Marketing and Advertising are used interchangeably across industries, particularly in small business. It’s not like SMB owners don’t care about one or the other, it’s that they can’t always take the time to care, the job just has to get done. Understanding the inherent differences between Marketing and Advertising will help you fine tune your campaigns, problem solve failures, and understand why it’s impossible to press a button and launch an effective advertising campaign.
If Marketing is a social science, Advertising is a study. Social science studies human behaviour. Academic fields of social science study include economics, geography, sociology, and social psychology – to name a few. When you’re in charge or the marketing department, you care deeply about customers’ spending habits, proximity to the product or service, how they interact with the company and spread word about products they like, what forms of advertising attract them, and what you as a business can do to close a sale. So, you care about economics, geography…you get the picture. You design an advertising campaign to test theories in all of those areas you’ve been studying. Then you record your findings, go back over it and other historical data, research new findings from other marketers, choose another hypothesis, and design a new advertising campaign.
Yeah, but you knew that was how it worked. Why care about the labels? If you go order a coffee, you give the server a little more information than that, right? You have to know what you 
want and how to ask for it (Marketing) before you can specifically ask customers to do what you want them to (Advertising). If you don’t have at least some knowledge of the working parts it makes Googling the latest trends or understanding your analytics a nightmare. Oh dear, is that the competition coming up behind you?! You bet it is!
Here is a short glossary of terms likely to come up in your research to keep handy.
Useful Marketing Vocabulary
Analytics: The results of your online campaigns including click-throughs and demographics.
Competitor Analysis: A study of your competitor marketing and advertising strategies, among other factors.
Target Market: The specific group of people you are aiming to attract. This should be as detailed as possible in order to design a successful campaign.
SEO: Search Engine Optimization, which is how easily things (website, articles, or ads) are found on search engines thanks to specific mechanisms like keywords and following search-engine-specific protocols.
Useful Advertising Vocabulary
Campaign: A specified run of marketing materials collectively designed to generate the same outcome. E.g. Your Boxing Week sale advertising is 1 campaign. Your food bank donation drive is another.
ROI: Return On Investment, which includes profits, overall reach, click-throughs, and fostered relationships.
Click-through rate: The amount of times someone clicked on a link you provided on your website or in social media.
Copy: The words in your advertising materials.
Impressions: The amount of times an online component was viewed by users.
Jelly Triangle can help you finesse your marketing strategy and design impactful advertising campaigns. Call us to book a conversation today at 519-624-8888.
