Define Marketing

Define Marketing

What is marketing? Marketing can have different definitions based upon the source or person giving the definition. Marketing is an essential component of any business, and understanding the exactly what marketing means to a company can mean the difference between success and failure especially for new companies. This paper will define the term marketing using definitions from two different sources and a personal source. This paper will also further explore the importance of marketing in organizational success based on these definitions.

Definition

A personal definition of marketing is all the activities a company performs to capture the market share for their product. Anything a company does to ensure the sell of goods or services can be considered a part of marketing. Marketing includes the producing a product, promoting the product, correctly pricing the product, and placement of the product. Each of these categories contains numerous tasks that need and should be accomplished to ensure a successful marketing plan.

According to Boone & Kurtz (1998), “Marketing is the process of planning and executing the conception, pricing, promotion, and distribution of ideas, goods, services, organizations, and events to create and maintain relationships that will satisfy individual and organizational objectives” (para. 5). This definition of marketing attempts to encompass the vast and complicated field of marketing. The definition shows that marketing is much more than just advertising and other aspects do exist.

However, definitions do vary between sources. Another definition of marketing is “The act or process of buying and selling in a market or the commercial functions involved in transferring goods from producer to consumer“(Marketing, 2000, para 1). Although this definition captures the overview of marketing, the definition does not give a complete picture of marketing.

Marketing is often mistaken for just advertising or any of the components that define marketing. Many fail to recognize or understand the vastness of the marketing field, and the intricacies that are involved with producing a successful marketing plan.

Importance of Marketing

The importance of marketing is easily summed up by Regis McKenna, (2003), “Marketing is everything, and everything is marketing” (para 3). Marketing is an essential part of any company, and the importance is often hidden. A company’s main priority is to turn a profit. To accomplish this task, the company must create a demand for their product through marketing efforts. Companies often fail to accomplish the research into the development of new products to ensure a demand will exist for the product. In 1985, Coca-Cola was losing the cola battle to Pepsi, and decided to change the flavor of Coca-Cola (Ross, 2005). Blind tastes test performed by the company showed that the New Coke was preferred over the original recipe. However, the company failed to take into consideration public emotion. The company failed to ask “Do you want a new Coke?” (Ross, 2005, para 8). According to Keough, Coca-Cola president the company “…did not understand the deep emotions…” of the customers (Ross, 2005. para 6). Had Coca-Cola performed more extensive marketing research for the new product, then the product may not have been introduced or the marketing department could have found a different angle to use to make the product profitable.

The importance of marketing is also seen in the release of the iPhone. The company did an excellent job in promoting the product through advertising, however, failed in two other areas of marketing: pricing and placement. Apple created a strong hype over the release of the iPhone, but only released limited quantities. “Once the hype has washed off, they’ll [Customers] just decided it’s not worth the money” (Observing Polarity, 2007, para 33). Apple left this market wide open for competitors to release similar products at a cheaper price. If Apple had produced more iPhones for the original release more people would have been able to purchase the phone at the current price tag, thus making more profit for Apple. Now that the hype has died down, people are now less excited about purchasing an iPhone at the current price tag especially when other company’s will soon be releasing other products that will be able to compete with the iPhone. Apple’s advertising and promotion