Disadvantages:

• Some people put filters on junk mail. Even some good and important adverts can be considered to be a junk. The message being sent might be ignored and so is not very effective.

• It’s relatively cheap to advertise products in the internet. It also works more effectively when businesses advertise their products on the search portals, like ‘yahoo’, where every time the person is trying to find something, he looks at the adverts displayed on the ‘home page’.

• There might be many other firms-competitors, which produce similar products, advertising their goods on the same website. If the business makes products, which are easy to be switched from one to another, then it creates a problem. For example, if there’s

Below-the-line promotion

These are basically all other types of promotion excluding advertising.

This is the list of examples of below-the-line promotion:

• Sponsorship- TV programs, sports teams

• Direct Mailing-junk mail, spam

• free samples

• exhibitions

• free gifts

• 3 for 2- BOGOF

• 25% extra free

• trade catalogues

• money off coupons, vouchers

These types of promotion are usually very expansive, but may change the behavior in the short term. If the consumer is brand loyal, then they are more likely to return to their preferred brand.

There are sales promotions, which include things like BOGOF (Buy One Get One Free), free gifts, ‘better value’, 25% extra of the product and etc. There also can be some competitions. E.g. Pepsi Co. introduced a competition where you had to collect certain number of ‘Pepsi’ bottles, which you could then change to a ‘Pepsi’ t-shirt, pen, radio, calculator and etc. These things help to encourage more sales of the products.

E.g. in the supermarkets it is very easy to find some points of sales, where you can try a new product and get a prize (pair of sleepers with the company logo). Trade-in is a very popular method in mobile phone warehouses and car saloons, where you can trade the product that you already have for something else. For example, in some mobile phone stores you can trade any mobile phone for the new one. Depending on the type of phone you have, they can give you a maximum discount of 20%. In some food stores, you may be offered to buy 52 packs of crisps for only 3pounds. Some companies do this to get rid of the old stock. Other businesses do this, in order to encourage more sales for the new products. These types of sales promotions are usually directly aimed at customers. However, there are also some other promotions, when suppliers give special offers to their retailers.

Place

A distribution strategy defines how you are going to create and satisfy demand for your products. It also defines how you are going to move products from point of creation to points of consumption in an efficient and cost-effective manner, and how to develop and maintain customer loyalty. For Walkers a distribution strategy must be coordinated with how customers want to shop and buy. Nowadays customers are much different than ten years ago. Today costumers have an access to the Internet, which makes it easier for them to buy certain products, and makes it easier for some manufacturers to sell them. Despite this fact, manufacturers and distributors continue to support outdated distribution strategies that actually make it hard for customers to shop for and purchase their products. Maybe that’s why when we want to buy a car, we usually go to the car store, test the car and then buy if we like it.

In order to sell their products, manufactures need to think about how they are going to distribute their products to consumers. There are different distribution channels, which businesses use depending on the kind of products they produce. Manufacturers are the businesses which produce the products. Wholesalers are those businesses, which buy the products in bulk in order to receive a discount and then resell them. Retailers are shops who sell to consumers. Some of the examples of the retailers are ASDA, Argos, Tesco and many other shops and supermarkets.

There are different ways of how the products can be distributed to the consumer. Products can be delivered from manufacturer straight to the consumer, or to the whole seller and then to consumer.

Basically, there are five main distribution channels or the ways how the products can be distributed: Zero Level Channel, One level channel, two level channel and three level channel.

Types of distribution

Zero level channel

By using the zero level channel of distribution the products are delivered from the manufacturer directly to consumer. The products being sold by using this type of the distribution are usually very expansive, technical, high value products. Technical high value products can also be bought online and then delivered directly to consumer. In this case manufacturer saves the costs of transporting the goods to the retailers. Because of the high cost of transport and because retailers may charge a higher price, the products may become very expansive. When the products are delivered directly from the manufacturer to consumer, manufacturer usually uses a transport agency, like DHL in order to deliver the goods. In this case the costs of transport are not as high, and the products don’t go to the retailers. By saving costs of transporting the products, manufacturers can charge lower prices.

In some cases the consumer may actually be asked to come to the factory in order to receive his product. For example, Ferrari and Porsche car buyers can actually come to the factory in order to receive their products. They are usually allowed to go into the factory and see how their products are actually being made. It gives a consumer a great experience of visiting a factory, but at the same time gives a manufacturer an opportunity to save the costs of transportation these cars.

Another example of people who sell the products or provide the service directly to the consumer is hairdresser or electrician. They sell their services directly to consumers without encouraging any other agencies. Nowadays we also have ‘e-tailers’, who do the same job as retailers, but using internet, using TV shops or telephone sales. For example, you can now buy a TV online on the internet Amazon, instead of going to the normal shop. There are already many companies like Amazon or EBay on the market which do e-selling. Normal retailers have many physical shops, which means they have higher costs of running these shops e-tailers. They do have some stores near their customers in the city, in order to make sure it is easy to deliver their products on time, and that they always have some in stock in the store.

Nowadays we also have ‘e-tailers’, who do the same job as retailers, but in the internet. For example, you can now buy a TV on the online shop on Amazon, instead of going to the normal shop. Normal retailers have many physical shops, which means they have higher costs of running these shops, than for e-tailers…….