Strategic Marketing Definition

In to understand the issues and methods of applying our “business built on relationships” approach to marketing your business it is helpful to have a clear understanding of our definition of marketing. If you ask ten different people what the word “marketing” means it is likely you will get different partially correct answers. No surprise, when in fact marketing should be the all encompassing engine that drives the success of your business. What you will find with most people is that they focus on a couple of the pieces of the marketing puzzle and think that is what marketing is all about.

A great many people confuse marketing with selling, advertising, packaging, promotion, and publicity. These are all small parts of the marketing puzzle, and not even the necessarily the most important parts. So what is marketing? Marketing is a way of thinking about every aspect of your business to maximize your success based upon the foundation of providing customers what they want to solve their needs. You might want to read that twice if you always equated marketing with the latest trick or technique to briefly attract the attention of the public!

Surprisingly, despite the common misconceptions, a relatively good simple definition of marketing is available in the dictionary. The dictionary.com site has this entry “the total of activities involved in the transfer of goods from the producer or seller to the consumer or buyer, including advertising, shipping, storing, and selling.” While this definition focuses a bit much on the broad activities of marketing, rather than the strategic thinking aspect of marketing, it does help show the all encompassing nature of the beast.

If you are to grow your business to it’s greatest potential, you must understand that marketing at the core is a way of thinking about all aspects of your business to maximize your ability to meet the needs of your customers better than any of your competitors. Marketing is in it’s most simple form a complete commitment to excellence in the quality and delivery of your products or services. It is a way of thinking that should permeate every aspect of the daily conduct of your business.

Marketing is the heart of all business planning and should never be delegated to anyone other than the person ultimately responsible for the success of the business, usually the owner of the business. Certainly that person should consult with other people with expertise regarding individual aspects of marketing when making decisions. In larger companies employees or departments may be dedicated to certain marketing aspects or tasks. However, the big picture of strategic marketing planning for the business should never be delegated to anyone other than the one at the desk “where the buck stops here.”

Hopefully this overview of our viewpoint on the all encompassing nature of business marketing is clear in this article. It is essential that the complexity and art of marketing a business be understood to reach your potential!