Need for Marketing Concept

Although it was felt like a revolution has happened in the 1960s, the idea that the entire activity of a business should be devoted to serving its customers’ interests, was not really new. One of the first and most famous writers on economics, the Scotsman Adam Smith already stated in 1776: “Consumption is the sole end and purpose of all production; and the interest of the producer ought to be attended to, only so far as it may be necessary for promoting that of the consumer.

The maxim is so perfectly self-evident that it would be absurd to attempt to prove it. But in the mercantile systems, the interest of the consumer is almost constantly sacrificed to that of the producer; and it seems to consider production, and not consumption, as the ultimate end and object of all industry and commerce.”

Why has ‘marketing’ and the ‘marketing concept’ come into prominence only fairly recently as an important aspect of management? This has been primarily caused by the growing complexity of modern industrial nations which were inclined to obscure the relationship between supplier and user. Some important aspects of this relationship are the following:

The chain of communication between basic producer and ultimate consumer can be very long. The manufacturer supplies wholesalers or overseas agents who, in turn, supply retailers from whom the consumer buys. Manufacturer may never meet consumer;

The big development of the Industrial Revolution was mass production. Many goods became available for consumption or use by ordinary people for the first time, because they could be produced in large quantity and therefore cheaply. Production on an ever-bigger scale was often the major factor in supplying customers’ needs. There was a ready market waiting for the goods that were produced;

As basic needs become satisfied, people turn to more and more complex goods and services. It is likely that this will require a more sophisticated approach from suppliers, more investigation of customers’ needs, and greater communication with customers;

As companies themselves become bigger and more complex, there is a greater tendency for objectives to become confused. (The entrepreneur running a small localized business, dealing with sales, production and finance himself, stands a much better chance of correctly divining how to turn customers’ needs into profitable business);

Due to increasing social economic and technological changes, the need for planned monitoring and responding to changing customer requirements became an important activity in business enterprises.