what exactly is marketing.? like, if someone spends 4 years studying marketing, what do they actually learn?
In: 4
Marketing, the art of selling you something you don’t need. So 4 years later, you could sell me a pen even if I didn’t ask for one.
My wife is a marketing director. When we met she scolded me for confusing/conflating it with advertising.
Advertising is draping a hot chick in a bikini over a car you want to sell.
Marketing is informing people that this Ferrari is built to x specification, has x history of excellence, reaches out to its database of former Ferrari owners, etc.
They learn to create discontent with the status quo. To make a person “need” something they may not have even known existed.
If someone spends 4 years studying marketing generally they have done a basic year of business where they will try out intro to accounting intro to macro or micro economics.
Some of the courses will be breadth requirements may be a history class or another language.
Some amount of marketing will go to what people are talking about how to create an advertisement how to display a product favorably. What is and isn’t legal presentation. How to use different platforms forms like online versus newspaper versus a billboard or bus add
Marketers also put a huge focus into learning markets and dissecting trends. It’s great that you can build an ad that appeals to 14 year olds but you also need to show me that there are enough 14 year olds willing to buy my product or get their parents to buy my product. This is where market analysis is important.
There are some other basic things like generally you go over human resources, talent acquisition, trading commodities.
Some of it is psychology, some is design, storytelling, business, etc.
Marketing is getting the word out and also the logistics of getting a product to the consumer.
Say you invent a drug, get FDA approval, now what? You need to let the medical community know, let patients know, get insurance to cover it, teach practices how to bill for it, there’s a ton of little but necessary communications that need to be created.
What is it? Why should I buy it? How do I buy it? And then a ton of legal and business stuff about what you can and can’t say, metrics and analytics for communication mediums, and a work stream for getting it all done.
Marketing is the Indirect method of reaching and educating your customers of your products and services. Can start with Advertising a car during the superbowl, followed by a website with more detailed specifications, cost, features and benefits.
Sales is the Direct method of contact/purchasing. Creating a system to buy (website check-out and payment) or having them go to an auto dealer to choose a specific model and finance plan from a salesperson.
Detailed article for Marketing Majors: [https://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/marketing-major-overview](https://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/marketing-major-overview)
Product: What are we selling? What should packaging look like?
Placement: How do we get the product to consumers?
Pricing: How much should we charge? Should we offer a discount to increase sales?
Promotion: How do we create interest in or awareness of the product?
Something not mentioned in the other comments is that marketing is not necessarily attached to a product. Marketing is about exploring, expanding and exploiting markets. Ideally marketing happens way before a product is developed. Marketeers identify groups of potential customers with a distinct need. This is called a market or market segment. Marketeers do a lot of research around the root of this customer’s need and how to fulfill it best. Then try to find ways to either develop a product or service to fit this need.
Part of the marketing process is advertising which focusses on the best way to communicate the existence and benefits of your product to this specific market.
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