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a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t
Article history: Social marketing is based on the adaptation of the contemporary commercial marketing theory and practice as
Received 1 January 2009 a means of guiding and aiding social change campaigns. This paper draws on recent developments in
Received in revised form 1 January 2009 commercial marketing theory and prior work in social marketing definitions to create a new definition of social
Accepted 1 February 2009
marketing which integrates the commercial definitions of the American Marketing Association (AMA) and
Chartered Instituted of Marketing (CIM) with established social marketing definitions from the past thirty
Keywords:
years of social marketing conceptual development. The development of the definition is supported through the
Social marketing definition
Marketing definition
use of qualitative research technique of text mining which uncovered a core series of principles consistent to
Leximancer the historical definitions of social marketing. Finally, the new definition also introduces clarification of several
key subcomponent elements as part of an expanded definition of social marketing.
© 2009 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
0148-2963/$ – see front matter © 2009 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.jbusres.2009.02.013
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with the commercial definitions of marketing, NSMC and the Kotler and tures in the existing social marketing definitions. Forty five defini-
Lee frameworks must be recoiled. Both social marketing definitions share tions of social marketing were selected based from a range of peer
a common ground in the systematic application of marketing principles, reviewed social marketing papers over the past three decades (The
and the targeting of audience behavior. However, the NSMC (2006) full list of definitions used in the analysis is available from the author
definition does not have an easily identifiable connection to the voluntary on request.). Unstructured ontological discovery was performed using
change element present in Kotler and Lee (2008). Further, these Leximancer as the software package is designed to engage in facili-
frameworks also need to be reconciled with the AMA and CIM definitions tated knowledge discovery through ascertaining underlying themes in
given social marketing is an applied adaptation of commercial marketing texts through semantic information extraction (Smith and Hum-
which is outlined in Table 2. phreys, 2006).
The definitions are compared on four areas — mechanism is the Leximancer is a specialist purpose content analysis emulator which
means by which marketing is applied, method is the techniques used replicates the manual coding procedures through the use of algorithms,
in marketing, purpose is the reason for the marketing activities being machine learning and statistical processes (Smith et al., 2002). This
conducted, and finally, market is the recipients of the marketing ef- process allows for the development of thematic clusters and grouping
forts. All four commercial and social marketing definitions can be seen of related concepts either manually, or through the automated discov-
to demonstrate overlap between method, mechanism and market, and ery processes (Young and Denize, 2008; Smith, 2000). For further de-
the disciplinary distinct purposes of behavior influence, profit and ex- tails of the Leximancer process, Grech et al. (2002) and Smith and
changes of value. Space constraints restrict the depth of analysis possi- Humphreys (2006) detail both underlying method and statistical struc-
ble for, and future research opportunity exists for social marketers ture. Leximancer provides a means of unsupervised ontology discov-
to apply more robust theoretical and conceptual analytic tests to the ery which can uncover core associations within a body of text whilst
cross-compatibility of the core definitions of commercial marketing and reducing expectation biases which may arise in manual coded analy-
social marketing. sis (Isakhan, 2005; Michael et al., 2008; Smith, 2003; McKenna and
Whilst the four definitions are relatively cross-compatible, the new Waddell, 2007). Lastly, Leximancer capacity for discovering unexpected
elements of the AMA (2008) are reflected in the pseudo marketing mix meaningful connections through its automated objective analysis pro-
of create, communicate, deliver and exchange that are absent from the cess is central to the current task of ascertaining if existing social mar-
predecessor definitions. Further, the CIM's profit orientation provides an keting definitions have an underlying consistent framework or structure
unusual element for social marketers to consider the role and value of (Petchkovsky et al., 2007).
cost–benefit tradeoff as a central element of a future social marketing The analysis process consists of a three stages from the explora-
definition. Prior literature in marketing has examined the expansion of tion of the dominant thematic group through to the discovery of related
the value concept from the monetary to the non-monetary aspects for concept groups within the textual data (Smith, 2000). The initial explo-
commercial marketing. If a similar line of thought to the intangible value ration determined the presence of dominant thematic clusters which
creation which moves cost–benefit equations from purely financial into was used as the parameters for the subsequent textual analysis. Three
a more holistic view of the marketing exchange, the CIM profit visualization maps have been provided to illustrate the phases of the
orientation can be adapted to the social marketing exchange process analysis. Analysis 1 resulted in a confirmation of the apparently self
as a cost–benefit scenario. Rewards to the individuals and to the broader evident — the dominant theme of the definitions is the application of
society should be considered on the extent to which they exceed the marketing. Fig. 1 represents the initial analysis to ascertain the primary
costs incurred by the behavior change. The applications of these conceptual domain(s) of the social marketing definitions.
