The issue of increasing sales promotion at the expense of advertising has been examined with growing concern over the last two decades. This study provides an exploratory analysis of the issues of allocation of marketing communication budget in the Japanese food industry: advertising for the long-term versus sales promotion for the short-term. Based on data collected from Nikkei Need-FinancialQUEST (Nikkei Digital Media, 2011), an increase in marketing budget allocated to sales promotion relative to advertising was observed in a time series analysis study from 1976 to 2008. The use of sales promotion budget has a two-fold effect on financial performance: the sales promotion budget is positively related to sales volumes and negatively related to profitability. Managerial implications of these findings and areas for future research are discussed. Research shows the weakened power of traditional advertising in a diversified media environment; the growth rate differential of sales promotion relative to advertising has become noticeable in recent years (Kim, 2010; Li, Lee, Lee, and Griffin, 2011). However, in spite of qualitative and quantitative research in the last two decades, there is a gap concerning the outcomes of advertising and sales promotion budget allocation decisions in the industrial sector. The aim of this article is to give a better understanding of whether the paradigm shift in budget allocation from advertising to sales promotion exists, and if this is the case, how marketing firms’ financial performance is affected in regards to sales volume and profitability. To address these issues, this study examines the budget allocation decisions for advertising and sales promotion from the perspective of short-term versus long-term objectives (Quelch, 1983; Achenbaum and Mitchel, 1987; Buzzell, Quelch, and Salmon, 1990; Jones, 1990; Low and Mohr, 1999, 2000; Rossiter and Percy, 1997). The issue of increasing sales promotion at the expense of advertising has been viewed with growing concern by both practitioners and academics over the last two decades. In this context, considerable attention has been paid to the fundamental changes in the advertising-to-sales promotion ratio (Quelch, 1983; Johnson, 1988; Buzzell, Quelch and Salmon, 1990; Messinger and Narasimhan, 1995; Ailawadi, 2001). Partly as a result of the growing buying power of retailers, manufacturers have been reducing their commitment to advertising activities and spending much more on trade promotion and consumer promotion. The rapid growth in the relative proportion of trade promotion compared to total sales promotion is remarkable. This study seeks to identify the changes in the relative emphasis on communication strategy at the industry level in Japan over an extended period of time. Therefore, we propose:H1: The proportion of the marketing communications budget allocated to sales promotion, versus advertising, has increased in Japan. H2: The proportion of the marketing communications budget allocated to sales promotion increased sharply around the time of the collapse of the bubble economy in 1991. In regard to consumer package goods manufacturers, the growth rate of sales volume may be lower than of the growth rate for sales promotion (Teramoto, 2001). This is not surprising due to the saturated market in Japan. A short-term perspective is defined as the degree to which management emphasizes short-term objectives and tasks, generally one year or less, and thus encourages short-term results (Burke, 1984; Rossiter and Percy, 1997). The short-term results of a sales promotion strategy are illustrated in an increase in sales volume. Yet the effect of sales promotions on sales volume does not last particularly long. This is because the carry-over effects of sales promotions are relatively low, compared with the level of purchase during the promotion period (Cotton and Babb, 1978). Often a company using sales promotion aggressively has a difficult time selling the products at full margins. Consumers would expect or demand lower prices all the time, so sales promotions may result in decreasing profitability for the firm (Rossiter and Percy, 1997; Jedidi, Mela and Gupta, 1999; Low and Mohr, 2000, Teramoto, 2001). Therefore, we propose: H3: Expenditure on sales promotion is positively related to sales volume. H4: Expenditure on sales promotion is negatively related to profitability. In order to test the hypotheses, time series analysis of financial data in the period 1976-2008 was undertaken (Otsuki, 1998; Teramoto, 2001; Kim, 2010). This study focuses on the Japanese food industry. First, the food industry has been broadly accepted in past research along with the consumer packaged goods sector. Second, the food industry is one of the most challenging industries to have experienced changes in market conditions in recent years. Data was collected from Nikkei Need-FinancialQUEST over a period that exceeded three decades (fiscal years 1976 to 2008 inclusive). The data was gathered from all food manufacturing companies that provided public information on financial performance. The sample includes companies currently listed on the stock exchange as well as others that are no longer listed. Data on 10 firms that provide advertising, sales commission and promotional expenses for the entire analysis period are analyzed separately to test the hypotheses. Consistent with previous research, this study considers the total amount of sales commission and promotional expenses as sales promotion. The study analyzed the relationship of sales promotion with total sales (sales volumes) and profitability (return on sales, ROS). To test the hypotheses stated earlier, simple linear regression was employed. For hypotheses 1 and 2, the dependent variables are advertising and sales promotion; the independent variable is the year. For hypotheses 3 and 4, the dependent variables are total sales and ROS, and the independent variable is the relative proportion of sales promotion in the total marketing communications budget. Research findings show that the relative emphasis on sales promotion relative to advertising has increased in the Japanese food industry, in the period 1976 to 2008. This change occurred around the time of the burst of the bubble economy, in fiscal year 1990. Subsequently, analysis shows sales promotion is positively related to sales volume increase, but negatively related to profitability. The relative proportion of budget allocation between advertising and sales promotion is a critical issue in today’s environment with its challenging market conditions. Therefore, strategic decisions regarding budget allocations need to consider the importance of short-term sales increases while simultaneously maintaining high profitability by building the long-term brand franchise through integrated marketing communications (Eagle et al., 1999).

