Dictionary.com defines marketing as “the act or business of advertising and selling products or services, including market research and advertising”.
If you work in a marketing role like me, it is probably difficult for you to define marketing, although you see and use it every day – the term marketing is a bit broad and variable for easy definition.
This definition doesn’t feel helpful.
The sales section, for example, overlaps a little too closely with a “what is sale” definition, and the word advertising makes me think of it mad Men Brainstorming sessions.
But when I dug deeper, I found that marketing really overlaps with advertising and sales. Marketing is present in all phases of the business from start to finish.
At first, I wondered why marketing was a necessary component during product development, a sales pitch, or retail sales. But it makes sense if you think about it – marketers have their finger on the pulse of their consumer personality.
The purpose of marketing is to constantly research and analyze your consumers, conduct focus groups, send surveys, examine online shopping habits and ask a basic question: “Where, when and how do our consumers want to communicate with our business?”
Purpose of marketing
Marketing is the process of getting people interested in your company’s product or service. This is done through market research, analysis and understanding of the interests of your ideal customer. Marketing refers to all aspects of a company, including product development, sales methods, sales and advertising.
Modern marketing started in the 1950s when people used more than just print media to advertise a product. When television, and soon the internet, came into the home, marketers were able to run entire campaigns on multiple platforms. And, as one would expect, marketers have become increasingly important over the past 70 years to optimize how a company sells a product to consumers in order to optimize success.
In fact, the basic purpose of marketing is to attract consumers to your brand through messaging. Ideally, this messaging is helpful and educational for your target audience, so you can turn consumers into leads.
Today there are literally dozens of places to run a marketing campaign – where do you go in the 21st century?
Types of marketing
Where your marketing campaigns live depends entirely on where your customers spend their time. It’s up to you to conduct market research that determines which types of marketing – and which mix of tools within each type – are best suited to building your brand. Here are some types of marketing that are relevant today, some of which have stood the test of time:
- Internet Marketing: Inspired by one Excedrin product campaign The idea of being on the Internet for business reasons is a kind of marketing in and of itself.
- Search engine optimization: Abbreviated with “SEO”, this is the process of optimizing content on a website so that it is displayed in search engine results. It is used by marketers to attract people who do searches that imply that they are interested in learning about a particular industry.
- Blog marketing: Blogs are no longer reserved for the individual author. Brands are now publishing blogs to write about their industry and encourage the interest of potential customers looking for information online.
- Social media marketing: Businesses can use Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn and similar social networks to get impressions from their audience over time.
- Print marketing: As newspapers and magazines understand better who subscribes to their printed material, companies continue to sponsor articles, photographs and similar content in the publications that their customers read.
- Search engine marketing: This type of marketing differs a little from the search engine optimization described above. Companies can now pay a search engine to place links on pages in their index that are well known to their target audience. (It’s a concept called “pay per click” – I’ll show you an example of this in the next section).
- Video marketing: While there were previously only commercials, marketers have now put money into creating and publishing all types of videos that entertain and educate their main customers.
Marketing and advertising
If marketing is a wheel, advertising speaks of that wheel.
Marketing includes product development, market research, product distribution, sales strategy, public relations and customer care. Marketing is required at all stages of a company’s sales journey and can use numerous platforms, social media channels and teams within its company to identify, communicate with, amplify their voice and build brand loyalty over time strengthen.
On the other hand, advertising is only one component of marketing. It is a strategic effort that is typically paid to raise awareness of a product or service as part of the more holistic goals described above. Simply put, this is not the only way that marketers sell a product.
Here’s an example (read on, there’s a quiz at the end) …
For example, suppose a company launches a brand new product and wants to create a campaign to promote that product to its customer base. This company’s preferred channels are Facebook, Instagram, Google and the company’s website. All of these areas are used quarterly to support the various campaigns and to generate leads through these campaigns.
To broadcast the new product launch, the company publishes a downloadable product guide on its website, publishes a video on Instagram demonstrating the new product, and invests in a series of sponsored search results on Google that drive traffic to a new product page on its website Run the website.
Which of the above decisions concerned marketing and which advertising?
…
The advertisement took place on Instagram and Google. Instagram is generally not an advertising channel, but if you use it for branding, you can build a base of followers that is occasionally prepared for a gentle product announcement. Google was definitely used for advertising in this example. The company paid for the storage space on Google – a program called Pay per click (PPC) – to direct traffic to a specific page that focuses on the product. A classic online ad.
Where did the marketing take place? This was a trick question, just like marketing the whole process. By targeting Instagram, Google and its own website on a customer-centric initiative, the company ran a three-part marketing campaign that identified the target audience, created a message for that target audience, and delivered it across the industry to maximize impact.
The 4 Ps of Marketing
In the 1960s E Jerome McCarthy came up with the 4 Ps of marketing: product, price, location, advertising.
Essentially, these 4 Ps explain how marketing interacts with every phase of the business.
product
Suppose you have an idea for a product that you want your company to sell. What’s next? You will probably not be successful if you are just starting to sell it.
Instead, your marketing team needs to do market research and answer some critical questions: Who is your target audience? Is there a market that is suitable for this product? Which messages increase product sales and on which platforms? How should your product developers modify the product to increase the likelihood of success? What do focus groups think about the product and what questions or concerns do they have?
Marketers use the answers to these questions to help companies understand product demand and improve product quality by addressing concerns from focus groups or respondents.
price
Your marketing team reviews competitor product prices or uses focus groups and surveys to estimate how much your ideal customer is willing to pay. If you set the price too high, you will lose a solid customer base. Price it too low and you could lose more money than you win. Fortunately, marketers can use industry research and consumer analysis to determine a good price range.
space
It is important that your marketing department uses your company’s consumer understanding and analysis to suggest how and where to sell your product. Perhaps they believe that an e-commerce website works better than a retail location or vice versa. Or they offer insights into the locations where your product can best be sold nationally and internationally.
promotion
This P is probably what you expected from the start: advertising includes any online or print advertising, event or discount your marketing team creates to increase awareness and interest in your product and ultimately lead to more sales . At this stage, you will likely see methods such as PR campaigns, ads, or social media promotions.
Hopefully our definition and the four Ps will help you understand the purpose of marketing and its definition. Marketing overlaps with all areas of a company. It is therefore important that you understand how to use marketing to increase the efficiency and success of your company.
Editor’s Note: This article was originally published in May 2018 and has been updated for completeness.