the word in order to gain a wide reach as fast as possible. The user won’t see this as classical ad­vert­ising and is therefore more likely to share it.
• Guerrilla marketing uses un­con­ven­tion­al and cost-efficient tactics like street art, viral campaigns, flash mobs and ad­vert­ising stunts. It’s often used by small companies with a limited marketing budget.
• Ex­per­i­en­tial marketing involves creating unique and memorable ex­per­i­ences in the form of events and in­ter­act­ive activ­it­ies for customers. The goal is to create a positive im­pres­sion of the brand and foster long-term con­nec­tions with the brand or company.
• Per­form­ance marketing is a data-driven marketing strategy that con­cen­trates on meas­ur­able reactions and trans­ac­tions such as clicks, leads, sales and other con­ver­sions.
• Affinity marketing is aimed at target groups that share a common interest. The goal is to create a con­nec­tion between the brand and its target group by appealing to common interests, values or beliefs.
• Gender marketing works based on the as­sump­tion that people of different genders have different pref­er­ences, needs and behaviour when it comes to consumer goods. It involves targeting a product, service or ad­vert­ising campaign to a specific gender.
• Green marketing involves promoting products or services based on their sus­tain­ab­il­ity. The goal is to appeal to users who are conscious of the impact of their purchases on the en­vir­on­ment.

What types of ad­vert­ising are there?

There are a number of different types of ad­vert­ising. They can be broken up into the cat­egor­ies of tra­di­tion­al vs digital ad­vert­ising. Tra­di­tion­al ad­vert­ising involves ads that are shown in a specific location so that as many people as possible see or hear them. It includes:

• Radio ads
• TV ads
• Print ads (bill­boards, magazines, and other print media)
• Shopfront ad­vert­ising
• Pro­mo­tion­al giveaways

Digital ad­vert­ising includes all forms of ad­vert­ising that are dis­trib­uted on digital channels. Below are some examples.

• With search engine ad­vert­ising (also known as SEA), ads are shown in search engine results.
• Display ad­vert­ising, also known as display marketing, includes all forms of ad­vert­ising that work with graphic ads online, such as banners, videos and animation.
• Native ad­vert­ising can appear either online or offline in print media. It involves ad­vertori­als, which are in­dis­tin­guish­able from normal editorial content.
• Pay-per-click ad­vert­ising is a form of online ad­vert­ising in which ad­vert­isers pay for each click on their ad. PPC ads appear on search engines and social media, for example.

In addition to mass ad­vert­ising, there are also more targeted and per­son­al­ised ways to come into contact with customers. These direct ad­vert­ising strategies include letters and emails, ad tracking on websites using cookies, tele­market­ing, SMS marketing, product tests and home visits. The challenge with these forms of ad­vert­ising is that the person you’re con­tact­ing has to give consent for the use of their data in advance.

How do you plan an ad­vert­ising or marketing campaign?

A suc­cess­ful ad­vert­ising or marketing campaign requires careful planning. You should take the following things into account:

1. Set goals that you want to achieve with your campaign. For example, you might want to increase brand awareness, boost sales or strengthen re­la­tion­ships with customers.
2. Define your target group and identify their needs and interests. That way you can create content that’s tailored to that demo­graph­ic.
3. Set a marketing budget and use it as ef­fect­ively as possible.
4. Create a marketing plan that lists everything you need to do to achieve your goals.
5. Research the com­pet­i­tion. How do they do their marketing? What can you do better?
6. Implement your marketing campaign. Con­stantly keep an eye on KPIs so that you can make ad­just­ments to your campaign as necessary.
7. Measure results, optimise and repeat your campaign, if necessary, in order to get the best possible results.