Marketing and design jargon buster!

The world of marketing and design is often awash with gobbledygook and strange sounding names or acronyms.  At Bulldog, we really, really don't like it!  Admittedly, some of the jargon has made it's way into the main arena, but often these words and phrases get bandied about as though they are the sign of a superior life form by those who choose to use them.

For those not in the club, Bulldog Creatrix happily provide a jargon buster here, with some of the oddities you may come across.  Let us know if you hear of any more that need to be busted!

Above the line Mass marketing, such as TV, radio, press, web etc.

ACCC: The A Triple C The Australian Competition & Consumer Commission. Government body which ensures that individuals and businesses comply with the Commonwealth competition, fair trading and consumer protection laws.

Ambient Marketing Marketing methods that use the space around your potential customer and where they will be.  Billboards, street posters, even football pitch stencils are all forms of ambient marketing.

Ascender In type, the parts of lowercase characters that go above the x-height of the font: b, d, f, h, k, I, and t.

B2B Business-to-business (providing products or services between businesses).

B2C Business-to-consumer.

Below the line Targeted marketing aimed at specific potential customers such as direct mail, narrowcast (see below), newsletters, email marketing, etc.

Corporate identity Combination of color schemes, designs, words, etc., that a firm employs to make a visual statement about itself and to communicate its business philosophy.

CPM Cost per thousand people reached. M is the roman numeral for 1000.

CSS Cascading Style Sheets. A coding language which helps web developers create a uniform look, or style across all pages of a web site, when viewed on any browser (even, hopefully, Internet Explorer!).

Demographics Classifications of consumers, such as their age, sex, income, education, size of household, ownership of home, etc.

Descender In type, it is the part of the letterform that goes below the baseline: g, j, p, q, y.

Device An icon or image which is a part of a logo design.

Direct mail Marketing communications delivered directly to a prospective purchaser.

EPS Encapsulated Postscript. A file format that allows artwork to be scaled up very large without degradation of the image.

Experiential Marketing A form of Ambient Marketing. This is a method of marketing or branding that involves an interaction with the customer that does not necessarily result in a direct sale.  It aims to develop an 'feel good' association between customer and brand. For example, branding interactive kiosks that end up being places for people to chill out for a while and nothing more.

Flannel panel The information panel, usually on page 2 or 4 of a magazine.  It contains details of contributors, production staff, printers, sales contacts etc.

FMCG Fast Moving Consumer Goods, such as food, clothing and perishables.

Four colour process The printing process that reproduces colors by combining, cyan, magenta, yellow and black.

Javascript Web development language that can be added to a pure HTML page to provide dynamic features, such as automatically calculating numeric data or activating an action.

Kerning The relative distance between characters in a word.

Logotype Lettering style or font used to identify a brand or business. The best know example is probably Coca Cola.

Loss leader An item advertised at a low price in order to attract customers for the purchase of other, more profitable merchandise.

Narrowcasting Using a medium to appeal to audiences with special interests.

Pass along reader
Someone who reads a publication that was purchased by someone else. Typically, there are 3 readers to each magazine sold, though the figure can be much higher.

PHP Hypertext Preprocessor (the name is a recursive acronym) is a widely used, general-purpose scripting language designed for web development to produce dynamic web pages or interactive applications within a website.

Print Post Service Special low postage rate from Australia Post for periodicals and newsletters.

SEM Search Engine Marketing.  Marketing (usually paid for) which places your business onto search engine results pages.  An example would be Google Adwords, where you 'rent' space to the right or top the first page of search results and pay a fee every time your link is clicked.

SEO Search Engine Optimisation.  Creating website content, keywords and data within your website, that enables it to be seen more easily by search engines.  The aim is to increase the chances of your site appearing higher in the search results.

Spot colour Specific colour that is not a mixed colour. Typically from the Pantone Matching System (PMS) that can be used to ensure consistency of printed colours every time.

Trade press Business to business and special interest newspapers and publications.

USP Unique Selling Point (or Proposition). The benefit of your product or service that your competitors do not have.

Vector graphic A graphics format that uses shapes and lines, called paths. Vector graphics are resolution independent graphics that appear smooth and crisp regardless of how much they are magnified.

Viral marketing Typically email based marketing, whereby an article or video that is interesting or witty is forwarded on by recipients to friends or colleagues, growing in popularity as it is spread.

x-height The vertical height of a typeface that is measured from the baseline to the top of lowercase letters, typically the 'x'.

"Our business is infested with idiots who try to impress by using pretentious jargon." David Ogilvy