在广告费用中增加促销这一问题已经被关注了20年了。本研究通过探索性分析来研究日本食品业中市场营销沟通的预算问题：长期的广告对比短期的促销。通过Nikkei Need-FinancialQUEST中的数据(Nikkei Digital Media, 2011)，我们对1976年到2008年的促销和广告预算进行了分析。结果发现促销预算对于财务绩效的有两个方面的影响：促销预算对于销量有着积极地影响但是对于利润的影响确实负面的。文章的结尾对于管理的应用和未来的研究方向还进行了讨论。研究表明传统的广告作用在复杂的媒体环境中正在降低；而近些年与广告相关的多样的促销活动却在一直增加(Kim, 2010; Li, Lee, Lee, and Griffin, 2011)。尽管过去20年间不管是定性或定量的研究已经很多，但是广告和促销的预算分配效果研究却极为有限。本文的目标就是对于有关广告和促销共存的预算分布有一个更好的了解，同时探讨营销企业的财政绩效是如何被销量和利润影响的。为了解决这个问题，本研究检验了基于短期和长期目标视角的预算分布决定(Quelch, 1983; Achenbaum and Mitchel, 1987; Buzzell, Quelch, and Salmon, 1990; Jones, 1990; Low and Mohr, 1999, 2000; Rossiter and Percy, 1997)。在过去的二十多年中，增加促销广告费用的问题已经受到从业者和学者越来越多的关注。在这种情况下，广告促销比例的根本性变化，相当受到人们的重视(Quelch, 1983; Johnson, 1988; Buzzell, Quelch and Salmon, 1990; Messinger and Narasimhan, 1995; Ailawadi, 2001)。部分原因是由于越来越多的零售商的购买力，制造商已改变了他们之前的承诺，在广告活动和贸易促销和消费者促销相应减少了投入。促进贸易与促销总额的相对比例快速增长是显著的本文将从行业层面讨论营销沟通的战略，所以我们假设： H1：相比于广告，在日本营销沟通预算中促销的部分增长显著。H2：自1991年经济泡沫破裂以来，营销沟通中促销的预算增长显著。在包装消费品制造商方面，销量的增长速度可能会低于促销的增长率。(Teramoto, 2001)这并不奇怪，由于在日本市场已经饱和。一个短期视角被定义为管理短期目标和任务，一般为一年或一年以下，从而鼓励短期结果s (Burke, 1984; Rossiter and Percy, 1997)。增加销量说明了促销策略的短期结果。然而，促销对销量的影响不会持续特别长。这是因为与促销期间购买的水平相比，结转促销活动的影响相对较低。(Cotton and Babb, 1978)通常一家公司在有困难的时候充分利润率区间，积极使用促销。消费者所期望或需求价格较低的时候，促销活动可能会导致公司的盈利能力下降(Rossiter and Percy, 1997; Jedidi, Mela and Gupta, 1999; Low and Mohr, 2000, Teramoto, 2001)。因此，我们假设：H3：促销上的花费对于销量有着正向的影响。 H4：促销上的花费对于利润有着负向的影响。为了测试的假设，1976年至2008年期间的财务数据的时间序列进行分析 (Otsuki, 1998; Teramoto, 2001; Kim, 2010)。本研究着重于日本食品工业。第一，的在过去的研究中，随着消费领域的包装商品，食品行业已被广泛接受，。二，食品行业是最具挑战性的的行业之一。收集的数据超过三十年 （1976年财政年至2008年（含）），数据的收集来自于Nikkei Need-FinancialQUEST。数据中的企业有些还活跃在现今的市场中，而有些已经倒闭消失了。10家企业提供的数据被用于验证假设。分行分析了促销和总销量以及利润的关系。通过线性回归分析，我们得到了一些结果。假设1和假设2的因变量是广告和促销；自变量是年份。假设3和假射4中，因变量是总销量和销售收益，自变量是销售预算所占比重。研究发现，1976-2008日本的食品业促销相对的广告都相应增长了。1990.这一变化主要发生在1990——经济泡沫产生的时期。随后，分析表明 促销的增加对于销量有着直接的影响，但是负向影响利润。在当下，具有挑战性的市场条件的环境中，广告和促销之间预算分配的相对比例是一个关键的问题。因此，有关预算拨款的战略决策需要考虑短期销售增加是很重要的一点，同时保持高盈利能力，通过整合营销传播建立长期的品牌专营(Eagle et al., 1999)。