Advertising and Marketing Communication of American Express

This report explores the advertising and marketing communication strategies of American Express, a leading financial services corporation, and its efforts to establish itself as a global leader. It also includes recommendations for improving and targeting key customers.

Running Head: American Express
American Express
Report
System04104
6/8/2019

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Table of Contents
1. Introduction.........................................................................................................................2
2. Situation analysis of the American Express.......................................................................2
3. Advertising and Marketing communication Objectives.....................................................3
4. Advertising Tool Used by American Express....................................................................4
5. Target Audience..................................................................................................................5
5. Recommended Advertising and Marketing Communication Tactics.................................6
6. Proposed Evaluation and Control Methods........................................................................6
7. Conclusion..........................................................................................................................7
References..................................................................................................................................8

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1. Introduction
The fourth P, of marketing mix (Product, Price, Place, and Promotion) focuses on
promotion, which means promoting ad communicating with target audience about the
company products, services, ideas, or offers etc. Advertising and communication are the ways
through which an organisation aware its customer and people about the offerings (product
and services) and other features of the company. Advertising and marketing communication
is the key of any company to promote and communicate people about the existing and future
offerings of the company. American Express (also known as Amex), which is an American
multinational financial services corporation known for its marketing and advertising
campaign in all over the world. American Express unveiled a new global brand platform and
marketing campaign that shows how people live and work today, called “Powerful Backing:
Don’t Do Business/Don’t Live Life Without It” (Grunig & Grunig, 2013). Through this
tagline, the American Express shows that life of people and business are interconnected. This
report shows the advertising and marketing communication of American Express and its
effort to establish itself as a global leader among its customers and people worldwide. This
report also includes two key recommendations for the company to improve and target the key
customers in the world.
2. Situation analysis of the American Express
American Express Company is one of leading financial service organisation of USA,
which operates its business more than 130 countries. The company was founded in 1850 and
its Headquarter located in New York, USA. American Express is one of the 30 components
of the Dow Jones Industrial Average (Piskorsky & Chen, 2012). American express is best
known for its credit cards, charge cards, travellers’ cheque business etc. The company had
more than 112 million cards in the world economy among them more than 50 million cards
were used by American people as of December 31, 2017. However, according to Forbes in
2017, American Express was the 23rd most valuable brand in the world. The company
operates its business in four segments, which are U.S card services, Global merchant
services, Global card services, and International card services (Balas & Kaya, 2012).
As company is working from last 139 years, it has a vast experience of working with
retailers and service providers to create and launch new innovative business ideas and
marketing campaign to explore its new businesses. ‘More businesses’ is a good idea to start a

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business, but if an organisation targets a specific area and segments of customers with more
specific business, it will be more beneficial and also provide the opportunities for effective
business ideas and operations. For this purpose, a business organisation needs to attract new
customers and make some efforts that existing customers come back to the business more
often (Cohen & Sayag, 2010). These things are not possible without a proper advertising and
marketing communication plan, which is the speciality of American Express. One of the great
examples of marketing plan of American Express was ‘Small Business Saturday’ when the
company teamed up with millions of small businesses to create a marketing even and very
quickly this trend became a holiday shopping season in USA. This was the amazing plan of
American Express in 2010, when company inspires its customers to show something out of
nothing talent and convince the consumers to show up their talent. The company gave the
tagline “Shop small with us” (Funk, 2013).
(Source: Luo & de Jong, 2012)
The American Express company is one of the leading financial service corporations in
the world and it is known for its marketing and communication plan. However, the company
is aggressively capturing the market of developing nations and revolutionised the digital
payment system in all over the world (Nasır, 2017).

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3. Advertising and Marketing communication Objectives
The American Express company wants to establish itself as one of the leading online
payment services, which is easy to use, secure, more convenient, and trustworthy among its
customers and people. The company wants to expand its business operation among the people
as a best technology that provides all the latest facilities to its customers in online payment
services. The major objective of the company behind its communication and advertising
strategy is to create value for the customers by facilitating them with best services to its
cardholders and for online payment services (Dhir, 2019). The American express focuses on
brand awareness among the people in developing country, create trust among people and
provide a secure and safe service to the customers and these are the back features of
American Express behind its communication and advertising concept. However, the people
who use the American Express cards are found to be more satisfied and they enjoy the
services of the company. The motive of the company is same behind its advertising and
marketing communication plan (Edelman, 2010).
The American Express company with increasing per capita income of the people and
increasing growth of the world (especially developed and developing countries), want to
expand its business among people and encourage the people towards the online and digital
payment gateway. The main motive behind advertising of American Express companies is to
utilise these global economic opportunities and expand the market in all over the world. Due
to emerging economies, the American Express way finds great opportunities in this market
segments and working in this university (Vize & Sherrett, 2017).

