---
title: "Marketing = Communication: Like It or Not, This Era Has Arrived"
description: "This article discusses the concept that marketing equals communication, tracing its origins from Ye Maozhong's early proposition to Liu Chunxiong's '4P is all communication' in the internet era, and delving into Schultz's Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) theory. It explains four key concepts of IMC—all contact points, information flow, unified communication, and interaction—and argues that in today's digital environment, interactive communication is the only efficient marketing method, urging marketers to adapt or risk being left behind."
author: "苗庆显"
publisher: "New Distribution"
email: "zhaobo258@gmail.com"
telephone: "+8615854817671"
published: "2018-08-08"
language: "en"
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---

# Marketing = Communication: Like It or Not, This Era Has Arrived

> This article discusses the concept that marketing equals communication, tracing its origins from Ye Maozhong's early proposition to Liu Chunxiong's '4P is all communication' in the internet era, and delving into Schultz's Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) theory. It explains four key concepts of IMC—all contact points, information flow, unified communication, and interaction—and argues that in today's digital environment, interactive communication is the only efficient marketing method, urging marketers to adapt or risk being left behind.

Click 'Read Original' for details.
**Introduction**
Caution: This is dense content. It takes 15 minutes to read, days to years to understand, or perhaps never. Let's start with two examples.
**First example:** Shi Yuzhu said that when he was doing Nao Baijin, advertising held the most strategic position in the company; he focused most on advertising and could ignore other matters. But when he moved to the game 'Zheng Tu', the product became paramount, and he focused on the product.
**Second example:** In the early 1990s, most companies did not have a marketing department, but there was a similar department called the planning department, which brainstormed ideas around the boss and was highly valued. The first-generation planner He Yang became famous then, known as the 'King of Ideas'. There was even a crosstalk on the Spring Festival Gala called 'Idea Company', showing how popular this was. From the late 1990s until recent years, marketing departments began to rise, but most were disheartened, doing activities, materials, exhibitions, and liaising with ad agencies and media. If sales were good, they got no credit; if bad, they were blamed as bad teammates. Slightly better marketing departments could participate in product management with the boss. In recent internet companies, there is a highly impressive role called 'Product Manager', who oversees user research, experience, feedback, product development, improvement, and promotion planning—a big boss coordinating everything. Star product managers like Zhang Xiaolong and Yu Jun have emerged.
Readers, consider these two examples. Now let's discuss today's topic: 'Marketing = Communication'.
According to Lao Miao, the first in China to propose 'Marketing = Communication' was Ye Maozhong, about fifteen years ago. Master Ye's view was to understand marketing through communication thinking: product, price, place, promotion—all are communication elements. They are not only information components but also communication channels.
At that time, few understood this concept, and some even called Ye 'advertising-only' or accused him of 'fooling clients into advertising'. As the saying goes, 'Good advice is hard to give to the damned'. After a year or two, Ye gave up on this idea.
In recent years, represented by marketing guru Liu Chunxiong, the concept of '4P is all communication' has been proposed again, based on marketing changes in the internet era. The discussion is deeper, and there is even a proposal to change the company's 'marketing department' to 'communication department'.
Whether it's Master Ye's 'Marketing = Communication' or Teacher Liu's '4P is all communication', the essence is an interpretation of Schultz's 'Integrated Marketing Communications' (IMC) theory. So Lao Miao will discuss what Schultz's IMC actually says, and why these two big names value and advocate it so much.
Among all classic marketing theories, 'Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC)' appeared the latest, and Lao Miao believes it is the most forward-looking and practical. The current internet marketing environment is almost a complete reproduction of what old Mr. Schultz predicted 25 years ago.
To understand IMC, you only need a few keywords to get a rough outline.
> The first keyword is **'All Contact Points'**
IMC believes that all contact points between consumers and the enterprise can serve as channels for information transmission. That is, all ways that influence consumer purchase behavior can become channels and part of IMC.
In the advertising world, Ogilvy's '360-degree Brand Stewardship' is a systematic brand management tool based on IMC's all-contact-points concept.
The essence of all contact points is the relationship between users and the product (or brand or enterprise), including how users approach the product, learn about it, usage experience, feelings, and attitudes.
> The second keyword is **'Information Flow'**
In IMC, influencing consumer behavior is the marketing goal. Since influencing behavior depends on information, IMC believes that **operating information is the core work in marketing**.
