Advertising and, therefore the people, manning the advertising department, do not function in a vacuum. Advertising is a tool of marketing. It is done to achieve a specified short-term or long term goal. The advertising staff, therefore, must actively interact with other departments most importantly, marketing and sales. The interaction has to be intensive to draw up a coordinated plan, of which advertising is a part. In fact, not only the advertising department, but also the outside advertising agency it may have employed, would have to be actively associated with the formulation of the marketing plan.

In companies, which realize the importance of advertising in its proper perspective, the advertising department gets useful inputs from sales, product and brand managers; from Marketing heads, General managers and top management and also from many others in the engineering and manufacturing departments who provide valuable advice in respect of appeals to be focused and also other advertising matters.