Continue "Change for Good"

Social communications field has been rapidly changing over the last few years. It has evolved from a one-dimensional reliance on public service announcements to a more sophisticated approach which draws from successful techniques used by commercial marketers, termed "social marketing”. Rather than dictating the way that information is to be conveyed from the top-down, public professionals are learning to listen to the needs and desires of the target audience themselves, and building the program from there. This focus on the "consumer" involves in-depth research and constant re-evaluation of every aspect of the program. In fact, research and evaluation together form the very cornerstone of the social marketing process.

Like commercial marketing, the primary focus is on the consumer in learning what people want and need rather than trying to persuade them to buy what we happen to be producing. Marketing talks to the consumer, not about the product. The planning process takes this consumer focus into account by addressing the elements of the "marketing mix”. We call them the "Four Ps" of marketing.  

1) The conception of a "Product"
2) "Price"
3) Distribution "Place"
4) "Promotion"