Professional Documents
Culture Documents
(2012) 40:3552
DOI 10.1007/s11747-011-0255-4
CONCEPTUAL/THEORETICAL PAPER
Received: 11 March 2011 / Accepted: 13 April 2011 / Published online: 11 May 2011
# Academy of Marketing Science 2011
R. S. Achrol (*)
Professor of Marketing Science, School of Business,
The George Washington University,
Washington, DC, USA
e-mail: achrol@gwu.edu
P. Kotler
S. C. Johnson & Son Distinguished Professor of International
Marketing, Kellogg School of Management,
Northwestern University,
Evanston, IL, USA
Introduction
A number of prominent scholars have analyzed the evolution
of the marketing paradigm (for example Bartels 1962; Hunt
2002; Sheth et al. 1988). The evolutionary path can be traced
from the functionalist paradigm to the marketing management paradigm to the exchange paradigm. The functionalist
paradigm described the institutions of marketing and their
functions. The marketing management paradigm is rooted in a
firm view of marketing processes (the archetype firm being the
classic manufacturing company). Under it, marketings role and
responsibilities expanded from sales and advertising to product
development and a firm-wide responsibility for customer care.
The impetus behind this major expansion was provided
by the generic and exchange paradigms (Bagozzi 1975;
Kotler 1972; Kotler and Levy 1969). Marketing theories
and research were generalized beyond the exchange of
goods, services and money to include any valuable resource
like time, energy, feelings, places, ideas, symbols or
information. They were extended to exchange with customers,
employees, suppliers, the public, and even competitors, and
applied to all types of organizationsfor profit, nonprofit,
social service agencies, government, NGOs and nation states.
The exchange paradigm, with its focus on inter-firm
relationships (Achrol et al. 1983; Dwyer et al. 1987), brought
the concept and theories of the marketing channel to the fore,
and from there it was almost a natural step to where we stand
todayat the threshold of the network paradigm (Achrol and
Kotler 1999; Iacobucci 1996). Relational theories of
exchange are highlighted in an exchange network (Achrol
1997; Anderson et al. 1994; Gummesson 1998; Morgan and
Hunt 1994; Sheth and Parvatiyar 1995). These changes in
the marketing paradigm are significant in themselves, but
they are occurring at a time of even greater change at the
boundary and foundations of the discipline.
The plurality of domains and theoretical riches is difficult
to address systematically without an organizing framework.
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Emergent paradigm
Consumer satisfaction
37
38
In the early 1990s a study by the Chicago based Smell and Taste
Treatment Research Foundation in a Las Vegas casino purported to
show that the right kind of scent induced customers to spend 45
percent more on the slot machines (Lee 2004). Now Sony stores are
being spritzed with a custom vanilla-and-mandarin scent created for it
by Scent-Air of Charlotte, NC. Other Scent-Air customers reportedly
include Doubletree Hotels, Westin Hotels & Resorts, Hard Rock Hotel
in Orlando, and Procter & Gamble (Hoppough 2006). Some advocates
see a brand having a unique scent image of its own.
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40
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Michigan, with its own blast furnace, steel mill, glass factory,
and more than 90 miles of railroad track and conveyor belts to
run the production lines. The manufacturing machines (nanorobots) of the future may well be so small that thousands of
them will fit in the period at the end of this sentence (Bonsor
2007). It is not far fetched to go a step further and imagine a
general purpose production machine in every consumers
basement that can, with the right software and programming
(accessed online), manufacture anything a consumer wants
from a jar of commodity atoms and molecules. Everything
in the physical world is simply the result of a particular
arrangement of atoms. Arrange them one way and you have
steel, arrange them another way you have corn. The ultimate
outsourcing of production and distribution will have taken
place, and a true era of consumer co-production and cocreation will have arrived (Jaworski and Kohli 2006).
Consumption networks
Today when we speak of consumption networks we think
mostly of the consumer communities organized by marketing
firms. Firms seeking to develop enduring relationship ties
with their consumers do so by creating forums for consumer
interaction, by developing extensive databases on the consumers and by targeting customized communications and
offers to them. This is the classic relationship marketing
model. But firm-driven vertical consumer networks will likely
erode in the near future, giving way to a bottom-up marketing
phenomenon shaped by horizontal consumer networks.
The Internet has created a vast channel of horizontal
information flows, word-of-mouth and technical advice from
user communities and websites in practically every class of
consumption. There is probably no area of consumer interest
today that does not have a dedicated chat group, blog, or
interactive forum created by an enthusiast or a group. It is
frequently said that power is shifting from media institutions
to consumer communities and firms are taking note. This
explains the rapid growth of online brand monitoring services
led by market leaders Nielsen BuzzMetrics and Cymfony.
These firms specialize in automatic searching of text-based
keywords and data on blogs, chat rooms, message boards,
subject groups, social networks, bulletin and message boards.
Del Monte allocates between 10 and 15 percent of its research
funds on online research (see Kim [2006] for a review).
Consumer communities hold the power to usher in a
bottom-up market model to rival the top-down manufacturing firmcontrolled information supply (the so-called
prescription model) with important effects on concentration and heterogeneity of preferences (Benghozi and Paris
2005; Gensollen 2005; both cited in Curien et al. 2005).
The sociology of consumer communities (Smith and Kollock
1999) will be important in understanding consumption in the
future. A community is a network of social relations
43
44
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46
Technology
Development
Search for
alternative
technologies
Component
Product
Production
Manufacturing
Scarce, harmful materials
Footprint, emissions, waste
Product
Product
Waste
Distribution Consumption Recycle
Excessive consumption scarce material
Slowing planned obsolescence
Emissions, waste
Health side effects of consumption
Sales Revenue/
Nature Costs ($)
Product
Development
Introduction
Growth
Maturity
Decline
Time
47
48
49
Sanitation
Electric
Leather
Prep
Natural
Gas
Utility
Production
Distribution
Franchises
Bio
Fuels
Communications
Phone, TV
Leather
Goods
Franchises
Franchisor
MNCs
Shop
Keeping
Microfinance
Banks
Fruits &
Vegetables
Tailoring
Powered
Trade -Tools
Franchises
Processed
Food
Franchises
Staple
Grains
Leather
Goods
Franchises
Repairs
Milk
Meat
Labor
Building
Trades
Carpentry
50
Conclusion
This has been a far ranging discussion of marketings future
possibilities. Marketing is confronted with a Kuhnian
paradigm shift, a transformation like nothing before. The
prominent features of the shift are consumer experiences,
networks and a macro domain spanning the global
commons.
Consumers experience products and services via their
senses. Our understanding of sensory experiences is fast
becoming a neurophysiological science. The growing impact
of digitization and virtual media considerably expand the
scope and impact of sensory satisfactions. Approaching is a
51
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