What is marketing anyway?

When people think about marketing, most commonly they think of two things:

1. Selling -
    personal selling of goods and services

2. Advertising

Advertising and selling, however, are just two of the many marketing activities.

In general, marketing activities are all those associated with identifying the particular wants and needs of a target group of customers "the market", and then going about satisfying those customers better than the competitors. This involves doing market research on customers, analyzing their needs, and then making strategic decisions about product design, pricing, promotion and distribution.

By contrast, the act of selling is a one-to-one activity. A sales man is trying to determine which features or attributes of a product or service would most benefit the individual or individual company so that they will make a purchase.

Marketing is: an organisational function and a set of processes for creating, communicating and delivering value to customers and for managing customer relationships in ways that benefit the organisation and its stakeholders.