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(Source: Piskorsky & Chen, 2012)
4. Advertising Tool Used by American Express
The company used various advertising tool to promote and advertise its products in
the world. Social media and Television channels are some of the key advertising modes of
American Express. Apart from this, the company also focuses on tie up with various small
and large e-business organisations to use its cards, provide it to customers, and promote the
digital mode of payment. For example, American Express tied up with Amazon and JP
Morgan Chase for a general-purpose consumer credit card. The company also tied up with
Synchrony Financial for a ‘Store Card’ that can be sued by people when they purchasing on
Amazon (Adamopoulos & Todri, 2015).
Apart from this, the American Express also used the social media channels for its
product advertisement, communicate its offerings, and encourage people towards the digital
payment and using the American Express cards while they purchasing or transacting (Chanda
& Zaorski, 2013). The campaign on social media like is also a key factor that helps the
company to create a strong relationship with its customers. Social media provide a wide
variety of customer choices to the company through which it can target the large number of
customers and on very low cost. The social media advertising of the American Express

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Company is really an attractive tool for advertising and communicating with people all
around the world (Borgogno & Colangelo, 2019).
The company wants to generate more customers from the small businesses and for
this purpose, the initiation of company “Small Business Saturday” was a great example of the
company. The company wants to put the small business organisation on its centre of
marketing campaign. The company involves the small business organisation to promote its
marketing campaign. The company also invited the public officials to endorse the SBS
campaign of the company and share their opinion among the people. Another motive of the
company that company want to encourage the consumers to participate by shopping at small
businesses on SBS (year over year). This method of promotion or communication was one of
the unique types of promotional campaign and it was so effective (Luo & de Jong, 2012).
Apart from this, the company also uses the mobile messaging and email facilities to
connect with its customer and advertise the products among the potential customers. The
company target those customers who belong to developing economies and social media like
Instagram and Facebook are some of the great channels that are providing a great platform
for the company to communicate with people about its product and offerings. It can be easily
noted on Instagram where the followers of the company are increasing with every passing
year with the 18% growth rate (Dhir, 2019). The company uses the social media for
advertising its financial cards and people really loved its pictures on Instagram and Facebook,
which helps the company to create a place in the heart of customers.
5. Target Audience
The Target Audience of the American Express are as follow:
1. Small Business owners: The major and key audience of the American Express are
the small business owners because these audiences help to promote the use of cards in
transactions. These small business owners are also playing a role of promoter of the
company who accept the digital mode of payment and which ultimately increase the
sales of American Express cards (Paniagua & Sapena, 2014).
2. Potential customers in developing economies: The key focus of the company is to
focus on those potential customers who belong to developing countries and now
looking for online payment and digital payment mode for transaction. The company
targets those types of people who like to purchase online and using cards for online

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transaction and it is more common in developing countries where the increasing
income and improving life standard of people increase the demand of American
Express cards (Hilliard, 2017).
3. Online purchasers and e-commerce companies: The online retail companies are
also key audience of American express, because these companies provide facilities to
customer to purchase products online and pay the price through various cards. Here,
the opportunity for the American Express is to expand its business and target the
customers through these online business channels.
4. Retail customers and small traders: The Company also targets the retail customers
and small traders who use the transactions cards for the online payment. The retail
customers and small traders are the key audiences of American Express and all the
advertisement and marketing communication plan company formulate around the
retail potential customers and small traders (Hilliard, 2017).
5. Recommended Advertising and Marketing Communication Tactics
The American Express can use two best advertising and marketing communication
technique to convey its message to its potential customers and aware them about the service
and product offerings of American Express:
1. The company can target the potential customer through mobile advertisements. In
recent time, advertisement is much and more than newspaper and TV advertisements.
The company can directly communicate with the customers on their phone number
and ask them to use the products and services of American Express. However, the
company todays mostly advertise its product and services through social media and
TV advertisements. However, if the American Express targets its customer through
direct consulting the customers on phone, it might be a more effective way of
advertising the products and services of customers (Dhir, 2019).
2. The company can target the small and large size of business organisation that promote
the cards of American Express and provide discount to the customers on purchasing
products on the cards of American Express (Paniagua & Sapena, 2014). The tie-up of
the company with the small and large business organisations help the American
Express to directly sale its cards and services to the customers who purchases
products from the small or large business organisations. Apart from this, the company
can also use the e-business organisation to advertise the products of American express

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on their sites and mobile apps. This will help the company to increase its customer
base especially in developing economies where the income of people are increasing
every day and people uses the online retail businesses for the purchasing of products.
6. Proposed Evaluation and Control Methods
The American Express is known for its advertising strategy and marketing
communication plan. However, measuring the effect of advertisement is not an easy task. The
company needs to monitor the sales and market share in those countries where it implement
its advertising plan (Van Heerde, Gijsenberg, Dekimpe & Steenkamp, 2013). The company
needs to review the effectiveness of advertisements through an advertising committee, which
monitors the effectiveness of advertisements. The role of e-business organisations is so
crucial in the advertisement as they can provide discount on American Express cards. The
effectiveness of the advertisement plan depends on how these small and e-business
organisations inspire and motivate other people towards the use of American Express cards
and its financial services (Chae & Hedman, 2015).
The company can also measure the advertisement effectiveness through calculating
the number of new customers who uses the cards of American Express. The frequency of
using cards and amount transaction per day by customers will also show the effectiveness of
advertising and marketing communication plan of the company.
7. Conclusion
In conclusion, the advertising and marketing communication in any business organisation is
so crucial as it determines the success and future growth of the organisation. American
Express is one of the leading multinational financial organisations in the world and known for
its customer services and global advertising strategies. The present advertising and
communication plan of the company will help it to target the potential customers in
developing economies while the company also target its customer through promoting the
small and middle-level business organisations. However, the company needs to promote its
products and services in those countries where people are becoming more trendy and
focusing on online purchasing through various e-business organisations. The company needs
to tie-up with new and small retail e-business organisations and ask them to promote the
cards of American Express and provide discount on the cards of the company. It will
definitely help the company to increase its market share and expand its business in

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developing economies. The company can control and measure the effectiveness of the
advertising by focusing on increasing number of customers and the transaction they are doing
using the American Express cards. It will help the company to assess the effectiveness of its
advertising campaign and marketing plan.

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