Profitability control is a mechanism of monitoring the sales made, profits earned and expenditure incurred by a company. The relative profit earning capacity of a firm’s products and consumer groups can be determined via profitability control. Sometimes surpisingly, it may be found out by companies how a small proportion of their products and even customers actually account for a significant percentage of the company’s profits. This can be achieved through profitability control. At times when the companies earn surplus profits, then such profits may even be ploughed back or reinvested. This also forms part of profitability control.

Online marketing is the exchange of products and services between the buyers and sellers on the internet.It is also known as e-marketing or internet marketing or online advertising. It may take the form of : 

a.B2C where the products are sold directly to the customers. 

b.B2B where trading networks or auction sites maybe used to reach out to the new customers and serve the existing one

c.C2C where one customer may further sell the product to another customer.

Examples of online marketing may include banner ads, blogs, social network advertisement.

In direct marketing, there is a direct interaction of the customers with the seller without any intermediaries. Here, the role of the intermediaries is nil. The medium used is more direct using telephone, mail, internet where the seller can directly reach out to the consumer. Examples of such marketing include telemarketing, email, voicemail marketing, door-to-door selling etc. This kind of marketing is more time saving as the problem of distance which may otherwise exist between the buyer and seller is eliminated and is also cost effective as it minimizes commuting costs.

Public relations includes promotional activities that work to create a strong public image of the company. Public relations activities include helping the public to understand the company and its products. Public relations if done right can reach a large audience without the expensive cost of traditional advertising and marketing.

A marketing mix and a promotional mix does have some differences, both being highly crucial for the success of a business. Marketing is very essential for the growth and continuity of business operations. It helps in creating new customers and retaining the existing ones to keep the business ongoing. Marketing focuses on all the elements of the marketing mix viz product, price, place and promotion while promotion focuses more on the customer- how to reach a product to its customers and how to sell it to them ultimately

a.Understanding the customer profile : the tastes,preferences, habits of the customers may differ from person to person.

b.Determining the objective as to who would be the target market, whether the company wants to go for cost minimisation or not etc.

c.Type of channel members :Who all would be involved? Wholesalers, retailers?

d.The criteria on which the channel members would be evaluated and selected.

e.How many intermediaries will be involved in the overall distribution?

These days channel members are being accepted by companies as their partners. The intermediaries are even being asked to integrate their business with the companies which results in lesser costs, greater efficiency and improved customer service. Corporates like Airtel are adopting PRM (Partner relationship management) software to give that added advantage to their supply chain. They organise rewards and recognition programs for their channel partners and also organise proper channels though which partners can vent any of their grievances relating to payments, violation of codes etc.

The SCPCA method can be used to evaluate channel members.

a) Sales (S): How much sales each channel member can give within a cetain time frame

b) Cost(C): How much cost would be incurred for each channel?

c) Profitability(P): Which channel can give better profitability to the company?

d) Control(C): Whether company can have better control over its channel members or not.

e) Adaptability (A): Whether the channel alternatives are flexible enough to any changes or not. The channel meeting the objectives of the company is selected