ADVERTISING’S DEPARTMENT IN AN ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE

Advertising is a function of marketing and it works in the market for bigger sales of the product. When a firm or institution decides to launch an advertising campaign or programme, it needs to have a system and an organization to implement it for the achievement of the desired objectives. Therefore large firms and institutions have an advertising department to manage the advertising function. In small firms, there may not be a separate department of advertising but the function of advertising is looked after by a responsible person or chief executive of the firm. The advertising department usually depends on outside experts, often the advertising agency which prepares the advertisements, selects appropriate media and arranges to release them. This department is responsible for the advertisement budget and supervises the performance of the agency.

An advertising manager has to coordinate with the marketing and sales function so that the advertising efforts may be fully integrated with the firms marketing and sales strategy. He is responsible  for the overall planning of the advertising programme, including such decisions as to which products to advertise, which markets to be reached and whether to employ an outside agency. The manger also maintain this programme within the financial and public relations guide lines set down by corporate management.

Most of the firms hire an advertising agency for their advertising programme. In this situation the firm’s advertising manager serves as the liaison person operating between the corporation and the advertising agency. He makes certain that the execution of the programme, which is the responsibility of the agency is carried out within company policy. If it is believed that the agency is not doing good work, a change of agency may be recommended to the management of the company.

The structure of the advertising department is based upon two major patterns. One is the “functional” pattern in which the advertising department is divided into manageable sub-functions such as ad creation, media selection, advertising research etc. In another form of functional pattern there may be subordinates for each of the functions of sales promotion, public relations, trade advertising and mass media consumer advertising. This pattern results in specialization which is a major advantage because specialized efforts lead to creativity.

The second pattern assigns the advertising responsibility to various production or product categories. The basic idea behind the “advertising by products” is that the product manager having particular knowledge about the product is in a very crucial position for the marketing activities pertaining to the product, including advertising. The basic responsibilities of the product manager include decisions regarding advertising strategies needed to obtain advertising objectives, advertisement creativity, media selection decisions and the management and control of advertising budgets.

In addition to these two basic advertising patterns, the advertising tasks could also be divided along geographical lines or the customer pattern. In division along geographical lines, each geographical territory or sales division has its own responsibility for regional advertising. A local advertising specialist is necessary in this pattern. This pattern is more appropriate when there are important and distinguishable geographic differences in consumer characteristics or product usage. Is importance is specially highlighted in the field of international marketing of product.

The customer pattern describes a separate advertising sub-section of different types of customers served. For example the industrial customers need a different approach than the consumer. A marble industry may have one department handling the needs of construction material while the other advertising department for handling marble furniture and decoration pieces.

The relation between an advertising department and an advertising agency is very close. Almost all the advertising departments of government institutions and private firms depend on advertising agencies for creating advertisements and launching advertising campaigns. The agencies also need the cooperation of advertising departments for the promotion of their business. Hence a good advertising is a joint venture of an advertising department and an advertising agency.

Radio , Television and the newspapers have also a department of advertising in their offices. The function of this department is to collect and receive different advertisements from the agencies, departments and individuals.