Promotional Mix and Brand Equity

The assignment delves into the concept of the promotional mix and its influence on brand equity. It examines various promotional tools such as advertising, public relations, social media, and sales promotions. Students are expected to analyze different promotional strategies employed by organizations across industries, drawing upon academic literature and real-world examples. The focus is on understanding how a well-defined promotional mix can contribute to building and strengthening brand equity.

PUBLIC RELATION AND
PROMOTION

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................3
A. ROLE OF PUBLIC PROMOTION:......................................................................................3
B. AUDIT OF DESTINATION'S ENVIRONMENT:....................................................................5
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................8
A. ANALYSING THE KEY MEDIA:.......................................................................................8
B.APPROPRIATENESS OF THE MEDIA:..............................................................................8
TASK 3............................................................................................................................................9
A.EFFECTIVENESS OF PUBLIC RELATION CAMPAIGN:................................................9
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................10
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
The report indicates a framework for highlighting the concept of Public Relations with
respect to VisitBritain which is a travel agency of UK. The agency has been using the concept of
public relations as a promotional tool for attracting maximum number of visitors all around the
globe. The company has thus been observed to to efficiently promoting various seaside tourist
destinations by effectively applying the promotional techniques so as to maintain the unique
brand image of services provided by the agency. The report focuses specially on underlining the
factors behind declining interest of tourists to enjoy their vacations in Southwold seaside beach
on account of weaker promotional techniques and lack of understanding the importance of
Public relations. The importance of developing a Public Relations plan that provides guidelines
to the agency to enable the destination mentioned to be viewed as a unique one for tourist's
selection for their vacation. Public Relation campaign is carried out in the report by applying
various strategies in accordance with the plan designed (Botan and Hazleton, 2010).
TASK 1
A. ROLE OF PUBLIC PROMOTION:
Public relation department of the company works efficiently by making sincere efforts for
building the brand image of company's services. The department of public relation is of
tremendous importance for the company as this is the department which obtains review from its
customers on the services given. The department welcomes the suggestions and brings in
required modifications for ensuring more satisfaction to the customers by delivering quality
services. Public relation department provides the company with a clear picture of customers
perception with respect to company's services. As the company is undertaking a complex task of
promoting tourism, it has to constantly review various activities that are a part of services
provided by the company. It not has to promote tourism but also build a stronger image of its
services globally to expand its area of operations and functions (Smith, 2012). The agency has
been providing a list of services such as accommodation facilities, food facilities and etc. to a
wide group of customers and therefore the department has to provide guidelines to the top
executives to frame strategies that will enable the company to make the selection preference of
the seaside area mentioned to the centre of customer's mindset by designing efficient plans that
will monitor and control the activities to be performed to promote the destination which

presently is facing the issue of lack of customer's preference. Public department plays a major
role in not only building special relationship with investors, customers and other stakeholders but
also designs to improve upon same to ensure tremendous achievements in future too. Moreover
public relation concept focuses mainly upon understanding the nature and behavioural pattern of
its customers to design the services to be provided accordingly for meeting their preferences
criteria (Dozier, Grunig and Grunig, 2013).
IMPORTANCE OF PUBLIC RELATION:
As mentioned above one of the tourist destination that is Southwold is facing the issue of
decreasing number of customer's preferences for choosing the same as their destination place, the
issue has been seriously considered by the management department. Upon analysing the
situation, the company has vested Public Relation department with the responsibility to
overcome the drawbacks and weaknesses. It has been observed that the company's overall
performance has been affected to some extent on account of negative performance of the
destination mentioned in serving its visitors as compared to other destinations. Customers,
employees and other stakeholders have been focused here by the public relations department to
promote the image of company by bringing up the performance of destination targeted. The
following points reflect the importance of public relations with respect to the issue in concern:
 The public department concentrates on understanding the mindset of customer to draw
conclusions upon improving customer's level of satisfaction.
 As customers are the people who directly feel the level of accuracy of services offered,
public relation department is assigned with the responsibility of measuring the same and
bringing in required modifications and improvements(Newsom, Turk and Kruckeberg,
2012).
 Through the means of communication built by public relations to stay in constant contact
with stakeholders including employees and customers, the agency can get hold of even
the smallest issue that might be faced by majority of people and might be a factor
unnoticed by top executives, thereby affecting company's overall performance.
 If required modifications are made by the public department to improve the appearance
structure of the area as per the requirement of visitors, the agency will be able to build a
longer term relationship with its customers and thereby attract people from different
corners of the world to visit the place for spending quality movements of their life.

