Marketing is the final concept of the market cycle, it is the work with the market to make exchanges, the purpose of which is to meet human needs and wants. The process of exchange requires work: it is the search for buyers, identifying their needs, designing appropriate goods, promoting them in the market, warehousing, transportation, pricing, service organization, advertising. The role of marketing in the economy is to increase its trade and operational efficiency. At the modern stage marketing is understood as an expression of a market-oriented managerial style of thinking, capable not only to react to the development of the market situation, but also to change the parameters of the environment itself, providing market entry, market expansion, market security
Marketing is one of the fundamental disciplines for professional marketers, such as retailers, advertising workers, marketing researchers, managers of new and branded goods production, etc. They need to know how to describe the market and divide it into segments, how to assess the needs, demands and preferences of consumers in the target market, how to design and test a product with the consumer properties necessary for this market, how to use the price to deliver the value of the product to the consumer, how to select intelligent intermediaries, so that the product is widely available and well presented, how to advertise and sell the product so that consumers know it and want to buy it.
Active market activity is now the cornerstone of economic development of enterprises. Nowadays the knowledge of the final consumer and the ability to react flexibly to all his requirements become vitally important. Otherwise, it is impossible to ensure the sale of goods, increased profitability of the enterprise. It is imperative to study the possibilities and effectiveness of various forms and methods of selling goods, to work on forming the demands of the population, increasing the prestige of the trading firm. This type of economic behavior of enterprises is usually associated with marketing, which has proven itself in foreign practice of organization of production and sales activities of enterprises in a competitive economy. Today there is practically no industrialized country, where marketing activity is not practiced in one way or another. Firms, focused on marketing, are more competitive, suffer less losses, lead in profitability.
In a market economy, the function of marketing is to organize a free and competitive exchange to ensure an effective match between supply and demand for goods and services. This correspondence is not spontaneous and requires:
- The organization of material exchange, in other words, the physical flow of goods between production and the consumer;
- organization of communication, in other words, the information flow that precedes, accompanies and follows the exchange to ensure an effective match between supply and demand.
- Thus, the role of marketing is to organize exchange and communication between sellers and buyers.
The role of marketing in the economy is to bring production in line with demand. The efforts of marketing services are aimed at creating a range of goods that meets public demand. Much attention is paid to the appearance of the goods, their consumer characteristics, and after-sales service. At the same time marketing efforts should be aimed at convincing the buyer that the given product is the best, to create a “commitment” of the buyer to the product brand.
Marketing is aimed at finding the most effective combination of traditional and new products, it is the basis for making decisions about expanding or reducing production, modernizing products or removing them from production, and it contributes to the development and implementation of enterprise development plans. Systematic and effective marketing increases the culture of entrepreneurial activity, allows enterprises to effectively link resources with goals, and goals – with the demands of customers.
The need for a market-based management concept in marketing has become especially felt recently due to the intensification of competition in countries with market economies.
Marketing increases the validity of decisions on various issues of production, research and production, financial and sales activities, extending consistency to the sphere of market relations. It is reflected in the rationalization of the process of commodity circulation, improvement of practice of accounting and forecasting of the market situation in the process of intrafirm planning. Marketing makes it possible to find means of mitigation and elimination of overproduction crises, to ensure conformity of supply and demand.
Marketing has an important economic role to play in a market economy. Not only because it ensures an effective match between supply and demand, but also because it triggers a virtuous cycle of economic development, whose stages are as follows:
- Marketing discovers unmet needs and develops accordingly adapted products;
- marketing implements an action plan, which leads to the creation and growth of demand for these new goods;
- the growing demand leads to a reduction in costs, which lowers prices, bringing new groups of buyers to the market;
- this market expansion attracts new investment, which allows for economies of scale and the development of improved or new products.
Marketing is a factor in economic democracy because it creates a system that:
a) listens to the voice of the buyer;
b) focuses investment and production on foreseeable needs;
c) takes into account the diversity of needs through market segmentation;
d) stimulates innovation and entrepreneurial activity.