COMPLACENT MARKETING
THE POST
MARKETING ERA:
NEW MARKETING!
By Diana Obath
O
n Friday 17th December
2004, Traditional marketing
– marketing as we know it
– died peacefully in its sleep. It took
its last breath and bowed out. It
died. Nobody attended the funeral
because nobody even realized it was
dead. Truth is, even today, people
believe it is alive.
So what was everybody busy
with on that day anyway? The
one millionth user signed up to
Facebook on that day, and the rules
changed by sunrise. The power shift
happened and life was sucked out
of traditional into digital and online
media. This could be the reason
that had since sparked increased
conversations years later among
marketing professionals that about
the death of marketing. Is it too
late to start writing an obituary of
our own profession?
Surprisingly or not, if that be
the case then marketing was on
its death bed last millennium
when David Packard, founder of
Hewlett-Packard (HP) thought
that marketing was essentially
unfit to be left for the marketing
professionals. He is known for
his famous quote: Marketing is
too important to be left to the
marketing department. So what
happened when he took it from
them? HP is a case study for the
Madison Avenue era of marketing.
At the end of the century, in
‘‘ The role of the marketer has changed,
and so have the tools of the trade. The pace
of change is rapid and change is the only
constant. However, the basics that encompass
marketing, as we know it still remain product,
price place and promotion. Even then change
is happening around the 4P’s fast.’’
16 MAL 19/17 ISSUE
2010, Jack Trout revisited this
same debate all over again. He
says, ‘Marketing decisions: Too
important for marketers’. According
to Trout, marketers therefore, are
unable to solve marketing problems
on their own.
In both scenarios, and as it is
today - the role of the marketer
has changed, and so have the tools
of the trade. The pace of change
is rapid and change is the only
constant. However, the basics that
encompass marketing, as we know
it still remain product, price place
and promotion. Even then change
is happening around the 4P’s fast.
On Death And Dying …
We all agree that the work
marketers’ do is not easy. Every
time you put out an ad, every body
from the CEO to your son has an
opinion about it.
The shelf life of marketing is
getting shorter accelerated by
how digital media is changing our
lives. We are in the most populous,
developing and adapting part of the
world and mobile phones are not