By Jacques Adam

The following is a summary of a MARCOM (Marketing & Communication) session I attended earlier this spring. While our situation differs from a pure marketing environment, there are similarities in the concepts and tools that they use.

The PSP marketer often lacks the resources and infrastructure, including channels of distribution, product development, promotional channels, etc. that commercial organizations inherit by selling product to the marketplace. Commercial marketers also have less complicated environments in which to market or adapt. Throughout decades of lobbying they have created policy and implementation environments that enhance their business execution, or at least don't impede it.

PSP marketers rely on partners and strategic alliances to assist with issues surrounding product, place, price and promotion. Their resources help achieve a behavior change objective (downstream), or change or enhance the environment where PSP marketers work and the target audience dwells (upstream). Key partnerships can fulfill the PSP marketer's need for the infrastructure and systems that the commercial marketer inherits. In a sense they provide the capital that the PSP marketer lacks.

These distinctions between the commercial and PSP marketing world require the PSP marketer to be creative in addressing the macro and micro environments in which they work, and in addressing the four "P" inherent to the program execution. These issues are sometimes upstream (policy or macro environments), sometimes downstream (execution of a specific PSP marketing program targeting a specific event). When looking at upstream issues we are often responding to an environment created by other forces and need partners to help us adapt to, or change these environments. When looking downstream we need partners to help us implement our PSP marketing programs in order to achieve event success.