Marketing in economics, that part of the process of production
and exchange that is concerned with the flow of goods and services
from producer to consumer. In popular usage it is defined as the
distribution and sale of goods, distribution being understood
in a broader sense than the technical economic one. Marketing
includes the activities of all those engaged in the transfer of
goods from producer to consumer - not only those who buy and sell
directly, wholesale and retail, but also those who develop, warehouse,
transport, insure, finance, or promote the product, or otherwise
have a hand in the process of transfer. In a modern capitalist
economy, where nearly all production is intended for a market,
such activities are just as important as the manufacture of the
goods. It is estimated in the United States that approximately
50% of the retail price paid for a commodity is made up of the
cost of marketing.
In a subsistence-level economy there is little need for exchange
of goods because the division of labor is at a rudimentary level:
most people produce the same or similar goods. Interregional exchange
between disparate geographic areas depends on adequate means of
transportation. Thus, before the development of caravan travel
and navigation, the exchange of the products of one region for
those of another was limited. The village market or fair, the
itinerant merchant or peddler, and the shop where customers could
have such goods as shoes and furniture made to order were features
of marketing in rural Europe. The general store superseded the
public market in England and was an institution of the American
country town. |
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