What is ‘Marketing’?
My (non-marketing) friends define marketing as such;
“People who use ads and other promotional tools to make a product or service profitable”.
My high school textbook defined it as:
The management of the 4Ps in such a way that it creates value for the customer and helps achieve organisational goals.
Kotler defined it as:
“A social and managerial process by which individuals and groups obtain what they need and want through creating and exchanging products and value with others”
They’re wrong. Everything you know about marketing is wrong. At its fundamentals what makes promotional tools work? The ability of it to the spread the idea of your product. What are the 4Ps but just another way to frame your idea to your market? What do people want? What is the exchange of products and value? Ideas. Ideas and stories that the idea tells.
So what is marketing?
This is Seth Godin’s take on it:
“Marketing is about the spreading of ideas”.
