what’s in a word?
Grant and I will be facing off in the 1% Army showdown very soon. In an ironic twist (although some might not call it irony, so you’ll just have to trust me), I’ve got a bit of an itch about dropping the word “marketing” from lexicons everywhere.
Maybe it’s just semantics, but I don’t think any one word will ever change an entire field of work. To view Pier Fawkes’ move (he dropped the word “marketing” from his “marketing” conference) as a trigger to denote when marketing ceased to be “marketing,” seems to omit some very important considerations. Case in point…
Grant notes, “If “marketing” were a brand, we would have redesigned and relaunched it a long time ago.” This is a maybe/maybe not statement. People tire of their brands long before the world has tired of them. Sure, those of us in the field feel the term “marketing” is a bit empty, a bit vague, a bit underappreciated - but Coca-Cola has had the same name and logo for 121 years.
Piers’ argument is that, “Marketing doesn’t really encompass the solutions that people are generating in business today.” I agree wholeheartedly. Marketing doesn’t encompass people’s solutions - and it shouldn’t - marketing is taking lessons from people’s solutions, not generating people’s solutions. When the Mentos/Coke Experiment hit prime time, marketers scrambled to replicate the viral effect. Now we tell our clients that we’ve internalized the best practices, but to appreciate that an element of chance still exists.
The other reason why marketing doesn’t encompass today’s user-generated solutions is because marketing doesn’t own the tools. These aren’t the days of media buys with economies of scale, prime time slots and billboards at the corner of Bay and Bloor. Now “people” have access to the same tools as “marketers.” We don’t mind of course, but it does make our job less about “showing the way” and more about recognizing it when we see it.
Piers also notes, “Marketing comes with all the bad baggage that advertising and promotions has generated (e.g. urban spam).” He’s right, there’s no doubt about it. Also of note is that Tylenol came with Cyanide, Apple came with John Sculley, and Daimler came with Chrysler. Rebounds aren’t just for Britney Spears.
Lastly, Piers concludes, “Marketing (as a word) isn’t accessible to a new generation of creative minds.” This may also be true. They (the new generation) don’t see “ideas” as necessarily equating to “marketing,” despite all the cache given to the word “ideas” by big agencies over the last decade. This generation just sees avenues for acquiring gold stars. 1000 people join your Facebook group… star. 1,000,000 video views… star. Marketing, despite all it’s creativity, is profit driven. The motivation for this new generation is to try, not for profit, for fun.
I’m all for changing the game. Marketing doesn’t mean what it used to and it won’t mean what it does now in another 10 years. But despite all of this, something tells me the scope, like a person, is not defined by a name.
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Someone who talks a lot, listens a lot, sings on the streets and loves big ideas. If you need a discipline or two for piece of mind, try Marketer and Entrepreneur. If you need a title to legitimize why you'd waste your time here, I can't help you. I work with people on fire for the things they love.
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