Navigating the Marketing Maze: From Manipulation to Meaningful Connection

In 1969, Philip Kotler and Sidney Levy, recognised by many as two of the main contributors to marketing and consumer behaviour in the twentieth century, proposed two possibilities for how modern marketing could be seen:

Possibility 1, where marketing conjures up the terms selling, influencing, and persuading, where it is seen as a huge and increasingly dangerous technology, making it possible to sell persons on buying things, propositions and causes they either do not want or which are bad for them.

Possibility 2 is the concept of sensitively servicing and satisfying human needs. Marketing is the function that can keep in constant touch with the organisation's consumers, read their needs, develop 'products' that meet these needs and build a program of communications to express the organisation's purposes.

Kotler and Levy contended that selling and influencing will be significant parts of marketing, but properly seen, selling follows rather than precedes the organisation's drive to create products to satisfy its consumers.

Which path did marketing ultimately follow, where has it taken us, and what have been the broader consequences for marketing and sustainability?

Marketing and alchemy

According to the Chartered Institute of Marketing, marketing is the 'management process responsible for profitably identifying, anticipating, and satisfying customer requirements.

Traditionally, marketing has operated through either a classical make-and-sell approach, which focuses on driving success by increasing sales of a company's core goods/services, or the neo-classical approach of sense-and-respond, which involves discovering and meeting the customer's demands.

Up until the early twentieth century, marketers focused on functional differentiation. Marketing effectiveness was primarily based on their ability to spotlight functional reasons to buy specific products when people needed them. 

With increasing competition, businesses sought better ways to differentiate themselves beyond the purely functional. In 1947, Edward Bernays published the results of his work experimenting with psychoanalysis to develop techniques for widespread behavioural manipulation in a seminal paper called 'The Engineering of Consent'. It became the foundation of the public relations industry and heavily influenced the way products were marketed and sold to consumers. 

Marketing effectiveness was no longer determined by its ability to raise awareness or harvest existing demand simply but by its ability to deepen and diversify the needs and wants that could be met through personal consumption. 

Marketing today 

Fast-forward to today's era, saturated with digital advertising, social media, endless content, and performance marketing. Marketing has become fixated on performance-based growth, which is eroding overall effectiveness and undermining its value.

We inhabit a digital landscape dominated by attention, validation, and fame, where clicks, views, and likes serve as currency. The most prevalent strategies involve shouting loudly and incessantly or provoking strong reactions. Our smartphones provide a continuous stream of comfort food 24x7x365, with algorithms flattening our culture and forcing us to tailor content and ideas to fit their feeds.

We are surrounded by a 'sea of sameness' that has enveloped us all. The images we share on Instagram, the music we enjoy, the programmes we stream, the applications we use, the websites we frequent, the brand logos we encounter, and the visual appeal designed to make websites, ads, posts, and content appealing and engaging are beginning to look increasingly alike. 

Marketing is still debating traditional brand building versus performance and differentiation versus distinctiveness. However, it agrees that commercial growth remains the main priority.

The only way to a happier life is through consumption

Consumption has become less reflective of our physical needs and more reflective of our runaway psychology. 

We buy brands to boost our mood and feelings, reinforce or enhance our self- or desired identity, or elevate our social status above others.

Marketing has manipulated our behaviour and hijacked our impulses to: 

• seek pleasure and avoid pain;
• acquire, amass and defend resources from competitors;
• display dominance, status or sex appeal through size, beauty, physicality, aggression and/or ornamentation;
• procrastinate rather than act whenever action does not have an immediate survival benefit, particularly for ourselves, close relatives and our home territories. 

Brands, advertising, social media and influencers continuously promote aspirational and seemingly 'perfect' lifestyles. Adfree Cities have aptly captured this sentiment:

„Whether it is the myth of a perfect body, a perfect family Christmas or a perfect holiday, advertisers are on hand with the promise of a perfect lifestyle. The message: if we would just buy their product, then we too could reach that perfection.”

The destructive effects of the marketing machine 

The marketing model of the 4 Ps (product, price, place, promotion) has been refined and optimised over more than 60 years of experience. Today's advertising offers people a wholly unrealistic view of happiness, closely linking it to aspiration, status, wealth, and power. 

Despite the considerable money spent on brands, these ideals are either fleeting or only partially attainable. 

More worryingly, the continual generation of demand and consumption is exerting unprecedented pressure on our natural environment, leading to environmental degradation, the loss of animal and plant species and habitats, pollution, climate change, and escalating social inequality and poverty.

Need more proof? Humans currently use as many ecological resources as if we lived on 1.71 Earths. 

Figure 1. Ecological overshoot in the number of Earths required. Data from Global Footprint Network – June 2023.

Rockström et al. encapsulate our predicament in one uncomfortable and sobering truth: 

„These (human) behaviours are collectively highly maladaptive, even suicidal for humanity.”

Therefore, marketing must take meaningful action to use its skills to notice and change its consequences and drive positive solutions. This means rethinking our modes of production and consumption and reducing how much we produce and consume. 

A new approach to marketing

Alexis Eyre and Paul Randle present a compelling argument for sustainable marketing in their thought-provoking book, ' Sustainable Marketing – The Industry's Role in a Sustainable Future'. 

