The Relationship between Marketing and Economic Prosperity

by Antonis Zairis*

It is known that the design of Marketing Policies is primarily related to the satisfaction and updating of the needs of Society, considering each time the new data and rearrangements that arise and are observed in the critical field of Society. The importance and relevance of the contribution of Marketing since the beginning of the pandemic until today becomes imperative and necessary as the required care and protection of vulnerable social categories and population groups lay at the heart of political discussions and a broader public dialogue aimed at finding ways to relieve these groups, always in the context of an organized and well-planned Management Policy. Ensuring economic prosperity is an institutional obligation of a coordinated State, which of course requires a serious analysis of social and income stratification in order to detect and identify the population pockets in need of protection.

Certainly, the apparent distance that separates, and which is unfortunately widening, the leading political elites from the deep social body produces superficial and misleading information that constitutes inapplicable, unrealistic and uncritical policies. This instrumental treatment of the phenomenon with the ’weapon’ of communication achieves first the identification of a part of the social body whose heightened expectations do not allow it to objectively interpret and constructively exercise criticism in ideological - but partisan terms. This form of alienation which a part of the social body has been subjected to is, certainly, far from economic prosperity based on equality and justice, as it is more a ’construction’ of reproduced mass hopefulness and less an applied marketing policy in practice.

However, if it is considered that the correlation between Marketing and Economic Prosperity is critical then it is necessary to design Policies for the next day that are well-founded on two (2) key components:

1.The uninterrupted and continuous communication between the responsible authorities (productive ministries), with marketing scientific potential (universities, research centers) to obtain useful information related to the mobility, diversification and prioritization of the scale of needs that link Marketing to the real problem of managing the changing behavior of consumers. This is important because of the cataclysmic changes in purchasing habits due to the pandemic crisis and its consequences.

2.The recognition of marketing as a sufficiently practical and multi-level science linked to the day-to-day problems of running a business. For example, the strategic decision of enterprises to reshuffle their product mix is a necessity compatible with the loss of disposable income, but it should also mobilize the institutions for income protection, e.g. a decision to increase the minimum wage. The support of Marketing in processing and analysing the findings on purchasing disposable income and consumption expenditure is crucial and extremely useful here. In addition, the emergence of a customer-centric approach emphasizing to the Z generations and millennials, who will materialize 45% of their future purchases, is a dominant strategic choice that needs to be embedded in the business culture, diffused and inspired by all business executives.

For the reason that in life, in modern societies, only the quantitative representation of economic indicators - economic figures, e.g. poverty, inequality, prosperity indicators is not enough and needs in-depth qualitative processing and analysis, the Marketing approach can work to improve and bring Businesses, Consumers and the State closer together, since at the center of everyone’s interest is Economic prosperity and well-being of Citizens.

In this rationale, the value of the business in the ’eyes’ of society is maximized, Politics ’discovers’ new destinations through social and scientific approaches and Marketing is ’liberated’ and contributes creatively to the growth dynamics of the economy.

*Deputy Vice President of SELPE & Assistant Professor of Business Administration at the University of Paphos, Cyprus & member of the World Economic Forum (WEF)