“Where’s the beef?” This short little phrase spoken by an 84 year old lady in a 30 second commercial set the tone for an entire marketing campaign for The Wendy’s Company in 1984 (Sayeconomy.com, 2009). The campaign was simple; burgers at Wendy’s have more beef than its competitors. Organizations in an open-market economy must find a need that a client or customer has and attempt to find an answer to that need. Once a company has an answer, then it must let the world know of its product or service. This report will look at three definitions of marketing and show how the slight variations in how an organization views marketing determine its level of success.
The first definition of marketing is that it is the performance of activities that seek to accomplish an “organization’s objectives” by anticipating customer’s or client’s needs attempting to fulfill that need (Perreault, Cannon, & McCarthy, Jr, 2009). This definition of marketing lays great value on understanding an organization’s objectives. Wal-mart’s business objective is to sell a large quantity of products at the lowest possible price (Walmart, 2011). So their marketing campaigns drive this idea that if you go to Wal-mart you will find everyday products and the lowest prices around (Walmart, 2011). This has created the global success for Wal-Mart in becoming the highest market capitalized corporation in the world in 2010 (CNNMoney, 2011).
The American Marketing Association offers the next definition of marketing as “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 (Kotler & Keller, 2009).” This definition lays strong emphasis on the relationship of the organization to the customer. Many organizations seek to market their products and services so that there is a strong pull on brand loyalty. One such company is Starbucks. The success of Starbucks was the success of marketing a culture of coffee into which its customers identified themselves. Starbucks is not just passionate about coffee, but passionate about the entire coffeehouse experience (Starbucks, 2011). This marketing not only helps Starbucks and its customers connect relationally, but it also helps make Starbucks a highly profitable corporation at US$9.8 billion dollars in revenue in 2009 (Starbucks, 2011).
A third definition, from my perspective, of marketing is that it is a value-based means of bringing together a product or service with a client base that could benefit from the product. This definition focuses on the drawing together a product to a consumer. Most businesses provide a product that it has confidence in and that it knows and can represent well. Businesses do not typically find a customer and then try to make a product to match them. A plumbing company would do no good trying to market a television. Marketing allows the producer to find and meet people that their product is compatible with. An example of this type of marketing is E-bay.com. Ebay, Inc., (Ebay) is built around the concept of providing a place where producers and consumers come together (Ebay, 2011). Ebay itself does not provide any products but merely offers a service to those wishing to satisfy a need, whether that need is to sell a product or a need to buy a product. This type of marketing has established Ebay as an online world market and has created profitability and market success. In 2010, Ebay reported net revenues of over US$9.1 billion (Ebay, 2011).
Marketing is vital to an organization’s success. The definition by which is chooses to run its organization is a key as to its values and organizational objectives. Whether you are Walmart and trying to offer the lowest price product, Starbucks and creating a coffeehouse culture or Ebay and offering services for the world to sell its goods, marketing must fit the objectives of the organization. If the marketing of an organization is effective, most likely the organization will be successful for its owners and investors.
Starbucks. (2011). Our Company. Retrieved from http://www.starbucks.com/about-us/company-information
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