Marketing Experts in their own minds

There are some clever internet-savvy individuals in cyber space that THINK they are marketing experts. Why? They can promote a web page, vendor or affiliate e-business; generate high hit rates, Google page rank, or clicks on pay-per-click.
These people are NOT marketing experts - they are sales promotions specialists in a subset of one single medium, the web.
Sure they have medium-specific copy-writing skills, but less have design skills - so they are not even ADVERTISING experts, they might, at best, be on-line promotions experts.

If they did understand marketing, they'd be thinking long-term, they'd be working for a higher purpose, and they'd be providing non-sales driven service to lead their industry, not milk it.

If they did understand marketing, they'd know their success is (mainly) due to having the right skills at the right time and being in the right place – “luck” as described by our on-house PhD mathematician on probability.

If they did understand marketing, there wouldn’t be this fury of selling without fulfilling expectations of customers… there’d be no SPAM, there’d be no price competition, there’d be recognised brand awareness, industry controls, standards and benchmarks that could be both believed and trusted.

If they did understand marketing, they wouldn’t CALL themselves marketing experts… they’d stop hiding under the layperson ambiguous misinterpretation of the word and come out and describe themselves honestly.

No, in fact they are cowboys… wild uncontrollable, dangerous, misleading, shoot-em-up, party hard and die young cowboys.

Some will survive, some will evolve. Some will make some much money in the short-term and get out before they a lynched, imprisoned or shot…. And some will learn the science, the craft, the finesse, the sophistication and the power of marketing.

If you want a reasonable definition of “marketing", just visit: http://bit.ly/MktgDef

What IS "marketing"?

Some people think 'marketing' is organizing brochures, and trade shows, getting advertising booked and making sure advertisements are typo free.
Others perceive 'marketing' as 'selling'... getting people to buy whatever is is your organization 'sells'.
Street-wise executives of medium and large companies recognize marketing as managing price, product, promotions and distribution (place)... commonly described as "The Four P's".
Winning companies, global giants, heads of industry, and leading consultancies understand 'marketing' is even more!
(People wanting a more detailed explanation should go to http://www.launchengineering.com/marketing.htm)
However, too few key decision makers understand the power, potential and promise that understanding of marketing can deliver in terms of sales and profits.
Successful companies, particularly larger ones, develop an almost impenetrable aura of arrogance... smaller companies, who have not had the skills to apply the science of marketing, or recognize that an 'ideas guy" is not a marketing expert, have failed to correctly apply 'marketing' to their advantage and no blame the tool, rather than themselves, for that failure.
Despite this, insightful management asks.... "How can a company spend $5M in launching a product, knowing it is not going to fail, and how do they do that over and over again?"
The answer is good understanding of marketing.... small companies fall over time and time again, large ones not only cope with INefficiencies of scale, but prosper... WHEN WILL THE SME SECTOR learn?
HOW can "marketing" be properly understood by SME entrepreneurs?
(People looking to comprehend the breadth of marketing science should go to http://www.launchengineering.com/MarketingPlanning.htm)
WHAT can be done to differentiate between promotions, advertising, selling and the REAL meaning of 'marketing'?
It has been suggested that lack of education is the root of all the world's problems... perhaps we simply need better education for our executives?
I recently coached a CPA in their final subject, amused to see 'marketing' tools as part of the course work presented as an accounting discipline... however, this is the beginning of better management.
When is becomes as mandatory for marketing qualifications in marketing managers, as it is for legal quals in law, or medical ones in medicine, THEN we WILL see a difference.