We use promotion to inform customers about a product, or business(espacially when new or changed), to keep a business ahead of its competitors, to create or change the image of a business and to maintain or increase sales. These aims will be used as necessary by a business, though they all try to keep sales at a level which is satisfactory for the business. As a business develops, the emphasis of promotion will change. For example when Sega first introduced its games consoles into Britain, its promotion was aimed at making people aware of the name ‘Sega’, which at that time was unknown. As the name began to be accepted, the emphasis of promotion switched to the products it was selling, such as Dreamcast.

It must be remembered that even the best-known companies and their products still need promotion. For example Nestle continue to promote products such as Kit Kat even though they are market leaders. This is simply aimed at maintaining the product as al leading chocolate product.

The different types of promotion are sales promotion which is where a business will part on certain offers (such as buy one get one free) to get customers to buy from their shop. The advantages of sales promotion are you get alot of customers coming to buy your cheaper merchandise, and this will build up your repuation. The disadvantage of sales promotion are that you may be selling off your merchandise too cheaply and not making a profit they might get used to the offers and many think its too expensive now. Public relations are when a business deals with influencing public opinion, through the presentation of a client’s image, message, or product.

The advantages of Public relations are the public will get to know about you personally and you will get alot of information about your customers. The disadvantages of Public relation are that it will take alot of time to issue and it may be quite expensive. Sponsorship is when you try to get your business known by paying a big franchise to broadcast your name under theres for example Thomas Cook and Rbk are paying Man City to sponsor them and wear there name on there shirts. The advantages of this is that your business name will get shown around which will raise your reputation.

The disadvantages are that even though your business name is being shown there isn’t any information given about it so customers won’t know the service or products you sell unless you have an obvious name such as PC World or Sofa World. Advertising is when you broadcast your business using media instead of other businesses or franchises such as an advert on the radio or televison. The advantages are that your business will broadcasted to many people and alot of information will be given about your business such as locations, numbers and e-mail adresses. The disadvantage are that it is very expensive to advertise and you may not get the money back to pay the loss you have just payed out advertising.

The methods I am using are Sales promotion and Advertising. I have chose these methods because at first I will need to sell alot of stock to keep my business survivng at too make some profit. Then I will be using cheaper versions of advertising such as billboards or newspapers to start off with. I think this would be best for my business because its going to be a small business for quite a long time. I haven’t chosen Public relations beacause it doesn’t promote your business to a wide range off people and it takes alot of time, I haven’t chose sponsorship because as I am running a small business at first people won’t get information about my location and contact numbers etc.