---
title: "Why Will Giants Gradually Eliminate Marketing Departments?"
description: "As social media companies become the new marketing firms, traditional marketing companies and departments face an uncertain future. In the digital marketing era, the traditional marketing funnel theory is losing effectiveness, and the explosion of social media has turned every consumer into both a touchpoint and a communication node, shifting market power to consumers."
author: "米尔顿·科特勒"
publisher: "New Distribution"
email: "zhaobo258@gmail.com"
telephone: "+8615854817671"
published: "2018-12-03"
language: "en"
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# Why Will Giants Gradually Eliminate Marketing Departments?

> As social media companies become the new marketing firms, traditional marketing companies and departments face an uncertain future. In the digital marketing era, the traditional marketing funnel theory is losing effectiveness, and the explosion of social media has turned every consumer into both a touchpoint and a communication node, shifting market power to consumers.

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**When social media companies become the new marketing firms, what will happen to traditional marketing companies and departments?**
Since entering the digital marketing era, the traditional marketing funnel theory has gradually lost its effectiveness. The explosion of social media has made every consumer both a touchpoint and a communication node, and market power has gradually shifted to consumers. When social media companies become the new marketing firms, what will happen to traditional marketing companies and departments?
**New Trends in Marketing Theory Development in the Digital Age**
> **1. The explosive growth of social media must be taken seriously**
The digital economy era is not new; we have already entered the digital age, and over the past decade or so, with the continuous maturation of technology, we have entered the era of digital marketing.
The future of marketing is digitalization. In the digital marketing era, the connection between place and people emphasized in traditional marketing theory will become increasingly close and fully integrated.
In this process, various new technologies will empower digital marketing, such as VR technology, innovations in logistics and delivery, robotics, etc., all of which will make corporate marketing more efficient in the future.
**Therefore, first, we must recognize that we are undergoing a shift from a "focus" marketing strategy to a "practice" marketing strategy.**
In this "practice" process, digital technology is a crucial element. In recent years, my brother Philip Kotler and I have also been promoting the practice of digital marketing strategy.
As the world economy grows and recedes, more and more companies will adopt more digital means. In digital marketing practice, the allocation of related technologies and professional personnel needs to be readjusted.
**In the digital marketing era, one interesting and unignorable point is that we must place great emphasis on the power of social media.**
The explosive growth of social media is a very important area for the future of marketing and a direction that marketers should pay special attention to.
Why? Because **social media will effectively commercialize the personal data of every consumer.** In this process of data commercialization, large aggregation platforms will emerge.
For example, Pinduoduo—I have recently been tracking Pinduoduo's business model and practices.
I have found that Pinduoduo not only brings consumers together and obtains their consumption information, but it also aggregates big data on consumers' individual needs to seek more reasonable prices from manufacturers.
Aggregation platforms like Pinduoduo (for consumer demand) will in the future directly aggregate consumer information and data, such as geographic data, personal information, and consumption needs, and connect directly with manufacturers through data.
I believe this will be a major impact on traditional retailers and channel distributors.
> **2. "Grassroots marketing" in the age of aggregators**
We are entering the era of "aggregators," and the role that aggregators play in gathering consumer data and commercializing it cannot be ignored.
From the producer's perspective, social media is reshaping production methods.
**There is a shift from internal product R&D and testing within companies to establishing direct connections between producers and individual consumers.**
The channel for establishing this connection is precisely social media, such as Weibo, WeChat, Facebook, and other platforms.
Producers establish direct connections with each individual consumer through mass media, and use big data on consumer personal data, preferences, behaviors, and needs to design, develop, and produce products, shifting from traditional internal R&D and production to an externally driven approach.
To this end, producers must integrate designers, consumers, and their individual needs into the product development and production process. We call this "grassroots marketing," which includes grassroots product development, grassroots distribution, grassroots sales, and grassroots pricing.
**Here, "grassroots" does not mean the general public in the Chinese context, but rather a shift in marketing methods to meet the needs of each individual.**
For example, adopting specific pricing strategies and channel strategies for each individual consumer. This is a bottom-up shift, no longer the top-down marketing approach of the past.
In other words, this is an era of personalized marketing led by mass media that focuses on each individual. We call it "popularity marketing," as opposed to the past "elite marketing."
**In the digital marketing era where everyone is media,**
**is a marketing department still needed?**
In the past, when formulating marketing strategies, we would conduct consumer research, market segmentation, etc.
