Discuss about the significance of public relation and PR activities in order to promote the brand.
In present scenario, promotion of any brand is a must for achieving strong customer base and adequate sales of the products. The companies are going global and having continuous expansions in the foreign markets thus it is essential for the companies to have strong global presence and brand recognition (Gupta and Singh, 2013). In this report, the key emphasis is on the public relation (PR) activities and how Samsung take use of the PR activities to promote its brand. Advertising and Public Relations are the two most important and key communication activities for the company for conveying the messages and informing the customers for attaining desired objectives and goals. While public relations comprise the maintenance and development of a positive image of the company and advertising promotes the sales of the company. The paper will provide an in-depth analysis of the ways Samsung promotes its brand and the importance of Public relation in the promotion of the company.
Samsung has one of the most renowned and largest electronic manufacturer organisations. It is a South Korean organisation which specializes in the system integration, computer memory, semi-conductors, media and the digital appliances. The company has gained and acquired a number of milestones throughout its long journey comprising expansions, product lines, public relations, marketing, global business operations and market share. Samsung was established in the year 1938 with the efforts of Lee Byung-chull who grounded the company in Korea named Samsung Sanghoe as a trading company. Samsung had its establishment in the electronic industry in the year 1969 and from there the company keeps on expanding itself in number of overseas countries in various industries (Samsungsem, 2018).
Samsung has always been one of those companies which have been recognized across the globe with strong brand visibility due its huge advertising, promotions, marketing, campaigns and other media appearances. There has been taken use of both the traditional as well as the online media by the company. in earlier times, when there was less introduction of online media, Samsung maintained its global presence through the traditional media sources and with the continuous technological innovations and advancements, Samsung had also gained enormous global presence through its presence on online media. The electronic market has flooded with latest and innovative technological products. There are a number of companies who are offering technologically advanced electronic products at somewhat reasonable prices but still there are customer base which have their reliable association with Samsung as their most preferred brand (Mangold and Faulds, 2009). In the case of Samsung, there is a major role of experience as well as the brand value and reputation. Samsung holds a long history in the electronic industry and is much aware of the increasing and diversifying needs of the consumers. Thus, with all the launches Samsung comes up with strong presence on the online media channels and robust marketing. Online media is considered as one of the most vital and significant part of the marketing strategy of Samsung. The company has huge presence on various online and social media channels such as Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and various other platforms (Manorek, 2016).
Samsung has taken use of Facebook as one of the strongest online media as no other online media can match the current momentum of Facebook as well as the extensive global customer base of the media. Facebook support the global visibility of Samsung through its extensive range of social applications and being the marker leader in the various online Medias. Facebook holds the rank of largest social networking site which have billions of users across the globe. Samsung took use of Facebook as the online media tool for its strong advertisements, marketing and developing robust public relations with the individuals and the potential customers (Sadat Hosseini and Mehrara, 2015).
With more than one billion users on Facebook, there has been a great opportunity for Samsung to become one of the highly globalized brands on Facebook. Presently, Samsung has around 70 million of followers on it Facebook page and this shows the brand recognition and visibility of Facebook through Facebook as an online media. Facebook had offered an opportunity to the company for reaching its potential customers from across the globe. Samsung had realized the value of brand marketing and promotion through online media and particularly Facebook. The company had marked its footprints in the global electronic market with the help of the online media channels and on a continuous basis there are several marketing campaigns carried out by Samsung by taking use of the innovative features of Facebook and other online media sources. The strong and effective sue of online media help Samsung in building a robust engagement with the present and the potential customers across the world (Pandowo and Makalew, n.d.). Facebook is considered as a platform for Samsung which satisfy the needs of the company in having a conversation and strong association with the customers. It offers a transparent as well as an open circumstance where there is sound flow of information among the company and the customers with no kind of barriers in between. Samsung has been benefitted in number of ways by taking sue of Facebook as one of the online media channels. Facebook have offered an excellent environment to Samsung for building its brand in various overseas nations and as a result of this Samsung had strong marketing capabilities. The company had also developed a platform for building interactions with the existing and the potential customers and receiving valuable customer views. Through the use of online media, the search engine ranking of Samsung had become higher and now it is on the top of the list of the search engines in respect with the electronic industry (Jose, 2014).
