In any business, the basic idea is that the company sells a product or service to its customers and profit from the sales. However, a customer does not just walk into the company’s store out of the blue to purchase something. The fact that the company exists and sells a certain product needs to be communicated to the target audience. This happens through marketing, which promotes one’s brand, company, product, or service through various channels, the most important being advertisement. Marketing leads to sales. The two terms are often used interchangeably, but there are stark differences. The concept of marketing helps determine the best marketing strategy for a company.

The Concept of Marketing

The concept of marketing (also called marketing philosophies) is primarily based on the ‘right’ principle, which forms the foundation of marketing strategies. Marketing involves researching and finding out the buyers’ needs and how your product or service is aligning with those needs. Through marketing, you communicate to a mass audience how your company is solving their problems. Many factors have to be considered, including but not limited to the price of the product, the product itself, promotion strategy, and channel. The crux of the right principle is that marketing should be such that it creates maximum value for both customers and the company. 

The marketing concept involves market research and the use of the data to understand customers’ requirements and then the development of marketing strategies that cater to those requirements. It works for the satisfaction of customers. Using the concept of marketing, a company can get a competitive advantage over its competing companies as it can create more value for its target audience.

Five primary marketing philosophies are as follows:

• Production Concept: The main objective of this is to increase production while simultaneously decreasing the cost of production. It assumes that customers prefer products that are readily available and inexpensive. 
• Product Concept: It is somewhat the opposite of the production concept. The objective is to increase the product quality as it is believed that customers give the most importance to quality. Price takes a back seat when customers are getting innovative products. The companies in the tech sector most widely adopt this concept.
• Selling Concept: Marketing through tactics like clearance sales, end-of-season sales, heavy discounts, etc., comes under the category of selling the concept of marketing. It is motivated by the company’s need to sell, rather than the customers’ requirement to purchase. The motive is to clear the items in inventory, which would otherwise be wasted if not sold. It makes use of aggressive marketing strategies for product promotion. This concept is also employed for products with certain drawbacks associated with them, which customers could find unappealing. For example, coca-cola does extensive advertising because it has a lot of health problems associated with its consumption. To counter this, they rely on the selling concept of marketing.
• Marketing Concept: Also known as the ‘customer-first approach’, it is a strategy that the company adopts to stand out from its competitions. Keeping customers’ requirements in mind and the product USP (unique selling proposition) is highlighted.
• Societal Concept: It is a relatively newer concept of marketing that focuses on the company’s moral obligation to its environment. Both customers’ and society’s well-being should be preserved. It makes use of sustainable practices to preserve the environment.

These marketing concepts are not independent of each other. The crux remains that it should promote the product among the company’s target audience in a way that appeals to them as well as benefits the company.

Functions of Marketing

• Promotion: It creates brand awareness and drives customers to purchase your company’s products. 
• Selling: This is one of the most important functions of marketing. The primary purpose is to generate sales, which would bring in revenue for the company.
• Product and Service Management: It improves the quality, design, and competitiveness of the product or service in the market. It is done by analysing the competitors’ products and taking feedback from the existing customers.
• Marketing Information Management: Today’s world is largely data-driven, and one function that marketing serves is to collect data about the company’s target audience, ranging from their needs, purchasing habits, pressure points, etc. It helps in product development and in devising marketing strategies.
• Financing: It helps to raise funds to finance the company’s operations. 
• Distribution: It is the process of making your product and service available to the customer at the right place and time. Retail stores, catalogues, sales calls, etc., are channels of distribution.
• Pricing: Deciding the price at which customers can afford the product is another marketing function.

Conclusion

The concept of marketing helps determine which factor the company should focus the most on to drive sales and serve other marketing functions. There are marketing philosophies, and they should be carefully orchestrated to help realise the organisational goals. The oldest concept of marketing is the production concept, and the newest one is the societal concept. The various functions of marketing are achieved by adopting these marketing philosophies.