As far as possible, the Shared Story Toolkit avoids using marketing jargon.
However, there are certain technical words and phrases you’re bound to come across when you’re thinking, reading or talking about marketing – here are some of the most common.
Above-the-Line
Conventional promotions using the mass media (TV, radio, cinema, newspapers, magazines, outdoor, internet) to promote products, services and brands. Basically, advertising.
Advertorial
A type of display advertising where instead of placing a conventional ad, you fill the space with copy – adver(tising) + (edi)torial. In order to show readers that it isn’t editorial, the publication will insist you use a different typeface, and you’ll usually have to head it up ‘Advertising Feature’ or similar.
Below-the-line (BTL)
Direct communication with customers, using any and all means, and often requiring a response. Usually this means direct mail (including e-shots), but BTL also encompasses the full gamut of PR, sponsorship, price promotions, special offers etc.
Brief
Background information, guidance and instructions for a piece of design or creative work.
Copy
General term for words in advertising, journalism and PR.
CRM
Customer Relationship Management – in the corporate world, the use of IT to manage processes where the business and its customers come into contact.
Database
A piece of software for storing, searching, organising and retrieving information on a computer. Also refers to the body of data itself.
Direct mail
A promotional item posted to a named individual. Known to the rest of society, not always fairly, as junk mail.
Domain
The ‘name’ of a website. Every website has a numerical IP, or internet protocol, address, but these are extremely hard for people to remember. Instead, we use text-based names: when you type in a web address, the internet’s Domain Name Servers (DNS) look up the site’s IP address and make the connection for you.
Editorial
Everything in a publication that isn’t advertising.
Features list
A magazine or other periodical’s planned features for the coming year.
Home page
The ‘front door’ of a website – generally the first page to open when you type in a website address or URL.
HTML
Hypertext Markup Language. A computer language that tells a web browser how to format a web page or email. HTML commands, or tags, are used to determine fonts, point sizes, colours, text positions and so on.
ISP
Internet Service Provider – the people who connect you to the internet and, usually, also provide your email service.
Metatags
Keywords embedded in your website content to make it easier for search engines to find it.
Mono
Printing term for black-and-white (from ‘monochrome’).
PR
Public relations – umbrella term for a wide range of activities designed to present your business in a positive light and develop closer relationships with customers.
Rate card
A publication’s list of standard advertising charges. It will usually be sent out with lots of other information (readership statistics, features list and so on) in a media pack.
Search engine
A specialised website that helps you look for information on the internet using keywords. Google, Bing, Yahoo! and MSN, of which Google is by far the biggest, are the most popular search engines worldwide.
Segmentation
Dividing a market according to precisely-defined social, economic and other criteria.
Stock
What printers call paper.
Target audience
Who your product or promotion is aimed at.
URL
Uniform Resource Locator – the proper name for a website address.
