Shashank Kapoor

SMBA14057

HISTORY of MARKETING

Marketing is as old as a civilization as in ancient Greece and Rome when the kings used to

rule there used to be lots of small stalls and these stall owners used to perform trading

activates and trying to convince people to buy their product( Persuasive communication), but

during that time this was not given the term marketing. It was just ways for people to earn a

living. This type of marketing was also seen in Egypt where people used to buy and sell

slaves and keeping in mind the direct mail marketing of Babylonian traders who wrote their

inventory on mud bricks and delivered them as they entered new towns. During this period

people used to travel a lot from one place to another to sell or buy their products.

It was only after the industrial revolution when things started to change.

18th and 19th century - Industrial revolution:-

This was the period of rapid social change driven by technological and scientific innovation.

One result was that for the first time the production of goods was separated from their

consumption. Mass production started taking place there was a new way of transportation

developed and mass media came into action, this brought about new ways for the producers

to manufacture their good in a better way, move their goods to different locations and inform

a large crowd about their product. During this period goods were scarce so producers could

sell whatever they produced as long as people had to money to buy those products. So

producers focused on production and distribution at the lowest possible cost.

The production orientation era- In much of the industrial revolution which began, goods

were generally scarce and producers could sell pretty much all that they could produce, as

long as people could afford to buy them. Their focus was therefore on production and

distribution at the lowest possible cost and what marketing management that there was

considered these issues (for example, reducing distribution costs, opening new markets).

The sales orientation era- From the start of the twentieth century to the period following the

Second World War (although the development was interrupted by the wars) competition grew

in many folds and the focus of marketing gradually transformed to selling. Communications,

Advertising and branding started to become more important as companies needed to sell the

increasing outputs of production in an increasingly crowded market. Marketing was therefore

still a 'slave' to production, but focussed on distribution, communication and persuading

customers that one manufacturer’s goods were better than the other.

The marketing orientation era- This is one of the most important eras of the evolution of

marketing. From the 1960s onwards most markets have become saturated (the size of the

market remains the same). This means that there is now intense competition for customers.

The sophistication of marketing management has therefore developed into what we now see

in a modern marketing department. Marketers are involved at a strategic level within the

organisation and therefore inform an organisation about what should be produced, where it

should be sold, how much should be charged for it and how it should be communicated to

consumers. Modern marketers research markets and consumers. They attempt to understand

consumer needs (and potential needs) and allocate organisational resources appropriately to

meet these needs. Modern marketers are particularly interested in brands. They are also

increasingly interested in ensuring that employees understand marketing, i.e. that everyone

within the organisation involves themselves with marketing activities. In more detail, many

theories have come into existence about the evolution of marketing and the different eras.

Some historians contradicted and some agreed upon this fact. Well, the advent of modern

marketing can be attributed to the 1900’.

The Advent of Modern Marketing- In any case, although aspects of marketing may have

existed sporadically for thousands of years, it is a fact that modern marketing was born only

in the beginning of the twentieth century. The term marketing itself was coined only around

that time, and marketing, as a subject warranting serious and scholarly inquiry, came into

being shortly thereafter.

Following is the timeline showing evolution in marketing-

In 1450 the printing press was invented by Gutenberg, this was the start of mass marketing

through brochures, fliers and direct mail. This also led to the mass production of printed

products but it had a major impact on marketing.

In 1730s magazines made their first appearance, this was another median which was used for

advertising and these advertisement catered to the niche market. This form of advertisements

catered to those people who could buy a magazine and not the rest of the population. But later

on in 1836 the true partnership between modern media and marketing was evolved as there

was a paid ad launched in a newspaper of France. Newspaper again catered to mass

population as everyone could but a newspaper.

In 1867 billboards were used for advertising. So basically the producers rented out billboards

for their advertisements and billboards are huge and it can be seen by everyone and this was

another way in which the companies make mass advertisements.

In 1880s trademarks come into action as producers make a unique logo/symbol for their

product which enables customers to identify their produce easily. Trademark enables

producers to sell their products as unique products. Thus differentiating their products from

other competitors in the market.

In the 1900s the importance of marketing was noticed by businessmen and so it was

implemented in universities.

In 1905 University of Pennsylvania offered a course called "The Marketing of Products".

This would enable to student to understand how to market products and how important it is to

market a product.

1908 saw the opening of the world-famous Harvard Business School, signalling to all that

“business” as an industry was here to stay

In 1910s terms were being defined, classifications being determined and conceptualization

being actualized, bringing marketing to life.

In 1920s basic principles of marketing were being integrated across mediums and in 1922

advertisements were make over the radio. This was another way in which companies reached

out to the public (Mass Media).

In 1930s marketing theory and specialization were developed. During this period the

marketing concept came into action. There was a lot of emphasis on selling and advertising.

The body boom after World War two created a tremendous market. Business scrambled to

capture their market share. Businesses know that they had to cater to the customer needs.

 The 1940s saw new demands being placed on marketers by a transforming business sector.

