Knowing The Difference Between Marketing and Advertising

Any online business will surely get a taste of success with the right Internet marketing and advertising tactics.

By Valerie Parson

Advertising and marketing are two different words with two different meanings, but more often than not, they are used interchangeably. For a person who has a limited background on Internet marketing or even on marketing alone, the two words can be connoted as one and may even be understood as two words with no difference at all. If you want your business to be on the right track, you need to differentiate one from the other.

What Is Advertising?
Advertising is a common yet effective way to market a particular product or service. It is one of the essential aspects of marketing wherein a sponsor pays the services of an advertising firm just to promote or popularize his product or service to reach as many target clients as possible. The advertisers simply endorse the product for mere purposes of endorsing the product and is no longer concerned of its outcome or if it would gain the intended sales and profit of the sponsor for as long as it was able to deliver its advertising job. Advertising can have the following medium:
* Direct mail
* Newspapers and broadsheets
* By using billboards
* Internet
* Radio
* Through the television

What Marketing Is
Marketing is looking at a particular business on a larger scale. Marketing largely focuses on strategies in making a particular business a successful one. It involves various aspects that operates independently but has to work together with the other marketing elements to achieve a wider and a much bigger goal. The usual marketing goal is to determine which product or services is suitable to particular target clients, what strategies can be effective, and how the company would develop and grow through these strategies. Some of the most essential elements of an effective marketing involve any of the following:
* Advertising
* Customer satisfaction support
* Sales strategies
* Product and service pricing
* Market research
* Economic analysis
* Distribution of products
* Public relations
* Involvement of community
* Media planning strategies

Applications of Marketing and Advertising
Marketing and advertising are both useful in making a particular business a hit among its intended clients and the public. In general, a business cannot, in one way or the other, survive without the two. By mere smiling or saying “good morning” to a customer is already a marketing strategy, while a mere mentioning of a product in a social gathering can be a form of advertising. In essence, marketing and advertising can be applied anywhere at any given time as long as there is a need to sell a product or patronize a service. One of the most in-demand forms of marketing nowadays is the so-called Internet marketing where all the benefits of Internet technology are applied to come up with an effective advertising and a successful marketing process. Some of the benefits of Internet marketing include the following:
* Provides immediate response for product concerns
* Fast exchange of communication between clients and service provider
* Convenient and hassle-free commercial transaction for both parties
* Inexpensive access to products
* It provides measurable outcomes and outputs.
* Traditional working hours are not followed.

If you plan to succeed in your online business, having a good grasp of Internet marketing and knowing the difference between advertising and marketing will give you a healthy jump-start. Know how your business can get ahead with the tough competition online.