The current marketing approach prioritises extracting value at the expense of society and the environment, with its sole objective being to drive financial growth.

We must reassess marketing's role for the future if we wish for it to become a catalyst for positive business change. It should consider the long-term welfare of individuals, nature, and the planet, aligning itself with commercial interests and societal and environmental impacts.

Sustainability must be integrated into every facet of a company's operations, including branding, marketing, and advertising, as well as strategies, governance, and how it defines and measures success.

As Paul Polman, former CEO of Unilever, profoundly stated: 

„The role of business, first and foremost, is to make a positive contribution to society; otherwise, it has no reason to exist.”

Marketing for good

Sustainability compels businesses to reassess their purpose and redefine success with the common good in mind. 

Imagine if we made sustainable choices more accessible, affordable, and aspirational. If we aided individuals in recognising that our purchases don't define a good life but by what we protect, preserve, and pass on to future generations.

Sir David Attenborough famously stated, 'Saving our planet is now a communications challenge.' And who better to rise to that challenge than marketers, the individuals who craft the messages the world encounters daily? 

Marketing can help reprogramme and reprioritise these aspirations.

This is not optional. It represents the future of business. It calls for companies and brands to redefine success in terms of the common good, balance commercial, societal, and environmental objectives, and commit to long-term systemic change.

This will become the table stakes, and those who commit and lead will pioneer a new generation of regenerative, restorative and reparative businesses.

As Patagonia's CEO, Ryan Gellert, states, „Sustainability isn't simply a goal that a company can achieve and then move on to other things: this is the work, forever and all time.”

Marketing needs to choose its path wisely

Fifty-six years after Kotler and Levy envisioned the future of modern marketing, the industry must once again engage in self-reflection and pose a challenging question to itself:

Is marketing rising to the climate change challenge and doing good marketing that's marketing for good?

Good marketers are uniquely positioned to help accelerate this mindset change. They are the ones who dare to care, refuse to stand still, and turn hope into action and action into impact.

Good marketing isn't just about selling anymore. It's about shaping a shared future we can all be proud of and want to be part of, and it contributes to a thriving future for all.

Marketing holds the potential to be a powerful force for good, contributing to the creation of a more positive world and fostering meaningful change. Let's hope it seizes this opportunity and makes a better choice this time.

As Václav Havel famously said: „Hope is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out.”

Graeme Murray is a marketing lecturer at Newton University, where he teaches Integrated Marketing Communications and Sustainable Marketing. He is also a practising brand and sustainable marketing strategist, helping clients and communication agencies find comfort in the uncomfortable through good marketing that's marketing for good.

Sources used:

• Kotler, P. and Levy, S. (1969). Broadening the Concept of Marketing. Journal of Marketing Vol. 33, No. 1 (Jan., 1969).
• Chartered Institute of Marketing, The (2015). Marketing and the 7 P’s: a brief summary of marketing and how it works. United Kingdom, Maidenhead: CIM.
• Hurth, V. & Vrettos, A. (2021). Unleashing the sustainable business: how purposeful organisations can break free of business-as-usual (Working paper). Cambridge, UK: The Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership.
• Kotler, P. (1997). Marketing management: Analysis, planning, implementation, and control. New Jersey, USA: Prentice Hall.
• Bernays, E. (1947). The engineering of consent. The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Volume 250, Issue 1.
• McGee, L. and Spiro, R. (1988). The marketing concept in perspective, Business Horizons, Volume 31, Issue 3, 40–45.
• Merz J., Barnard P., Rees W.E., Smith D., Maroni M., Rhodes C.J., Dederer J., Bajaj N., Joy M.K., Wiedmann T. and Sutherland, R. (2023). World scientists’ warning: the behavioural crisis driving ecological overshoot, Science Progress, Vol. 106(3) 1–22.
• Sirgy, M.J. (1982). Self-Concept in Consumer Behavior: A Critical Review, Journal of Consumer Research, 9: 287–300.
• Belk, R. (1988). Possessions and the Extended Self, Journal of Consumer Research, Vol. 15, No. 2, 139-168.
• Adfree Cities (nd) How does advertising affect mental health? adfreecities.org.uk/what-we-do/advertising-mental-health/
• Randle, P. and Eyre, A. (2023). Sustainable marketing - the industry’s role in a sustainable future, Kogan Page.
• Stern, P. C. (2000). New Environmental Theories: Toward a Coherent Theory of Environmentally Significant Behavior, Journal of Social Issues, 56 (3), 407–24.
• Menon, A. and Menon, A. (1997). Enviropreneurial Marketing Strategy: The Emergence of Corporate Environmentalism as Market Strategy, The Journal of Marketing, 61 (1), 51–67.
• Rockström J., Steffen W., Noone K, et al, (2009). Planetary boundaries: exploring the safe operating space for humanity, Ecol Soc 2009; 14: art32.
• European CEO (2016). Saving the world through sustainable business practices – an interview with Paul Polman.
• David Attenborough post on Instagram. Oct 31, 2020.
• The Wall Street Journal (2023). Ryan Gellert Wants Patagonia to Be Part of the Environmental Solution. Feb 3, 2023.