This led to a more scientific approach towards business marketing being developed,

culminating in the invention of the electronic computer, though it wouldn't be used for

marketing for some time.

In 1950s the marketers entered into telemarketing this was something new in which sellers

marketed their product over the phone or through web conferencing.

In 1960s and 70s there was a change in the politics and environmentalism of the global

market which proved that social changes were tightly tied to business marketing and

managing. The market had saturated but the size of the market remained the same, which

showed that there was a lot of competition for customers. The sophistication of marketing

management had developed to such an extent that we can relate to it with our modern

marketing departments. Marketers were involved to a strategic level within the organization

and therefore deciding on what should be produced, where it should be sold, how much

should be charged of it and how to it should be communicated to customers. Customers’

needs were understood and the organizational resources were allocated to meet those needs.

Modern marketers were interested in brands but they also make sure that their employees

understood marketing i.e. everyone in the organization is involved in the marketing activity.

In 1960 Jerome McCarthy came up with the 4P's also known as the marketing mix(A tool

used in marketing, is a crucial tool used which making a brand offering to the market and is

often associated with the 4P's). The 4P's are Product (What are the customer's needs), Price

(At what price to sell the product), Promotion (How to inform the customers about the

product), Place (Which area to sell the product).

In 1970s E-Commerce was invented this was another new platform where products could be

marketed and customers could buy product sitting at home and even buy products from

different places without travelling. This concept of marketing is still used.

In 1980s relationship marketing emerged, i.e. more importance was given to customers need

and wants and a relationship was the customers was built so that they feel satisfied with the

goods and services they get and not just dominating sales transactions. In this time businesses

began to apply marketing concepts more aggressively. In 1984 Guerilla marketing (A

marketing strategy in which low-cost, unconventional means like stickers, graffiti, flyers etc.

were used in a localized fashion to draw attention towards their product) conquered the

market for a long time. In 1985 there print media got a lot of freedom which gave the print

advertisement an enormous boost.

In the early1990s Integrated marketing communication (IMC- A method in which brand

messaging is done using different promotional methods to reinforce the product) and

Customer relationship management (CRM- A system for managing a company's interactions

with current and future customers. it uses technology to organize, automate and synchronize

sales, marketing, customer service and technical support) became the marketing and

promotions planning systems that would bring about a change in their earlier methods of

business and transform it into a modern era of marketing. In 1995 the "dot com" crazy began

and this was known to everyone and the online advertisements began to boom and companies

started creating their own websites so that customers can get more information about their

product. (The 70s E-Commerce introduction flourished the market at this stage). In 1996 viral

marketing (Marketing techniques that use pre-existing social network services and other

technologies to increase brand awareness or to achieve marketing objectives) started and it is

still prevailing the market.

During this period the concept of 4C's was introduced. The 4C's are Consumer (Marketers

should study the need of the customers in order to attract them to purchase their products),

Cost (The cost of the product should be reasonable so that the customer can buy it, Although

there are a lot of cost involved in manufacturing a product but the company show provide the

customer with a reasonable price), Communication (The way marketers attract their

customers), Convenience (The best was a marketer can make things easy for their customers)

In 2002 integrated marketing receives its first dedicated academic research center, another in

the long line of marketing establishments that will propel marketing into the future.

Many marketing historians have based their formulations of the growth of modern marketing

on Robert Keith's widely cited article "The marketing revolution" ((1960, Journal of

Marketing) which followed marketing's development at the Pillsbury Company for almost a

century between 1869 and 1960. According to Keith, Pillsbury's marketing

pattern encompassed four eras:

1 The production era -from the firm's beginnings in 1869 to the 1930s:

It was characterized by a concentration of efforts and capital into production. It was kick-

started by the availability of raw material and mechanical power necessary in the

manufacturing process. Pillsbury, typical for many production companies of that time,

concentrated on its mission of manufacturing one basic product.

2 The sales era - the 1930s to 1950s: 

For Pillsbury was marked by vigorous efforts into selling supported by market intelligence

and consumer advertising. Customers’ needs and wants became paramount: For the first time

we began to be highly conscious of the customer, her wants and her prejudices, as a key

factor in the business equation" The distribution network was given a renewed attention, and

its importance as the vital link with the customer became more focused.

3 The marketing era -1950s until 1960s:

The emergence of brand marketing, with one individual having total responsibility for the

brand, covering pricing, research, competition, servicing, advertising planning and control,

sales promotions and budgets. The competition became acute and the focus on the customer

paramount.

4 The marketing control era -1960s onwards:

The beginning of a new and revolutionary phase whereby the consumer orientation would

become the focus for the whole company.

Marketing historians considered that the Pillsbury experience was typical of many us

companies and generalized Keith's paradigm in order to explain the evolution of marketing.

Because of its elegant simplicity and seemingly wide application it has been used extensively

in academic texts and teaching of marketing.

So by looking at the whole timeline what we take?

