Institutional/Image Advertising and Idea/Issue Advertising as Marketing Tools: Some Public Policy Issues

Corporations have been increasingly resorting to institutional advertising campaigns to express managements’ viewpoints on controversial social issues where their vital economic interests are at stake. Such corporate communications blur the line between commercial speech and political speech which have varying degrees of protection from regulations and differing tax treatment. A new classificatory scheme is proposed to facilitate distinguishing between image/goodwill and idea/issue advertising. The objective is to demonstrate how idea/issue advertising can be made an effective corporate marketing tool, while at the same time improve corporate public credibility.