Samsung had not only gained higher brand visibility as an electronic supplier but it had also made the company visible in terms of a global recruiter. The Facebook page of Samsung is also a recruitment tool for the organisation as the company posts the vacancy positions on it so that higher number of potential candidates can apply for it. Samsung builds its association with its customers through getting feedbacks from its customers on its Facebook page and become the voice of its customers which not only help the company in publicizing itself but also recognizing its global recognition from time to time (Manoa, 2014). In respect with employee communication facilitation, knowledge sharing and interaction, Facebook had supported Samsung and had become a central hub for it. With the help of the online media, Samsung can effectively market its products as well as build its brand image in the online market. It had become possible for the company to reach huge number of customers in particularly one region, even across the globe. By subscribing the page of Facebook, the company remains successful in offering the latest info regarding the products and the organisation to its customers which also help Samsung in enhancing its sales as well as brand visibility. Whenever Samsung released its products in the market, there are launched several promotional activities, campaigns and other various things to attract the customers. With the help of the Facebook page, the customers get to know about all these information regarding the promotional activities and helped the company gained strong presence of the potential users and customers which ultimately also help in enhancing then overall sales and revenues of the company along with the brand visibility (Yektan, Nayebzadeh and Rabbani, 2014).
Samsung had taken vast sue of the other online media such as Twitter and YouTube such as with every new launch or the product of the company, there are videos posted on YouTube in order to make the customer informed of the products and have a detailed view of those products. There are video recommendation which the customers can see and analyze the products where a comparison is also made with its various competitive products. Thus, YouTube offers that platform to the company where the customers can analyze and decide whether they have to make a purchase or not. Similarly on Twitter, the customers post their reviews and also had a discussion over the products of the company which offers a sense of brand visibility to the company and also promote Samsung in number of ways (Greer and Ferguson, 2011).
Advertising as a promotional strategy is a paid form of promotion which comprises of promotion of the products and ideas and the impersonal presentation of the goods and services. The objectives of advertising are categorized on the basis of few factors such as what is to be informed and to whom it is to be informed. Advertising helps in creating an image for the company and the product for the purpose of boosting the sales (Davis, 2013). Advertising can also be introduced as a communication tool to have communication with the individuals in order to persuade them and demonstrates the strengths of the product and enhance the sales for it. In terms of the capital requirements, there is a need of huge capital and budget for effective television advertisements whereas there is other advertisement modes also which are comparatively cheaper and require low budget. The advertisement as a promotional strategy comprises of tools such as audio-visual materials, posters, display of logos, billboards, leaflets, brochures, films and advertisements broadcast or printed on radio or television (Smith, 2013).
Public relations can be understand as building of good relations and association with the public through managing events and news, reducing rumors, imposing a favorable image and obtaining favorable publicity. Public relations can also be introduced as a communication tool to have communication with the individuals and the company as it supports the organisational managers to get knowledge of the attitudes of the individuals and help in making decisions as well as it also help the individuals in understanding the organisations and developing a sense of reliability for them (Kitchen and Burgmann, 2010). There is a huge impact of public relations because of a number of afctors such as public relations holds a high degree of credibility as in comparison with the various advertisements displayed, the reports and the news offered in public relation is more credible (Manzur, et al., 2011). The second major factor which impacts the visibility of the organisations is lack of public reticence as in public relations the messages are in the form of news when they are reached to the potential audiences as like advertisements the PR activities are not strictly interested in the communications for the purpose of sales of the product. Presently the companies are taking use of public relations in almost in all its activities, events, campaigns, political and social moments and in various other actions (Terpstra, Foley and Sarathy, 2012).
Public relations is usually a tough and complex area of marketing which requires high level of expertise as there is a need to respond adequately to the desires of individuals and maintaining sound association with the public as a company (Ashworth and Kavaratzis, 2010). The key task of the PR department of an organisation is to have an effective internal as well as the external communications. The external communication comprises of a diverse set of public events of the company that may include the exhibitions, association with the media, videos, photos, audio-visuals, public opinion campaigns, promotion, direct communication, films, DVDs, public affairs, fundraising, crisis management, openings, cocktail parties, organizing event launches, press reviews and service reviews. On the other hand, the internal communication comprises of addressing to the internal audiences, members of the company, shareholders and employees with the help of the welcome program, closed network news and publication (Heath, 2013).
