Someone once said, “Did you know that reading the marketing textbook is a good way to procrastinate studying for the accounting midterm?”.
While the message it sends is not very beneficial to students (you MUST study accounting if you want to pass), its not completely untrue. Studying marketing doesn’t just mean that you read the textbook or memorize Tamar’s notes….it has a lot more to do with observing the world.
Observing consumer action/reactions are a major component of how we learn about marketing. Knowing the customer, knowing suppliers and building relationships with them is very important if you want to keep up with the up-and-coming trends and ideas in the business world. This is definitely not something you can learn from a textbook (its a lot more fun than a textbook 😀 ), and is definitely something you need to learn if you want to be successful in the marketing profession.
So the million dollar question is: how does a university student with piling homeworks and midterms galore find the time to notice anything but her textbook?
I leave you with another question: Even though observing consumers is essential to marketing, at what point does a social experiment cross ethical boundaries?
Good night folks <3