Marketing (Meaning and Explanation)

We explain what marketing is, its phases, objectives and other characteristics. Also, the types of marketing that exist.

What is marketing?

Marketing or marketing (borrowed from English), is the set of commercial techniques and procedures whose objective is to stimulate demand for a good or service. Among them are advertising, design, market research and other conceptual tools that help adapt the offer to the needs or aspirations of its target consumers.

Initially, mass marketing in the 1950s focused on the bulk of the consumer population without distinctions. Later, between the years 1960 and 1980, he classified it by strata or niches. From 1990 onwards, it began to be personalized and directly observe consumer behavior, thanks to technological advances in communications and data.

In addition to these multiple changes, there are many approaches and ways of understanding marketing. The American economist Phillip Kotler (1931-) is considered the father of marketing, and one of the most important thinkers in this branch of economic knowledge.

Marketing characteristics

Marketing is characterized by the following:

Aspire to facilitate production flow from producers to consumers, thus increasing the commercial performance of a specific sector of the economy.
It has like object of study to the entire society but above all to clients and consumers, as well as the company's workers.
You have a mix of tools and commercial perspectives to address your object of study, which is traditionally defined in the “four Ps”: Price, Positioning, Promotion and Product.

Objectives and functions of marketing

marketing characteristics — Whoever offers the product and whoever buys it are interested in carrying out the exchange.

The marketing objectives can be summarized in one: take the potential consumer to the limit of the purchasing decision or what is the same, facilitate the exchange of goods and capital between producers and consumers in a certain commercial niche. For this to happen, according to Phillip Kotler himself, the following conditions must be met:

There must be two interested parties in carrying out the exchange.
Each party must extract a value of the exchange operation.
Each party must be able deliver and communicate value.
Each part must be free to accept or reject the offer what is done to him.
Each party must understand how convenient or desirable to carry out the exchange.

Therefore, the functions of marketing are those that tend to fulfill these objectives, through different orientations: production and the product, or sales (to the market and the brand).

Types of marketing

More than types or classifications, marketing has different tendencies, since the same set of functions are applied in each of them, but from different points of view or following paradigms and in different contexts. Thus, we can talk about:

Social marketing. Or “responsible” marketing, when it has a clear interest in issues of corporate social responsibility, which is the name given to the secondary objectives (that is, those faced when the market is established) of organizations: the environment , social progress, the dissemination of culture, etc.
Attraction marketing. Call inbound marketing in English, specializes in attracting the interest of potential consumers towards a specific brand, through social marketing techniques, SEO positioning management on the Internet, and other persuasive or “positioning” strategies in the market.
Street marketing. In English street marketingspecializes in the urban environment and how to impact passers-by for the benefit of the brand, using methods not controlled by traditional advertising.
Relationship marketing. That which focuses on the development and strengthening of producer-consumer relationships, through methods of loyalty and market segmentation.
Holistic marketing. That which approaches the commercial exercise in a global, integrated manner, as a whole whose processes are interrelated and cannot be analyzed separately, but require global perspectives.
Neuromarketing. When it is based on advances and discoveries in neuronal and cerebral matters, if not psychological, to design more effective product and brand placement strategies.
Geomarketing. Communion of geography and marketing is a recent trend that explores the ideal geographic locations for a certain type of product, thus incorporating cartographic or geostrategic tools into commercial activity.

Importance of marketing

Marketing has gained importance over time, until it has become one of the most active and fundamental areas of commercial and business competition. It was already important in the last century, to highlight industrial products above the competition. Today it is essential, as it is better able to “know” the target audience and shorten the gap between producers and consumers.

Its function is vital in a hypercompetitive global society, such as that of the globalized capitalism of the 21st century. Visibility, loyalty and positioning are key concepts in contemporary commercial dynamics, propelled to new horizons thanks to the Internet and the so-called “culture 2.0”.

Marketing and advertising

Although they are related disciplines, we should not confuse advertising with marketing, more than anything because the former is just an instrument at the disposal of the latter. That is to say that Marketing encompasses the area of study of advertising and surpasses it also delving into the productive, the social and the corporate.

Advertising, however, understood as the set of strategies that seek to highlight a product or convince the consumer to make a purchase, is among the main pillars of marketing.