Schultz's original words: 'IMC is a new way of looking at the whole, where in the past we only saw parts, such as advertising, promotion, personal communication, point-of-sale advertising, etc. Now it is a re-orchestration of information communication to make it more consistent with how consumers view information, like an **information flow** from an indistinguishable source.'
The three elements of marketing: goods flow, money flow, and information flow. In all previous eras, people focused more on the transaction of goods and money, commonly known as 'selling goods'. Starting with IMC, the operation of information flow has been regarded as a more essential work under 'selling goods'.
> The third keyword is **'Unified Communication'**, also called 'Speak With One Voice'.
This is most easily taken out of context. Many people use a slogan or image on packaging, TV ads, terminals, and outdoor ads, thinking this is 'speaking with one voice'. This is the biggest misunderstanding of IMC.
The true requirement of IMC's unified communication is: '**Every message should be integrated and mutually reinforcing to support other information or impressions about the brand.** If this process succeeds, it will build brand equity by conveying the same brand message to consumers.'
**Communication information is a planned whole, not monotonously conveying the same image or content. Communication without context is like a person speaking without regard for the occasion, which seems abnormal.**
> The last keyword is **Interaction.**
**This may be the most important keyword. Interaction is the essence of IMC and its most advanced aspect.**
Consumer behavior research divides purchase into three behavioral stages: 'cognition, emotion, behavior' (which aligns well with the three-layer brain structure). Based on these stages, several classic consumer response hierarchy models have been summarized.
The most well-known is the AIDA model: **Attention, Interest, Desire, Action**, widely used in traditional marketing.
IMC, however, created another model—the communication model: **Exposure, Reception, Cognitive Response, Attitude, Intention, and Behavior**. From this model, we see that the communicator and the audience are interactive; the brand conducts the next communication based on consumer reactions and attitudes.
This is the same underlying logic as current internet content marketing: **the audience participates in communication, not only as the object but also as the subject of communication**. Traditional indoctrination communication has failed or is extremely inefficient. **The only efficient communication method today is interactive communication**.
> In the past, brand building was the company's business, at most spending money on media, advertising, and PR. Now, brand building requires the joint effort of enterprises, KOLs, the public, media, and distributors—five parties working together to put on a big show.
After understanding these four keywords, reading Schultz's 'Integrated Marketing Communications' becomes very easy, as simple as reading a martial arts novel. Because these four words are the premises and underlying logic of IMC. Once you understand them, the CRM, relationship marketing, precise segmentation, and brand positioning in IMC theory become logical.
Having talked so much about IMC, Lao Miao is not here to popularize IMC theory, but to provide a theoretical and methodological basis for bosses and marketers who are determined to transform and upgrade in this era where everyone is calling for transformation and everyone is overwhelmed. That is Schultz's IMC theory and its corresponding tools.
As the youngest classic marketing theory, IMC has almost never been applied in previous marketing. What existed was only marketing under the banner of 'integrated marketing communications', but in reality, it was just 'different marketing communication combinations'.
There are two reasons: First, it was too ahead of its time. Interactive communication, as the essence of IMC, could not be realized in traditional communication channels, or the cost was too high. Second, corporate cognition could not reach that level. Most bosses and marketers were still immersed in the logic of selling goods through money-goods transactions, and did not pay enough attention to the information operation underlying selling, or had no awareness at all.
Any marketing theory and tool has boundaries. Master Schultz's conditions for IMC, such as precise segmentation, interactive communication, contact points as channels, and consumer attitudes, seem tailor-made for the current internet marketing environment.
The cognition of enterprises and marketers is also incomparable to before. A few days ago, I discussed with an entrepreneur. This guy is ten years older than Lao Miao and is a typical traditional enterprise boss. Yet he designed a marketing model with people as the main body, information flow as the main business goal, and goods flow and cash flow as carriers. It is truly amazing creativity.
The times and market environment choose matching marketing theories and tools, not the other way around. Fifteen years ago, Master Ye said 'Marketing = Communication', and most people did not understand or accept it. That was normal, and it did not seem to affect them.
But now, in the context of mobile internet and consumption upgrading, the second decade of the 21st century is already in its seventh year. IMC is approaching its 30th anniversary since its birth. Teacher Liu Chunxiong and Lao Miao are still introducing '4P is all communication' in detail. If marketers still do not understand, they will miss the most reliable theoretical and methodological basis for building a new marketing system.
To put it elegantly: They can wash up and go to bed!
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