A little application question on the various types of promotional tools. Remember the definitions of each.

6.    A car company sent three automobile magazines some technical information and explanation about the features of its innovative new model.  One of the magazines later printed a story about the car. This is an example of:

    a)    publicity.
    True: publicity (sometimes also called public relations), is a form of nonpaid advertising, whereby the company prepares information on its products and makes them available to various media or opinion leaders who may transmit that information.

    b)    sales promotion.
    Sales promotions are activities limited in time which increase the value of the product/service temporarily. It is a paid and identified form of promotion. Hence, not what is talked about here.

    c)    personal selling.
    Of course not.

    d)    advertising.
    Of course, one could argue that publicity is also a form of advertising, but in its strict sense, advertising is a paid form of promotion, where the sponsor is clearly identified.

    e)    sponsorship.
    No: sponsorships are also paid forms of promotion, but they are not directly related to either giving information about the product or to stimulate its sales.