Firstly, consider that marketing started as an inward looking discipline – focussing on what

the organisation produced. Now marketing is outward looking. It brings an understanding of

markets and of consumers into the organisation.

Secondly, you might consider that the marketing that you are familiar with today is, in fact, a

very recent development – marketing is still a very new subject. You might also note that

although we can talk about a ‘marketing orientation’, many organisations – especially small

and medium enterprise – act as though they are still in the period of production or sales

orientation. In the absence of a good understanding of marketing, organisations may still

focus on production or sales.

Thirdly, modern definitions of marketing hide the fact that the development of modern

marketing management has not been a coordinated process. Origins in production and

managing distribution mean that manufacturers have been quicker to adopt marketing

practice than, say, the service sector, including banks and much of the tourism industry.

Finally you might consider that marketing has changed rapidly over this century and it

continues to change. The sorts of activities that you might be involved with at the end of your

marketing career might be very different from the marketing we see today. As a professional

marketer you should be particularly sensitive to changes in society, technology, and the world

economy.

It is hard for many to believe, but when compared to economics, production and operations,

accounting and other business areas, marketing is a relatively young discipline having

emerged in the early 1900s. Prior to this time most issues that are now commonly associated

with marketing were either assumed to fall within basic concepts of economics (e.g., price

setting was viewed as a simple supply/demand issue), advertising (well developed by 1900),

or in most cases, simply not yet explored (e.g., customer purchase behaviour, importance of

distribution partners). At the organizational level, marketing is a vital business function that

is necessary in nearly all industries whether the organization operates as a for-profit or as a

not-for-profit. For the for-profit organization, marketing is responsible for most tasks that

bring revenue and, hopefully, profits to an organization. For the not-for-profit organization,

marketing is responsible for attracting customers needed to support the not-for-profit’s

mission, such as raising donations or supporting a cause. For both types of organizations, it is

unlikely they can survive without a strong marketing effort.

Led by marketing scholars from several major universities, the development of marketing

was in large part motivated by the need to dissect in greater detail relationships and

behaviours that existed between sellers and buyers. In particular, the study of marketing led

sellers to recognize that adopting certain strategies and tactics could significantly benefit the

seller/buyer relationship. In the old days of marketing (before the 1950s) this often meant

identifying strategies and tactics for simply selling more products and services with little

regard for what customers really wanted. Often this meant companies embraced a “sell-as-

much-as-we-can” philosophy with little concern for building relationships for the long term.

In the last two decades of the twentieth century, the marketing of services has received

special attention from marketers. The realization that all multi attribute options on the market

are essentially services and that they simply vary on the magnitude of tangibility has given a

fillip to the area of services marketing. Further, the notions of credence and experiential

qualities seem even more relevant to services.

The consumerism movement championed by Nader in the early 1960s paved the way for

tackling public policy issues in the consumer-marketplace domain, including public safety,

consumer education, effects of marketing on children, and the environment. Public safety

coupled with a concern for the fragile environment has given rise to green marketing. As life

expectancy has increased significantly around the world, and as the chronologically older

segments seem to have more discretionary income and special needs, marketers have focused

a significant amount of attention on these segments. Terms like aging and mature marketing

have suddenly assumed considerable importance.

We have seen the emergence of the post purchase phase as even more vital than the pre

purchase phase, as evidenced by the blossoming of research in the areas of customer

satisfaction, dissatisfaction, complaint behaviours, and public policy issues pertaining to

product liability. In more recent times, marketers have been sensitized to the importance of

developing and nurturing a relationship with their customers and suppliers, and this has given

rise to the area of relationship marketing, which is assuming increasing importance as time

passes. The advances here entail a melding together of knowledge from the basic disciplines

with new ideas from marketers.

Social-responsibility issues triggered and illuminated by credit card misuse brought

marketers into the area of deviant consumption behaviour, compulsive buying in particular,

and many researchers in marketing have contributed to the growth of literature on compulsive

buying. Also, very recently, there has been some sensitization to the role of marketers in the

lives of special people in our society, leading to the coining of the term special marketing.

We have seen a swift evolution in marketing research. An area where marketers have

consistently provided innovations. Marketers have taken us from simple perceptual- maps to

various levels of gap maps to sophisticated multidimensional scaling techniques, thereby

adding to the avenues of inputs to managerial decision making and product positioning.

 In market segmentation alone, we have gone, in only 50-plus years, from a consideration of

basic demographics to detailed demographics including socioeconomic indicators,

personality variables, lifestyle aspects, and psychographics. Marketing research coupled with

information systems and decision support systems has evolved into marketing intelligence.

We have come a long way in understanding the concept of innovation. In the process, we

have seen the various shapes that the product life cycle can take owing to factors of

innovation and obsolescence. We have also debated whether the process of new product

development and management should be a neat, sequentially phased process or an

overlapping process. We have considered the factors of degree of innovation and speed of

entry into the market in new product strategies. Of course, we have developed a number of

models for each stage in the concept life cycle, starting with the idea generation, to screening

of concepts, all the way to the launch cycle in commercialization.