Vision Quest

Flair Communications will enter the new century practicing what it calls PowerHouse Marketing. It’s a promotion-centered concept that the Chicago-based agency says its clients will need to practice in order to thrive in the future.

“Promotion needs to be more powerful and more integrated, reaching out to every audience available,” says Fran Heller, Flair’s senior vp-management director, New York City. “It is promotional thinking that is going to win the day in terms of generating the results that brands want.”

PowerHouse Marketing begins with three insights: promotion is the driving force of marketing; every human being in the distribution channel is the brand’s customer; and brands need to target by attitudes, not ages.

“The broadest consumer base for a brand will tend to come from a group of people who share the same attitudes,” says Heller on the last point, noting that promotion is often the most useful method of targeting to a psychographically defined audience.