The essence of being in business by any business outfits is to produce for sales and profits. In order to remain in business an organization must generate enough sales from its products to cover operating costs and post reasonable profits. For many organizations, sales estimate is the starting point in budgeting or profit. It is so because it must be determined, in most cases, before production units could be arrived at while production units will in turn affect material purchases. However, taking decision on sales is the most difficult tasks facing many business executives. This is because it is difficult to predict, estimate or determine with accuracy, potential customers’ demands as they are uncontrollable factors external to an organization. Considering, therefore, the importance of sales on business survival and the connection between customers and sales, it is expedient for organizations to engage in programs that can influence consumers’ decision to purchase its products. This is where advertising and brand management are relevant. Advertising is a subset of promotion mix which is one of the 4ps in the marketing mix i.e. product, price, place and promotion. As a promotional strategy, advertising serves as a major tool in creating product awareness and condition the mind of a potential consumer to take eventual purchase decision.

See Samples Of Undergraduate Research Topics And Projects For Students

Advertising is a form of communication through mass media about product, services or ideas paid for by an identified sponsor. Since communication is transfer of idea, attitude, information, mood, and so on from one person to another through a medium: it may be quite correct to define advertising as a form of communication. This is because in advertising, persuasive messages about the products, service or idea are made through a channel. This no doubt is similar to the communication process of a source sending a message through a channel to a receiver for a feedback.
In Nigerian economy, many manufacturers attempt to stimulate the demand for their products (goods/services). They are not satisfied merely to produce and trust to the chance that consumers will become aware of their products through the impersonal interplay of the market.
It is believed that if a better product is produced, consumers will not necessarily take special pain of informing themselves of its existence, its worth, its satisfying qualities and where it can be purchased. Advertising provides information that facilitates the job of the seller, helps customer make quick decision, informs customer of the presence of a product, price which it is being sold and placement (where it is available) thereby giving room for economy of time, energy and money in trying to look for the product. It also announces a new product, indicates new uses of existing products, reminds customer of an existing product, about the desirable qualities, stimulates or generates enquires and builds corporate image to mention a few. The effectiveness of these is expected to result in increased sales and profit. Profit can be viewed as the excess of total revenue over and above the total cost. Profit making in any organization is a function of many factors. There is prudence in vigorously and diligently pursuing organizational goals and objectives. One of such goals is maximization of the wealth of the owners in an environment where social responsibility is openly embraced.
ADVERTISING
Advertising is impersonal communication of information about products, services or ideas through the various media, and it is usually persuasive by nature and paid by identified sponsors it consists all activities that involve presenting to a group, non-personal, oral or visual sponsored messages regarding a product, service or idea “Advertising is directed to groups of people and is therefore non-personal. Companies usually sponsor advertising in order to convince the public that their products will benefit them.
More so, advertising is the paid promotion of goods, services, companies and ideas by an identified sponsor. Marketers see advertising as part of an overall promotional strategy. Other components of the promotional mix include publicity, public relations, personal selling and sales promotion. Advertising allows a company to tell the benefits of a product to a potential customer. Advertising can be in a newspaper or magazine, on radio or TV, a billboard, internet or a variety of other means. Advertising is generally paid for, as opposed to publicity, which is usually free.
FUNCTIONS OF ADVERTISING
There are four main functions of advertising:
1. Economical function: The nature of the economical function of advertising is first of all to stimulate sales and increase the volume of profits from the sale of a certain product for a certain unit of time. Advertising informs, creates the need for a product or service, and encourages people to purchase. The more people have responded to the ad, the better it is for the economy and the economical wellbeing of society.
2. Social function: Advertising information has a significant impact on the formation of the consciousness of each individual. When advertising is addressed to consumers, besides the promotion of a product, it also helps to form ideological values of the society and at the end has an effect on the character of social relations causes consumer instincts, encouraging people to improve their financial state, improves the culture of consumption. Comparing different products and services, the consumer, in any case, tends to get really the best.
3. Marketing function: Advertising is an important component of marketing. Advertising entirely connected to the tasks of marketing, whose final aim is the full satisfaction of customer needs concerning goods and services.
4. Communicating function: Advertising is also one of the specific forms of communication. It is designed to perform an appropriate communicating function, linking together advertisers and consumer audience by the means of information channels.
PRODUCT DISPLAY
Retail product displays are the fixtures in your store that hold or promote your products. The look of retail product displays relies heavily on your visual merchandising strategy. You or your visual merchandiser can arrange displays to showcase your products and increase sales. The merchandise display happens to be a special presentation of the products of a store that is used to attract and even entice consumers.
A well designed display will infuse exactly the right message into the minds of consumers. And if your display is placed in strategic areas of the store, your product can be exposed to a lot more potential customers than if it's sitting on a shelf.
PROFITABILITY
Profitability is the primary goal of all business ventures. This is simply a cash transaction between the business and the lender to generate cash for operating the business or buying assets.
Profitability is a measurement of efficiency – and ultimately its success or failure. A further definition of profitability is a business's ability to produce a return on an investment based on its resources in comparison with an alternative investment.
THE EFFECT OF ADVERTISING AND PROFITABILITY
The role play by advertising in the sales growth of an organization cannot be treated with just a wave of hand. Sales promotion in the form of advertising in promoting product and service awareness among consumers cannot be overstressed. Advertisement provides a platform for firms to create awareness about their products or services and how consumers can make the best out of such products. Thus, for advertising to be effective, it must have an appeal, attract attention, commands interest, inspire conviction and must provoke interest.
Advertising is an important tool of marketing as it helps the business achieve competitive advantage by selling its products and overcoming the rivals. Companies spend money on the advertisements and publicity in order to make sure that the masses are aware of its products, their features and advantages over the competitors. Basic purpose of advertisement is to increase the sales of the advertised products/companies.
Logically there has to be an impact of advertisement on sales because that is the reason why companies resort to advertising spending. What remains to be seen is though, which companies spend (more heavily) on advertising and which do not. A company that has a higher amount of sales revenue can afford to spend more on advertisements when compared to a company with lower sales revenue.
CONCLUSION
Companies need not only to produce good quality products, but also to inform consumers about their benefits, as well as to achieve clear positioning of their products in the minds of the consumers. In order to make a new product to succeed, it must have the desired parameters for consumers, to be unique, and consumers should have the information about its characteristics. To do this, companies need to use different means of promotion that is an essential part of a series of the marketing activities, a kind of information output to the consumer. The main way of promoting of products is the advertising. Advertising is any paid by a specific sponsor form of non-personal presentation and promotion of ideas, goods and services. Organizations use advertising to tell about themselves, about their products and services, or about some of their activities for an audience selected in a certain way and with the hope that this message will cause a responding reaction.

Product display plays a pivotal role in enhancing profitability, and selecting the right packaging solution is crucial. A comprehesive guid to selecting ideal box sleeves, box sleeves can significantly impact the visual appeal of products on shelves. Box sleeves not only protect merchandise but also serve as a canvas for branding and product information. Attention to detail in choosing the right box sleeves can lead to increased customer engagement and ultimately boost sales, making it an essential aspect of overall business strategy.