No study of marketing is complete without taking a close look at the marketing history. The contemporary sense of marketing we use today began during the Industrial Revolution. Examining how different concepts evolved from their original ideas is beneficial to anyone who wants to develop a full understanding of marketing.
Marketing is, in some respects, as ancient as humanity itself. Like the scenes of crowded market stalls and traders actively engaged in persuasive communications in films set in ancient Greece. Of course, these activities would not be classified as marketing. They may appear to be quite different from someone booking plane tickets through a website. The modern notion of marketing is largely a result of advances throughout the industrial revolution.
This was a time of fast societal transformation because of technology and scientific advancements. As a result, for the first time, the production and consumption of things separated. Because of mass manufacturing, expanding transportation infrastructure, and expanding media, producers could develop some interesting ways of distribution management of the things they were selling. Those ways have been employed by marketers of all times. Including modern, although slight or drastic changes occurred overtime.
The study of the marketing history will tell you that marketing as we know it now is a very recent phenomenon. Marketing is still a relatively young discipline. Despite the fact that we may talk about a ‘marketing orientation,’ many organizations – particularly small and medium businesses – operate as if they are still in the production or sales orientation phase. Organizations may continue focus on production or sales if they don’t have a clear knowledge of marketing.