Samsung being one of the most recognized and a historical brand has taken use of both the advertising and PR for promoting the brand. In earlier phase of establishment and growth, Samsung take extensive and robust use of the advertising. Samsung had taken use of various advertising channels and method for promoting the brand such as follows:
Samsung had taken much use of online advertising as its promotional strategy for having global promotion of the brand. The company had taken use of various social media sites and online platforms for selling the product, offering information to the potential buyers and also for making the people aware of the brand and its continuous activities. The online advertisements are one of the strongest promotional tools of Samsung which the company utilizes and keep the customers updated. For example the online advertising includes videos on YouTube which contains the information regarding any new product launch, its reviews and various other related thongs (Wambui, 2013).
To promote the brand globally Samsung also take great use of the mobile advertising such as the company has launched a number of applications which can be used through mobile as they are mobile applications based upon diverse things. For example there are mobile applications of Samsung such as Samsung Internet Browser, Samsung Health, Samsung Smart Switch Mobile, Samsung connect, etc. All these and other various mobile applications not only enhance the customer base of the company but also effectively promote the brand on various grounds. With the help of these mobile applications, Samsung also upsurge its revenues and gained an extensive market share (Yektan, Nayebzadeh and Rabbani, 2014).
Samsung has also taken use of the print media advertising in an extensive manner which comprises of periodical advertising, direct mail advertising and advertising through handouts, newspaper, brochures, etc. Samsung had taken use of all such print media advertising in a great manner. There are several magazines which comprises of advertisements of the several products of Amazon. In the newspaper, the company gives advertisements of the products fir increasing the sales. Even the company also takes use of direct mail advertising by sending the information to the potential customers through direct mails. Thus, it can be said that the company had use the print advertising effectively (Manoa, 2014).
Samsung had taken significant sue of Guerilla advertising as one of its prominent advertising tool where the company invites its customers to have their participation in the various activities so that there can be increased level of interaction. There are two major factors in it i.e. location and the timing. For example, there are number of times when Samsung perform such activities where there are chances with the individuals to win a mobile or notepad, etc. The key aim of the company for taking use of Guerilla advertising is to have word of mouth publicity through the social media (Jose, 2014).
This is one of the advertising which Samsung had used to achieve maximum growth and global visibility. The company takes use of television advertisements to have broadcast of the advertisements of various products of it as it is one of the most significant ways to reach the highest number of potential customer and masses (Hanafizadeh, 2012). Whenever any product is launched, the television broadcast advertising is the most dominant way to advertise and make the people aware of the product. Samsung had a creative marketing team which helps the company in developing ideas and innovative advertisements to fetch the attention of the potential customers and enhance the sales.
From last few decades, there has been gained huge significance and importance by the PR activities as the promotional tool for the big companies (Manorek, Pangemanan and Rumokoy, 2016). In case of Samsung, the company had gained enormous success and brand promotions through its robust PR activities. Following are the PR activities undertaken by Samsung in order to promote its brand across the globe:
in the PR activities of Samsung, the corporate sponsorships are the key media or advertising form which offers immense level of global recognition and brand visibility to the company. Samsung is offering huge support to a number of events or a cause which can support the development of the societies across the world in order to gain an opportunity to increase the sales, brand and product image and goodwill of the company (Taylor, 2014). There are several PR activities done by Samsung under the head of corporate sponsorship which are still continued to be performed by the company. The one of the PR activities to promote the brand of Samsung is the Samsung Sports which is a multi-sport club of Samsung established in South Korea. With the support of this club, the company enhances its global recognition as there are own sports team created by Samsung where there are a number of games comprising the professional as well as amateur sports. Samsung Electronic Australia had a corporate sponsorship with Sydney Opera House where the company offers its support for ensuring that there can be an innovative and technologically advanced environment for the visitors (Samsung, 2018). Another corporate sponsorship through which the company perform its PR activities includes the Samsung Foundation as it is the one which offers high-end support to the communities, masses and the events so that there can be gained strong brand value and recognition across the world (Keller, Parameswaran and Jacob, 2011).
The external communication is another major factor of the PR activities of Samsung where the company promotes its brand through a number of things such as posters, newsletters, brochures, emails and the uncontrolled messages in the mass media. With the help of the external communication Samsung portrays its brand image on several platforms and try to gather attention of the masses (Pandowo and Makalew, n.d.) For example, there are newsletters published by the company which have a short description of various activities performed by Samsung across the globe. The key aim behind the publishing of such newsletter is to make the people aware of the various initiatives taken by the company in order to benefit the society. All such external communication activities help the company in fetching the attention of the masses as well as also influence them to get associated with the brand and its products.
