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Marketing communications is defined by actions a firm takes to communicate with end-users, consumers and external parties. Marketing communications encompasses four distinct subsets, which are:
Personal sales

Oral presentation given by a salesperson who approaches individuals or a group of potential customers:

    Live, interactive relationship
    Personal interest
    Attention and response
    Interesting presentation
    Clear and thorough.

Sales promotion

Short-term incentives to encourage buying of products:

    Instant appeal
    Anxiety to sell

An example is coupons or a sale. People are given an incentive to buy, but this does not build customer loyalty or encourage future repeat buys. A major drawback of sales promotion is that it is easily copied by competition. It cannot be used as a sustainable source of differentiation.

Public Relations

Public Relations (or PR, as an acronym) is the use of media tools by a firm in order to promote goodwill from an organization to a target market segment, or other consumers of a firm's good/service. PR stems from the fact that a firm cannot seek to antagonize or inflame its market base, due to incurring a lessened demand for its good/service. Organizations undertake PR in order to assure consumers, and to forestall negative perceptions towards it.

PR can span:

    Interviews
    Speeches/Presentations
    Corporate literature, such as financial statements, brochures, etc.

Publicity

Publicity involves attaining space in media, without having to pay directly for such coverage. As an example, an organization may have the launch of a new product covered by a newspaper or TV news segment. This benefits the firm in question since it is making consumers aware of its product, without necessarily paying a newspaper or television station to cover the event.

Advertising

Advertising occurs when a firm directly pays a media channel to publicize its product. Common examples of this include TV and radio adverts, billboards, branding, sponsorship, etc.
Marketing communications "mix"

Marketing communications is a "sub-mix" within the Promotion aspect of the marketing mix, as the exact nature of how to apply marketing communications depends on the nature of the product in question.

Accordingly, a given product would require a unique communications mix, in order to convey successfully information to consumers. Some products may require a stronger emphasis on personal sales, while others may need more focus on advertising.