Robyn Blakeman's Integrated Marketing Communication offers a classroom-tested, step-by-step approach that lays out creative processes and strategies for effective IMC, as well as how traditional advertising and marketing principles are changing. Blakeman covers key areas, from marketing plans, branding and positioning, and creative briefs to copywriting, design, and considerations for each major media format. She also looks at visual and verbal tactics, along with the use of business theory and practices—and how these affect the development of the creative message.
IMC trends require students to become well-rounded professionals, understanding not only advertising but also marketing, public relations, sales promotion, and direct marketing. This student-friendly text walks students through these areas and helps them develop their skills in taking a creative idea and employing the correct message, placing it in the most appropriate media, and using the most effective communications approaches.
This book covers all the various marketing and advertising methods from radio to social media and even alternative and guerilla marketing. While comprehensive, the book was also very repetitive (each chapter seemed to need to reiterate the need to highlight the key consumer benefit) and lacked insights. There were some helpful examples to understand what methods fell under which categories, but I kind of expected more of a conversation about how to develop a cohesive, cross-media strategy. I'm not sure what that would entail, exactly, but something more than descriptions of how cheap radio ads are to produce or the reach of social media. I don't know that I felt like I learned a ton, but for those completely new to marketing, it's not a bad place to start. Even then, I don't think this book, nor the course I took while reading it, helped prepare me any better for planning, deploying, and/or analyzing integrated marketing campaigns.
Didn’t love it, didn’t hate it. This book provides a general overview of marketing communication channels, plans, and ways to work it into any organization.