(Source: Pinterest, 2018)
the external communication also help in gaining publicity and promoting sales of the company, announcing events, support branding and generating sponsorships (Van Scheers and Prinsloo, 2014).
The internal communication is another strong way of Samsung for the promotion of the brand and gain publicity at global regions. Through the internal communications, Samsung forward or disseminated planned messages to its employees and other shareholders and partners through various communication channels such as newsletters, payroll stuffers, posters, etc. It is one of the key ways to engage the employees of the company and gain worldwide publicity. The Samsung Global Strategy Group has its focus on the corporate development by ensuring that there is a great development of the employees too. All such PR activities help the company in achieving string brand visibility in terms of employer branding and thus a stronger brand image is formed (Sadat Hosseini and Mehrara, 2015).
The campaigns and the events are the key opportunities for Samsung to gain business exposure, attain brand visibility, and promote the sales of the products and reaching to the target customers. The campaigns and the events are one of the best ways to perform PR activities and to gain strong brand visibility at international levels (Tiago and Veríssimo, 2014). These events hold by Samsung not only enhances the brand reliability but also help the in building the confidence of the customer on the brand. there are a number of events and campaigns which are performed by Samsung in various and different regions of the world. For example, as a PR activity, Samsung promotes its brand through an event or an initiative named ‘The Samsung Smart Class’. In such event, the company provided the students with modern learning by the means of offering tablets, printer, interactive smart board and various other devices to them. Such an initiative or event not only enhances the corporate image of the company but also supported in building customer confidence as a reliable brand (Jose, 2014).
(Source: Samsung, 2018)
There are various other activities, events and campaigns too which supports the PR activities of the company and offer a number of sequential benefits in promoting the brand of Samsung. The events and the campaigns are usually in respect with the development and the societies and the general masses so that there can be performed both corporate sponsorship as well as attaining the brand visibility (Jose, 2014).
With the help of the social media, Samsung perform a number of PR activities which go direct to the customers without the involvement of the media. There are number of Social media sites used by the company which comprises of Twitter and Facebook. There are individuals, journalists and media who followed these social media channels of the company which help Samsung to drive web traffic. Samsung perform its PR activities by having a direct communication with the customers and by managing their issues by giving a quick response to all the negative perception and criticism. This helps Samsung in enhancing the exposure of the brand and visibility across the globe (Papasolomou and Melanthiou, 2012).
The companies take use of both the advertisements as well as the public relations in order to promote the brand and gain global brand recognition. Samsung is also taking effective use of advertisements as well as PR in the promotion of its products and its brand. Advertising and Public Relations are the two most important and key communication activities for the company for conveying the messages and informing the customers for attaining desired objectives and goals. While public relations comprises the maintenance and development of a positive image of the company in order to provide consistent and constant communication with the various stakeholders, advertising possess an objective to develop sales by keeping the customers informed regarding the products of the company (Malik, et al., 2013). Building up of strong and good association with the strategic publics requires the public relation practitioners to remain strategic communication managers instead of just the communication technicians. Whereas on the other hand, advertising is a form of non-personal communication which is usually paid and is also persuasive in respect with the products (Armstrong, et al., 2014).
From the overall discussion and analysis, it can be said that the public relation sis one of the promotional tool which is currently more effective. The key reason behind its being more effective is that in present scenario there is a need to persuade the people with more reliable and accurate information rather than just planned advertisements. Public relation not only help in promoting the brand but also helps in building a favorable image for the company as well as winning the goodwill of a brand (Moriarty, et al., 2014). Through PR activities a large group of people can be addressed that includes customers, distributors, financial partners, stakeholders / employees, members, the community, and also the leaders. Thus, it can be said that the companies must have their key emphasis on the public relation activities in order to achieve higher brand visibility and global recognition (Hackley and Hackley, 2017).
Conclusion
From this report it can be concluded that the companies take use of both the advertisements as well as the public relations in order to promote the brand. From the overall analysis and the discussion it can be concluded that Samsung is also taking effective use of advertisements as well as PR in the promotion of its products and its brand. It can be stated that advertising and Public Relations are the two most important and key communication activities for the company for conveying the messages and informing the customers for attaining desired objectives and goals. The companies need both the tools for having strong promotions and brand visibility across the world. With the changing consumer needs and the dynamic business environment, Public relations activities are considered as more effective in offering benefits to eth business in the promotion and marketing.
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