opportunities are examined later in the paper. Two items of note emerged from the conceptual clusters — first, the
analysis detected the systematic use of marketing in the form of change
1.6. Influence 3: social marketing historical development programs; and, second, the influence was a significant factor which
connects to the previously stated assumption of social marketing as a
The third part of the development of the social marketing defi- form of voluntary change regime (Andreasen, 1995; Rothschild, 1999).
nition was the use of unstructured machine learning text analysis to Analysis 2 involved a level of manual intervention with the Lexi-
test for the existence of any underlying trends and thematic struc- mancer software instructed to ignore the concept marketing in order
to explore the interactions within the top level domain. This ap- 2. Constructing the definition
proach, in conjunction with the machine learning technique of the
Leximancer software allowed the system to extract the major the- The following section outlines how the bounding expectations
matic groups within the definitions primary domain of marketing. The derived from the three analyses detailed above will be used as guide
“Behavior” cluster encompasses the majority of the identified out- parameters for the new definition of social marketing. First, the def-
comes of social marketing with concepts such as “society”, “change”, inition will follow the pedigree of social marketing as part of the
and “voluntary”. The behavioral orientation of social marketing is also broader marketing discipline. Second, the definition will represent the
supported throughout the social marketing literature as behaviors are means and mechanism for behavioral change using marketing con-
easier to measure, observe and change than internal attitudes and cepts and practice which acknowledges that behaviors are embedded
belief (Almendarez et al., 2004). Behavior can also be used as a lear- in the individual, consumer, and societal level behavioral change oc-
ning tool to assist attitude change and value development through curs through mass adoption of individual level behavior. Third, volun-
the do–feel–learn model espoused by Kotler and Roberto (1989). The tary change is included in based on the results of the Leximancer
analysis, and marketing's pedigree as a contractual and exchange As the inclusion by implication approach to interpreting a definition
based social mechanism. Finally, benefit is recognized through AMA is problematic with its reliance on shared frames of reference for
(2008) exchange, NSMC 2007's social good, and the CIM (2005) focus similar interpretations, the paper offers further definitions of key sub
on profitability which has been converted into the cost–benefit trade- components to provide greater depth for interpreting and applying
off. These four elements are represented in Fig. 4. the core definition.
Based on these parts, and drawing on the influence of the prior The definition uses “induce” rather than “influence” in order to
definitions, the paper defines social marketing as: frame social marketing as a social leadership approach which involves
the deliberate use of influence and persuasion to move a target market
the adaptation and adoption of commercial marketing activities,
towards a specific course of action. An important semantic differ-
institutions and processes as a means to induce behavioral change in
ence exists between the more passive approach of influencing behavior
a targeted audience on a temporary or permanent basis to achieve
change and active leadership orientation of inducing behavior change.
a social goal.
In the context of the definition, behavioral change is the process of
Additional sub definitions have been included in the paper. This altering, maintaining or encouraging the cessation of a specific activity
inclusion is designed to address one of the weaknesses of marketing undertaken by the targeted audience. Behavioral change is achieved
definitions typified by the AMA (2004) definition of commercial mar- through the creation, communication, delivery and exchange of a
keting which have required significant levels of inclusion by inter- competitive social marketing offer that induces voluntary change in the
pretation and assumptions as to the meaning, intent and translation targeted audience, and which results in benefit to the social change
of key sections (Dann, 2005; Gundlach, 2007; Dann and Dann, 2007). campaign's recipients, partners and the broader society at large.
Fig. 4. Core principles and influences on the new definition of social marketing.
Author's personal copy
A competitive social marketing offer is an alternative product offering analysis excluded any website based definitions, blogs, trade press or
that has been developed through the identification or anticipation of government periodicals, and instead focused on the academic papers
a market need for a socially beneficial alternative behavior that satis- where social marketing was given a specific meaning for the context of
fies the same needs an individual in the targeted audience is currently the paper. This restriction ensured that the concepts presented in the
meeting through the consumption or use of less socially desirable analysis had been subjected to peer-review prior to publication, and
products. Product offering draws on the broadest understanding of the exposure to peer review is utilized as a proxy minimum quality
the product concept in commercial marketing to include, but not be standard measure. Further, the range of arbitrary lines drawn in the
limited to, physical goods which incorporates both the service dom- sand to determine key foundations of the definition do limit the global
inant logic construct of embedded co-created services and the goods- application of the research. Arguments as to the influence of the AMA
dominant logic of value in ownership; service which can be admin- and CIM can, and should, be made by future researchers who wish to
istered by third party delivery, co-created through participation in the raise alternative foundations for their own definitional work. Sim-
service delivery and/or self service activity; ideas which including ilarly, the English language bias of the definitions is a further limi-
knowledge of how to perform a self-service behavior; attitudes to- tation of the research alongside the Anglo-American focus of the
wards the beneficial social outcome which incorporates the newly definitional dataset, even with the inclusion of Australasian research-
developed fields of emotional and experiential marketing; and, the ers and papers. However, with the continued absence of an iden-
specific behavior that is undertaken by the recipient in the course of tifiable Australasian academy definition of commercial marketing,
acting upon the competitive social marketing offer. researchers in the geographic area are still adapting either the AMA or
“Benefit” is where the return on social investment through actual CIM as their officially sanctioned definition. Further, at the time of
or perceived returns exceeds the financial and non financial costs of publication, the Chartered Institute of Marketing had commissioned a
the social marketing activity. The approach draws on the work of review into its official definition with the intention to develop a new
Rothschild's (2002) self interest motivation as the consumer-side conceptual framework which would differ from the definition used in
framework for determining value, and includes the Joyce and Morris the paper.