Today, when conducting such research and surveys, we must pay attention to the large groups on social media platforms, separating different communities, interest groups, and different populations, and on this basis, conduct new, effective segmentation and consumer surveys.
Therefore, I believe that today, social media companies such as Facebook, Twitter, WeChat, etc., will become the new marketing companies.
These companies have access to vast amounts of consumer data—their preferences, needs, where they gather, etc.
**Social media companies will disrupt traditional marketing companies, and traditional marketing companies may be moving step by step toward death.**
In fact, social media companies are also conducting secondary commercialization of the data they hold.
For example, iQIYI may rely on social media data to study the preferences of specific user groups, conduct analysis and mining, and produce films and TV dramas for specific groups. Companies like Netflix in the U.S. also rely on social media data to produce new films and videos.
From this, we can see that content producers are already cooperating closely with social media companies.
Of course, this shift will occur across all industries, including the automotive industry, real estate, hotels, and many others, and they will cooperate in this way.
Due to the intervention of new technologies, traditional distribution channels, agents, and intermediaries in the hotel industry are slowly dying out.
In such a situation, large companies and giants will gradually open up the functions of their marketing departments to external partners for functional outsourcing.
From product design and R&D to the application of new technologies, they may engage in external collaboration with different entities.
**Some advice for startups**
At a time when China is in the throes of reform, many startups are facing difficulties in financing. Why?
Because **more and more investors are inclined to be market-oriented rather than technology-oriented based on the startup team.**
More and more investors are paying attention to whether startups produce, design, and sell products in a consumer-oriented manner, and whether they achieve profit growth in a consumer-oriented way.
**In this process, the use of digital marketing technologies, such as using big data for consumer data mining, has become a hot spot that startups should focus on to achieve profit growth and attract investor attention.**
At the same time, this requires more entrepreneurs and founders who are skilled in using new technologies to step forward.
These are my suggestions for startups.
**Every company must realize the importance of social marketing**
> **1. China already has mature experience in social media and digital marketing**
In the U.S., in the field of medical technology, for example, medical device companies, in the traditional product development process, mainly communicated with clinical doctors in hospitals to discuss whether the products produced were suitable for hospital use and met doctors' needs.
Today, I would more often advise them to communicate with social media companies and social media platforms that hold large amounts of consumer data, and to conduct demand mining facing consumers.
**From the perspective of the Chinese market, in digital marketing, including digital technology, China is actually already ahead of the U.S.**
Chinese social media companies, digital technology companies, and digital marketing companies already have mature experience that can be shared with American companies.
> **2. Social media and big data are reshaping business**
Big Vs and KOLs (Key Opinion Leaders) can be a great field for entrepreneurship.
My niece is a KOL; she has over 10,000 followers on social media platforms and is currently trying to commercialize.
I believe that **the first thing social media opinion leaders should do is build personal leadership. Second, the business model is also a key issue to consider.**
In this process, they generate a large amount of data through interaction with fans and consumers, and mining this data to obtain new business models and new product opportunities is also a good area to focus on.
**In the past, producers led product production; in the future, social media big Vs will lead business activities and product R&D and design.**
For companies, this means they need to choose to cooperate with specific big Vs, mine the data on consumers' individual preferences they hold, and based on this, conduct comprehensive cooperation from front-end R&D to back-end promotion and communication.
This also brings tremendous changes and challenges to the retail industry.
We know that traditional retail mainly provided convenience. In today's digital era, convenience has been provided by online e-commerce giants such as JD.com and Amazon.
The so-called "convenience" advantage of traditional retail no longer exists. In this process, retail should consider providing experiential services, including entertainment, socialization, and education.
**Retail should rethink how to provide consumers with training opportunities and knowledge dissemination opportunities to reshape their appeal to consumers.**
Here, I have mentioned several points—experiential, entertainment, socialization, including cultural dissemination, and educational platforms.
> **3. Every company must realize the importance of social marketing**
In the future, AI will replace many positions and functions in traditional marketing, while traditional marketers will take on more of the function of interpersonal communication.
The past approach of celebrity endorsements will become increasingly unsuitable for marketing in the digital age.
Conversely, grassroots opinion leaders and spokespersons closer to the public will become increasingly suitable to appear as representatives in the digital marketing era to guide opinions, etc.
I really like the definition of "grassroots"; it means being more authentic, more down-to-earth, and more understanding of public needs.
In today's era, I also hope that every company, every KOL, and every individual consumer realizes one point:
The concept of "social marketing" we mention emphasizes a sustainable marketing approach that is responsible to society as a whole, responsible to the environment, responsible to consumers, and responsible to the atmosphere, animals, etc.