 The public relation department carries the importance task of connecting with the
customers through intermediaries such as investors, spokes person or stock analysts ,etc.
 The department holds importance in organization's structure as almost all of the
customers now believe interpreting company's image on account of performance of
public relations department. This ensures the customers that they will be served with
extra care by focusing on resolving their issues (Tench and Yeomans, 2009).
 The important information and details provided by the department helps aligning
activities performed by other functional departments by providing a common base to
work upon.
DIVERSITY OF PUBLIC:
The agency being a part of travel and tourism sector holds a complex structure of customers,
employees and stakeholders belonging to different culture following different ways of living.
The company has a wide collection of destinations to provide choice of selection to its visitors
thereby it welcomes people from different cultural background having differences with respect to
way of celebrating an occasion, different cuisines and different standards of enjoyment. The
company therefore needs to consider this varied features of behaviour of its customers as well as
its employees. For satisfying and providing high standard of enjoyment to its visitors, the
company has acquired personnels coming from different cultural backgrounds specially to ensure
quality assured meals that is prepared in the way to align with the needs of various customers.
More then 21 countries are members of this group, wherein a wide section of different cultural
needs are considered to promoter the overall performance of the agency. The task of managing
such cultural differences is very much complex and thus requires the support and involvement of
public relations department which mainly concentrates on understanding this wide group
(Mangold and Faulds, 2009).
The agency is viewed as a role model representing various other companies and agencies with
the idea of keeping a broad mindset for accepting various cultural diversities to enable the
company work for longer terms for serving people from different backgrounds. The diversity
concept accepted by the agency has provided the globe with the message of importance of unity
for representing the globe as a single village by uniting various country members.

B. AUDIT OF DESTINATION'S ENVIRONMENT:
For preparing a strategic plan for improving the environment of the destination and increasing
the quality standard of each of the services provided, it was required for the company to
undertake an audit. The audit concentrated mainly upon analysing the environment of the seaside
area mentioned here. Being a seaside location it was observed that the customers felt that the
communication system was weaker in the area. They had been facing the problem of connecting
with their near and dear ones as the location has poor technological up gradations. The
communicational connectivity even within the area was weak which led to series of issues being
faced by the visitors (Capriotti and Moreno, 2007). The area needs to be established by setting
up better accommodating facilities with features of providing extra comfort to the visitors.
Customer's frustration level seems to be increasing on account of lack of facilities provided by
the hotels and relaxation areas. They had been facing problem with respect to inadequate supply
of food and beverages. The spa treatment provided in the area by various hotels seemed to be not
meeting the criteria of customers leading them to have a bad experience as customers mainly
visit such place to enjoy peace and comfort. The environment can be made more pleasing and
attractive by improving the lightning of beachside especially to explore the evening beauty of
nature when the sun is all set to dissolve in the waters of the bay. This can provide a romantic
environment to the couples and a strong reason to spend the special movements of their life. The
environment must include designing sound systems for providing the customers with the
environment to organize evening or late night parties. As many of the company are realizing the
importance of providing a package of family trip to its employees to motivate their performance,
special schemes must be designed for the same. Also a trend has been observed wherein
companies have been taking their employees on beachside trips for a small break against there
routine schedule, the agency needs to modify the schemes and packages provided for same as
this could be very advantageous for expanding company's clientele base both including
professional as well as regular clients (Albareda, Lozano and Ys, 2007).
PREPARING A STRATEGIC PLAN:
It can be concluded here undoubtedly that the customers would not like to visit the place ever
again if there basic requirement of enjoying peace and comfort is not fulfilled. This section
therefore includes list of various objectives that the agency needs to include in framing of its
strategic plan. The list of objectives in context of above mentioned concerns are as followed:

 Aligning the standard of quality of services provided by various hotels in the area as
compared to those of other destination areas of the region.
 Using promotional techniques to promote the uniqueness of the area mentioned to attract
visitors from international basis (Heath, 2006).
 Building stronger customer relationship by using effective techniques of communication
to stay in contact touch with even those who had visited the area previously.
 Visitors from other member countries of the agency must also be contacted and provided
with the details of uniqueness of the beachside of the area.
 Bringing up new ideas with respect to increase the beach activities that provide
extraordinary enjoyment to its visitors.
 Establishing occasional environment in the area by creating a sense of festivity in the area
to introduce new experience with respect to enjoyment.
 Bringing uniqueness in every sector including sports activities carried out and different
food items providing different experience to the visitors that would make their trip a
unique one.
 The strategic plan must arrange for obtaining funds to invest in exploiting the benefits of
enlightening the appearance of beachside for enhancing the beauty of candy coloured
huts established on beachside shore.
 The strategic plan must include policies that not only promote specific area but also the
performance of all the member countries.
Each of the above mentioned objectives have been considered in preparation of a strategic plan
to improve the overall performance of the agency by uniting coordination from different member
countries. The plan includes framing of strategies that utilize maximum of promotional
techniques to promote the uniqueness of the destination such as list of aqua venture activities,
underwater diving to experience the world inside the bay for the major task of improving public
relations. Concentrating on providing unique services that enables the visitors to view how the
chefs prepare the meals so that they can enjoy viewing the same and provide various suggestions
with respect to their taste preferences. All of these activities carried out must be well advertised
in media to deliver a message inviting visitors from around the globe to experience the unknown.
Also the means of communication available such as various social media sites must be used to
attract the visitors to visit again by providing a flashback of their past experience (Mangold and

