This definition describes marketing as an art and a science which is perfectly correct as marketing practice tended to be seen as a creative industry in the past, which included advertising, distribution and selling. However, because the academic study of marketing makes extensive use of social sciences, psychology, sociology, mathematics, economics, anthropology and neuroscience, the profession is now widely recognized as a science. It is also related to many of the creative arts as marketing involves creating the right product for the right customer and frequently creating demands for consumers to provoke their urge for buying.
“Driving profitable growth” is another strong point in this definition as the word driving implicates the need for long term planning and gardening of the value delivered to customers to maintain the profit gained through this exchange of mutual benefits and of course, ensure sustained and thriving growth of this profit.
The weak points in this definition include failure to mention that marketing is a process that involves different steps including segmenting, targeting and positioning.
The definition focuses only on creating demand and gaining profit with no reference to delivering value to customers or to managing customer relationships.
Marketing is defined by the AMA as "The activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large.”
This replaces the previous definition, which still appears in the AMA 's dictionary as: "An organizational function and a set of processes for creating, communicating, and delivering value to customers and for managing customer relationships in ways that benefit the organization and its stakeholders.”
This new definition has