I hope every company can realize the importance of social marketing.
From this, an important concept extends—"Belief marketing."
For example, take Apple phones. Every year, tens of thousands of people attend Apple's phone launch events, and Apple fans constantly update their iPhones. This is actually a form of "belief marketing."
**The power of "belief marketing" lies in bringing together a group of people with shared beliefs and faith.**
For example, bringing together those who value environmental friendliness, protect rare animals, and have a strong belief in precision nutrition foods.
For example, Trump is actually a very good practitioner of belief marketing.
He can bring together the lower-class American people and make them believe that he is doing everything possible to make America better.
I don't know exactly how he does it, but he has indeed achieved this effect.
The same is true in China; under the guidance of the "Chinese Dream," we also believe that China will become better and better.
**The original intention of the Kotler brothers:**
**To make ordinary people's lives better and make the world a better place**
> **1. Cross-disciplinary thinking keeps us moving forward along our original intention**
There are several reasons why my brother and I have been committed to working and practicing in the marketing field for many years.
First, we come from a Jewish merchant family. As descendants of Jews, we have been deeply influenced by our parents' contributions and work in the business field.
The second reason comes from the broad education we received. Our parents brought us a wide-ranging education in anthropology, sociology, science, including music, and other fields, which cultivated our broad interests and curiosity from an early age.
Therefore, **we have always had cross-disciplinary thinking and vision, and can use cross-disciplinary thinking to consider complex problems.**
In this process, we have maintained a high degree of openness, inclusiveness, learning, and curiosity, learning many new technologies and theories, and continuously crossing boundaries into unknown fields.
For example, my brother (Philip Kotler, the father of marketing) studied economics as an undergraduate, and later began studying sociology, continuously crossing boundaries and exploring new, unknown fields.
I am the same. I started by studying political economy, then later focused on community self-governance issues, and then later turned to fields like consumer behavior. So this is a process of continuous exploration and learning that keeps us highly enthusiastic.
In fact, what we have in mind is to hope that through our efforts and work, we can make ordinary people live better lives and make the world a better place. This is the most fundamental starting point and goal of our commitment to research and enthusiasm in the field of marketing.
> **2. From marketing service provider to industry ecosystem aggregation platform**
In the past, we served clients one by one, and today we still do this work. At the same time, we are also making new breakthroughs and attempts.
For example, we have established our own precision medicine park in Songshan Lake, Dongguan.
In this medical park, we have built an overall ecosystem for the big health industry. Here, we focus on many companies developing innovative drugs, including companies producing medical devices.
In addition, we are about to establish an international source innovation center in Zhengzhou.
There, we will focus more on smart industries, such as intelligent manufacturing, bringing together AI R&D companies, enterprises, and institutions from Germany, France, China, and the U.S.
At the same time, we have also shifted from providing services to companies one by one to gradually becoming a community-based aggregation platform.
**This brings us back to the aggregation platform that social media is doing, as mentioned earlier. Such a platform embodies a very good and obvious characteristic, which is integration.**
Different technologies, different entrepreneurs, and different companies are integrated into such an aggregation platform. In the aggregated community, many different needs will be discovered.
We will rely on this platform to understand targeted needs, clarify the problems customers are facing, and then provide customized services and work.
Source: Huazhang Management (ID: hzbook_gl)
**10th B-end E-commerce Inspection--"From Product to Scenario"**
Event time: December 10-13
Event location: Wuhu, Nanjing, Changsha
Event schedule:
> Morning of December 10: Visit Three Squirrels headquarters + snack store
>
> Afternoon of December 10: Visit Nanjing Squirrel small store
>
> Evening of December 10: Visit Nanjing Master Gao Beer Workshop
>
>
>
>
> All day December 11: Nanjing-Changsha, or free arrangement
>
>
>
>
> Morning of December 12: Community group buying exchange salon
>
>
> Afternoon of December 12: Kaola Select Heroes League launch event
>
> Evening of December 12 to early morning of December 13: On-site inspection of Kaola Select logistics center—**This time period is the warehouse sorting peak, allowing direct observation and learning of the backend operation process of community group buying e-commerce**
**Distributor friends who are interested are welcome to join us for understanding and on-site inspection**:
**Organization format**
**1. Big shot exchange salon 2. Company visit
3. On-site explanation
4. One-on-one communication 5. Actual market case visit**
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