Faulds, 2009). Thus the various public relations activities and promotional campaign carried out
by the agency will surely increase the number of visits of travellers.
TASK 2
A. ANALYSING THE KEY MEDIA:
Social media has been selected to accomplish the objectives drawn to be attained by undertaking
a campaign. The campaign needs to be carried out to improve the company's relation with that of
its public. Public relationship includes strengthening the channel of communication with
employees, visitors and stakeholders. This role of enabling the company to be in regular contact
with various stakeholders can be done by using latest means of communication. One of them
used here is social media. Social media has provided a list of various ways that involve use of
latest technological means. With globalisation and technological advancement, people are
influenced on a large scale to exploit the benefits of social media. The social media is an new
element of promotional mix followed by the company.
RELATIONSHIP WITH THE MEDIA:
The relationship between social media and the public relationship department can be observed to
be very strong and direct. The agency must be welcoming the suggestions and feedbacks on
every single activity carried out. This will enable the company to bring in required improvements
in the procedure of delivering particular service. The agency can display each of the activities
and services rendered on social media sites. This has attracted visitors from various cultural
backgrounds to be influenced to visit the same.
B.APPROPRIATENESS OF THE MEDIA:
The importance of using social media for promoting the brand image of the agency has
been a well known fact. As the agency is wishing and planning to attract huge visitor's place for
making the destination as a centre of attraction of tourist ,the company must frame strategies that
enables the agency to communicate the visitor with each of the information about latest updates.
Foreign clientele base have been increasing day by day on account of influential promotional
techniques followed by the agency (McCartney, Butler and Bennett, 2008).

TASK 3
A.EFFECTIVENESS OF PUBLIC RELATION CAMPAIGN:
The public relation campaign have been carried out with the objective of increasing the clientele
base on transnational as well as international basis by carrying out various activities to advertise
company's unique set of services provided (Jain and Saxena, 2011). The effectiveness of the
campaign can be concluded from following:
 The campaign includes contributing to sponsor various charitable events and thereby
promote agency's image.
 The campaign might include arranging for annual meetings that will enable the company
to gather the points on areas that require improvements which would promote the overall
performance of organization.
 The campaign might include arranging for special training programmes for developing
skills and overall personality of employees.
 The campaign must include a series of activities that includes taking part in various
advertising events as done by other competitors in the industry.
 The campaign must include framing plans that promote the participation of organization
in various promotional events organized by various similar agencies to boost up entire
travel and tourism sector.
 The campaign must be able to illustrate various people about the benefits of travelling .
 The campaign must focus on promoting every individual services related to food
department, accommodation department, travelling department , etc. then only the
campaign will be a successful one.
ACTION PLAN: Following strategies must be framed:
 Strategies for Inviting Investments: An strategic plan must be formulated such that the
organization can arrange for obtaining maximum number of funds by providing the
stakeholders with lots of opportunities for investing in shares of organization.
 Strategies for developing skills of employees: The strategies must focus upon specially
developing personality and providing training on latest innovations , so that they can
perform better (Robinson, 2006).
 Strategies must be framed for obtaining required funds for advertising.

 Strategies must be framed which enables the top executives to design plans that
coordinate company's activities with that of other similar agencies.
 Strategies must enable to design plans that can influence people to celebrate their special
occasional and festive functions on beachside to enjoy the extreme peace and happiness.
 Strategies must be framed so that the agency is able to design various schemes to extend
the base of customer's satisfaction (Mangold and Faulds, 2009).
CONCLUSION
It can be concluded here that the report presented above clearly highlights the importance of
effective communication within the company as well as with its customers. Visitors may be
current or potential. Each of them must be constantly updated with the creative activities and
campaigns carried out by the agency that will promote the brand image of the company. Public
relation department of Southwold has been observed to be delivering weaker services on account
of ineffective communicational techniques applied. People is an important part of every
organization including its employees as well as its visitors and travellers. Keeping a constant
touch with them will thus benefit the organization tremendously by bringing in modifications
upon suggestions and feedbacks obtained-this is all what is managed by the public relations
department. The report has therefore well illustrated the importance of carrying out a public
relation campaign to promote various services provide specially to those who are unaware of the
peace delivered by spending vacations at a beachside. Thus public relation has been observed to
depend upon directly on promotional activities carried out (Hughes and Fill, 2007).

REFERENCES
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The Promotional Mix: Target Markets, Buying Decisions & More