The ‘life’ of marketing / J.J. (Hein) Prinsloo

Abstract

Everybody seems to be able to do marketing until they actually have to do marketing. The word marketing is originally a derivation from the Latin word “mercatus”, meaning marketplace or merchant. In general, marketing is both a business science and the science of art. Marketing as a business science does have set rules with quantifiable results, followed by scholars and practitioners alike. Therefore, marketing will remain incomplete if one disassociates academia from industry. Evolutionary and market-related changes continuously influence and contribute to the evolvement of this science. Marketing, as the science of art, does seem to be flexible during the interpretation thereof. Both scholars and practitioners approach ‘marketing as an art’ individualistically. Therefore, the contextual environment (scholarly or industry) influences the creator. Torok (www.PowerMarketing.ca) encapsulates marketing as follows “…marketing is a science that should draw upon the art. Never let art dictate the direction of your marketing. Use science to determine decisions and use art for the nuances”. The question, therefore, is: What elements represent this ‘art’ within marketing? This lecture feeds from both. Unlike the chronologically sequential belief by Torok (science followed by art), the contextual (art) leads and science follows.