When I was nine years old I asked my Aunt why companies marketed. She was a buyer of fashion clothes for a couple of different companies and has a marketing degree. Therefore, I place some weight upon her response. What she said really shocked and confused me because it seemed so obvious and simple but ineffective.
Well here it goes, “Imagine you walk into a shop and you want to buy toothpaste, the question that is posed to you as you stand in the isle is, which one? Now this is where marketing comes in, each product is similar and should have the same effect but each one is uniquely different as well. Therefore, the one what you will probably buy will be the one you recognize and know the best because someone has told you about it. And VOILA, there’s marketing. The larger companies like Colgate have marketed their product enough that when you think of buying toothpaste you automatically think of Colgate and will probably buy it.
Although this is only one minuet part of marketing it is the part that has struck me the most. I sometimes wonder if the amount of money that is spent of marketing is really worth it. However, I know that if you do not have a product that people know about or affiliate themselves with then your product is worthless. This is because one of the definitions of marketing is giving a product value. A product that no one knows about has no value and cannot sell. Therefore, marketing is needed to give that one product value.
Then next point that I am forced to think about though is is the amount of money invested in marketing worth the return you will make. This is tricky because that question can only be answered looking back from the future. At least that’s what I think, therefore, I think we need to learn how to estimate how much to put into marketing to create the product customers want, but will make us MONEY!!!
