Sales Promotion Meaning
Sales promotion is the term used in the context of marketing, on weekends if you go with your family to any shopping mall of the city there you will see various offers like discounts, contests, coupons, free product samples and so on, all this is nothing but sales promotion. In simple words in case of this sales technique company for a limited period of time uses all techniques to lure customers towards the company’s products and services to stimulate demand for the company’s product or service. In order to understand this concept more one should look at some of the important characteristics of sales promotion –
Characteristics of Sales Promotion
Part of Marketing
The first and foremost feature of sales promotion is that it is only a part of marketing, implying that company cannot rely solely on this technique for promoting its product or service rather this technique acts as a support for other techniques of marketing like television advertising, social media marketing, newspaper advertising and so on. In simple words, the scope of sales promotion is limited as compared to marketing which has much wider in scope.
Limited Time
Another feature of this technique is that it is done for a short period of time which is usually during festive periods or during holidays unlike another medium of marketing which is done throughout the year and not for a limited period of time. In simple words just like avengers movie come in 2 or 3 years while other marvel movies come every year in the same way sales promotion 2 or 3 times in a year, unlike marketing which has to be done by company round the year.
Short Term Impact
Sales promotion can never have long-lasting impact implying that customers get attracted towards the company’s product or service only due to offers or rewards rather than purchasing those products due to the company’s brand or quality of a product. In simple words, if the company is thinking of building loyal customers using this technique than it is wrong as loyal customers are never made overnight rather it takes years of good quality products and customer service for the development of loyal customers.
Not Used Universally
Another characteristic of this technique is that the company does not use it universally implying that unlike normal discounts which are given to all the customers of the company irrespective of their location in case of this technique discounts are available at select centers only. Hence, for example, suppose the company has made a tie-up with multiplex chain for doing sales promotion of its products than the customer will get discount on buying the products of the company from that multiplex but if he goes out of that multiplex and purchases the same product than he or she will not get that discount.
Use of Several Techniques
Sales promotion is not done through single process or way rather company makes use of several techniques for luring customers towards company’s products; hence apart from normal discounts company gives prizes to winner of contests organized by company, discount coupons of famous brands on purchasing the product, freebies on purchase and so on depending on product of the company as well as target customer of the company.
As one can see from the above that sales promotion has some unique features and that is the reason many companies use it for the company’s products and services apart from normal marketing techniques.