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The Definition of Marketing?
Have you seen the new definition of marketing from the American Marketing Association (AMA)? I just came across it again while doing some research on the Web and it made me laugh:
“Marketing is the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large.”
On January 14, 2008 The American Marketing Association announced in a press release that this new definition “…will be used as the official definition in books, by marketing professionals and taught in university lecture halls nationwide.”
Sorry. Not by this marketing professional!
If it sounds like something created by a committee, it was. According to the press release,
“The committee formed in late 2006, under the leadership of Donald R. Lehmann, the George E. Warren Professor of Business at Columbia Business School in New York. The committee used qualitative insight generated through an evaluation of the 1985 and 2004 definitions of marketing to craft a new definition that better serves the constituents of the American Marketing Association. As part of this process, Association members (A second, much bigger committee?) were asked to provide input on what they liked best about the previous definition, and what they would change. Members were later asked to offer feedback on a draft of the revised definition. At the end of the revision process, the American Marketing Association found that more than 70 percent of their membership viewed the new definition as an improvement.”
I guess I am one of the 30 percent that think the AMA’s latest definition of marketing is worse than the one it replaces. And that one, announced in 2004, wasn’t great either:
“Marketing is an organizational function and a set of processes for creating, communicating, and delivering value to customers and for managing customer relationships in ways that benefit the organization and its stakeholders.”
Maybe George E. Warren and the others on the committee should try to explain this new definition of marketing to a couple of CEOs or CFOs. Do you really think the CEOs or CFOs will say, “I get it! Now I understand why we need to invest in marketing.” I doubt it.
I think that us B-to-B marketers have a tough enough job of convincing the folks in the C-suite that marketing is an important ingredient in the company’s success, without the AMA making it our job even harder by confusing people with their latest marketing definition.
If you are one of the AMA committee members that developed this new definition of marketing, please let us know if you are 100 percent satisfied with this new definition, and why so or why not?
And you, the person reading this right now: What are your thoughts? Does the current definition clearly communicate to you what marketing is? If not, do you have a better definition of marketing to share?
But Mac, you’re presupposing the people on this august committee were actually interested in creating that “Aha! I get it now” moment. These folks are highly intelligent, highly educated (probably largely academic) beings. And of course any definition they arrived at had to reflect this. OK, I’m being a bit cynical and sarcastic.
What the AMA has come up with here is a “camel.” You see, a camel is a horse designed by a committee. This “camel” is a convoluted, high-brow sounding, garbled mess. You would have hoped that an organization like the AMA could have done a lot, lot better.
I’ll take a quick stab at creating a more straightforward definition. How’s this? “Marketing is the art and science of publicizing and promoting a company and its offerings so as to predispose the public to make purchases and become loyal and profitable long-term customers.”
Still too wordy but I think its more to the point of what the purpose of marketing really is.
Posted by: Ernest Nicastro | Apr 14, 2008 at 10:06 pm
Hi Mac,
I am researching the field of sales lead/customer relationship management. I was formerly in Search (SEO) field. I’ve been looking for blogs that can educate me about what is a new industry for me(lead generation, lead resellers, online lead purchasing, etc.) Your blog is exactly the industry information I have been looking for.
I work for a rapidly growing company that provides a scaleable sales lead management application for many industries. It is also priced wholesale to be resold and used as a CRM.
Can you recommend other up to date reading material/blogs/RSS, etc. on the web?
Posted by: Kerry Beasley | Apr 22, 2008 at 2:46 pm
Kerry,
Check out my Web site’s Learning Center http://www.sales-lead-experts.com/tips.
Mac
Posted by: Mac McIntosh | Apr 22, 2008 at 5:29 pm