(Just-Drinks) - The other day, I had an interview with an Italian wine magazine where I shared some of my experiences as both a wine marketer and a winery owner. The journalist's questions got me thinking about the deep confusion around the term 'marketing'.

Too often, I see marketing being confused with sales, and I see marketing tactics confused with marketing strategy. It begs the question, what is 'marketing', and how can it be employed successfully?

The Evolution of Marketing

First, let's look at the basics and how marketing has evolved. Marketing has progressed based on global, political, social, and cultural events. Philip Kotler's book, Marketing 3.0, perfectly simplifies this evolution:

• Marketing 1.0: Back in the '50s and '60s, marketing was tactical. It was focused on product management because it had to support industrial growth. In this phase, the concepts of "marketing mix" and the "4 Ps" were born. Marketing served to support production functions. Marketing meant developing a product, with a proper price, with an adequate promotion, and distributed in the right places.
• Marketing 2.0: Fast-forward 20 years and marketing evolved from a product-focused discipline to a client-centred management procedure. The oil crisis redefined global market powers and the slower product demand during uncertain times led to the need for something more than the 4Ps. To stimulate demand, marketing had to shift from being a purely tactical function to a strategic discipline. Marketing activities focused on creating consumer needs with specific product positioning to the targeted consumer.
• Marketing 3.0: The next developmental stage came with the internet. Consumers became connected and the decision-making power shifted to their fingertips as they started to make up their own minds about products, services, and companies. This connectedness characterizes the new era of marketing. To create demand, it is no longer enough to access the minds of consumers; there is a need to access their hearts too.

Concepts like emotional marketing, experiential marketing, and brand equity were created to adapt marketing to this new connected consumer. This adjustment meant moving from client-centered marketing to brand-centered marketing. In a current era characterized by recession and loss of trust, the objective of brand management is to establish a trusted bond with consumers through identity, integrity, and authentic image.

According to Kotler, author of over 50 marketing books, consultant, and distinguished professor: "Marketing is the science and art of exploring, creating, and delivering value to satisfy the needs of a target market at a profit. Marketing identifies unfulfilled needs and desires. It defines, measures, and quantifies the size of the identified market and the profit potential. It pinpoints which segments the company is capable of serving best and it designs and promotes the appropriate products and services."

From my experience in marketing for FMCG companies, I can attest that without strategic marketing, companies cannot succeed. In organisations that understand the value of marketing, no product or service is ever made without an evidence-based marketing plan in place.

Many in the wine industry, however, consider marketing unnecessary. In most cases, marketing is a misused term and, in the wine industry - as in many others - this misuse has created a confused idea about what it truly entails.