What Are Marketing Campaigns? Definition, Types, and Examples

What Is a Marketing Campaign?

Marketing campaigns promote products through different types of media, such as television, radio, print, and online platforms. Campaigns are not solely reliant on advertising and can include demonstrations, video conferencing, and other interactive techniques. Businesses operating in highly competitive markets and franchisees may initiate frequent marketing campaigns and devote significant resources to generating brand awareness and sales.

Understanding Marketing Campaigns

Marketing campaigns can be designed with different goals in mind, including building a brand image, introducing a new product, increasing sales of a product already on the market, or even reducing the impact of negative news. Defining a campaign's goal usually dictates how much marketing is needed and what media are most effective for reaching a specific segment of the population.

Types of Marketing Campaign Activities

There are many ways to market products and services to customers, from mailing brochures to coordinating a social media blitz. Small companies can email invitations to a special sale and offer a free product to every customer who brings the invitation. Larger companies can use paid advertising and professional agencies to reach a wider audience.

Whatever the size of the company, it's important that someone is dedicated to handling the influx of traffic a marketing campaign generates. If you are prompting customers to sign up for your email list, you must make sure that the list is managed well and that new customers receive welcoming messages. If visits to your website increase, you must continually update your content to convert this traffic to profitable sales.

Companies that lose sales due to major negative press often use marketing campaigns to rehabilitate their image. One example is Chipotle Mexican Grill, which was investigated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention after dozens of customers became sick in 2015 from food safety issues related to E. coli and norovirus. Chipotle's sales dropped 30% in the first quarter of 2016, and to regain customer interest, the company offered coupons for free food via direct mail and texts. Chipotle also used online video to announce a $10 million grant to support local farmers.

Examples of Successful Marketing Campaigns

The long-running Aflac duck campaign is one example of a campaign that significantly raised brand recognition. The company's brand-recognition rate was just 12% when it launched the campaign in 2000, and more than a decade of advertising boosted recognition to 90%.

Lay's launched its first "Do Us a Flavor" campaign in 2012, asking customers to suggest new potato-chip flavors through texts and social media. The company's sales increased 12%, and its volume of social media followers tripled.