(1990) total price concept which recognizes the financial costs of Finally, Lazer and Kelley's (1973) work was excluded from inclusion
adoption, and the associated non-financial costs such as time, effort in the paper as, although the work contains both social marketing
and prestige. Simultaneously, benefit also engages Bright's (2000) and critical marketing elements, the paper is the foundation of critical
observations of the need for cost effectiveness in social marketing for marketing rather than a social marketing definition. To that end, the
the supplier side equation which has been reflected in the practice of paper does not presume to merge Lazer and Kelley's (1973) critical
reporting societal cost–savings per dollar of intervention spent (Lee, marketing into the social marketing research. Rather, the critical mar-
2008; Starinchak, 2008). The construction of benefit is dual focused on keting field is respected and recognized as a related but indepen-
downstream benefit with an emphasis on the return to the adopter dent area of study that has equal application in commercial and non-
exceeding the total cost of adoption, and upstream benefit with the commercial marketing.
return to the society at large and partners exceeding the societal level
investment in the social change activity. 4. Further research
“Targeted audience” reflects the use of the customer orientation by
targeting social marketing activity on specific, identifiable and reach- The definition represents approximately one-third of the possible
able market segmentation within a broader community population. means of inducing social change through social marketing activity as
This sub definition incorporates the Kohli and Jaworski (1990) market a deliberately constructed piece to represent a downstream view of
orientation alongside the CIM (2005) customer requirements, AMA social marketing, and not inclusive of the Goldberg (1995) upstream
(2008) clients/customers framework, Kotler and Lee (2008) target approach, or Kotler's (2008) mid-stream marketing concept. The
audience and the NSMC (2006) targeted audiences. Social marketing strength of the definition is the clarity of focus on individual and group
campaigns must have an identifiable target audience in order to meet level behavior for systematic social change, yet the weakness is the
the key criteria of providing a competitive social marketing offer based limited application in the upstream environment. To that end, future
on altering, maintaining or ceasing an identified behavior amongst in research into the definition of social marketing needs to explore the
an individual member of a larger population group. adaptation of business to business marketing into the social market-
Finally, “social goal” represents the objective of the campaign to ing environment. Current definitions have focused on consumer level
change or maintain society in accordance with the long term objectives interventions based on individual behavioral change. Future research
of the campaign's organizers. Whilst social marketing is an inherently should examine the application of an upstream social marketing pro-
neutral toolkit, the goals of a social marketing campaign are inherently cess through the adaptation and adoption of business to business and
subjective and political in nature (Dann, 2007). The complex nature business to government marketing insight.
of social goal has been incorporated to recognize that social marketing The definition of social marketing presented in the paper is a
is a purpose driven platform which is implemented for the improve- snapshot of a definition that will need to evolve when the underlying
ment of society as defined by the driving forces behind the campaign. conceptual commercial marketing frameworks adapt and change.
Change requires the presumption that the current behavior of the Specific challenges for the definition, and all social marketing defini-
target market can be replaced with a more beneficial set of activities tional research, come from the stated intention of the American
which will lead to positive societal outcomes. Similarly, maintenance Marketing Association to review the 2007 definition in 2012, and the
of behavior assumes the current behavior is beneficial for society, and Chartered Institute of Marketing's intention to release a revised
needs to be defended against less beneficial alternative behaviors. The definition by 2010. Given the paper originated from the changes in
concept of social goal is also connected to the use of the term induce to AMA (2008) and CIM (2005), further research will be needed to
indicate the implicit assumption of planned objectives with marketing update and patch the current work to meet the challenges of the future
based metrics to determine success by the creation or prevention of understanding of marketing.
observable and measurable change within the targeted population.
Acknowledgements
3. Limitations
Thanks to Alan Andreasen, Nedra Weinreich and Susan Dann for
The paper does not claim to contain a definitive list of social their feedback on the paper. Thanks also to the National Centre for
marketing definitions due to limitations on the selection process. The Social Marketing and the participants at the World Social Marketing
Author's personal copy
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Griffith University: School of Arts; 2005. Copyright Date: 20th December.
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