Marketing in government - Optimum Online

1 Democratic governments exist to serve their exist to make profits. And yet it is business thatsearches obsessively for new ways to please the Americanpeople. Most American governments are customer-blind, whileMcDonald s and Frito-Lay are customer-driven. This may bethe ultimate indictment of bureaucratic has been a key practice in business formany years and, indeed, has its roots Marketing remains a major managementfunction in business, it is also now used widely, with vary-ing degrees of success, in other types of organizationsincluding governments, non-profit organizations, politicalparties and even religious organizations.

2 However, most ofthe literature on developing successful Marketing strategiesapplies to the private sector. It is often frustrating forpublic sector managers to try to apply Marketing ideasdeveloped in business directly to government when theyare ever cognizant of the fact that government is not examination of the differences between public andprivate sector Marketing is vital because we are witnessingan unprecedented increase in the use of Marketing in gov-ernments. The Public Service of Canada is in the midst offundamental transitions stemming, in part, from the gov-ernment s commitment to reducing the deficit.

3 As a result,many government units are adopting marketingapproaches to help meet two major challenges: the chal-lenge of meeting mandates and satisfying client needs inthe face of significantly diminishing resources, and thechallenge of meeting specified revenue a Marketing approach suited to the govern-ment environment offers special challenges. Governmentpersonnel may have little or no Marketing background,and there is a dearth of literature dealing specifically withpublic sector Marketing . As a result, government officialsare often left to adapt conventional business-oriented mar-keting theory to their particular needs.

4 But governmentmarketing is different in fundamental ways, and it is criticalto identify and understand these differences if Marketing isto be used successfully in the public , The Journal of Public Sector Management Vol. 28, No. 4 (9-18) Marketing in governmentJudith J. Madill*9 government managers can greatlyincrease their chances of developingsuccessful Marketing strategies byunderstanding key differencesbetween private sector and publicsector Madill is an associate professor in the School of Business,Carleton University. She has a BHEc and a MSc (ConsumerEconomics and Management) from the University of Manitoba, anda PhD (Business Administration) from the University of WesternOntario.

5 Dr. Madill s current scholarly studies and research concernthe public sector and social Marketing , consumer behaviour andindustrial Marketing . She is the editor of Marketing : Proceedings ofthe Administrative Sciences Association of Canada, 1998.*The author would especially like to thank Mr. Dave Monahan,Canadian Hydrographic Service, Department of Fisheries andOceans, and Mr. Jim Mintz, Partnerships and Marketing Division,Health Canada, for their ideas, assistance and support for theresearch upon which this paper is article is intended to provide an overview ofsome of the key differences.

6 The ideas presented herewere developed from researching Marketing in the federalgovernment in three major ways: reviewing the academic and practitioner literature forinsights about Marketing in the public and private sec-tors; interviewing managers in a variety of governmentunits about public sector Marketing ; and conducting case studies of Marketing projects in theCanadian federal government over the past this article is not intended to serve as an intro-duction to Marketing fundamentals, it will begin with adefinition of Marketing , then describe the major types ofmarketing practiced in government departments.

7 This isfollowed by a discussion of seven fundamental differencesbetween public sector and private sector Marketing , andhow these differences affect the development of successfulmarketing strategies in the public is Marketing ?According to the American Marketing Association, oneof the world s largest associations of professional mar-keters, Marketing is the process of planning and executingthe conception, pricing, promotion, and distribution ofideas, goods, and services to create exchanges that satisfyindividual and organizational objectives. 2 This definition takes into account that Marketing is amanagerial process involving planning and executing andthat there are four main areas of Marketing activities, some-times known as the 4 Ps.

8 These are the conception of aproduct, followed by its pricing, promotion and distribu-tion. Moreover, Marketing can pertain to any offering(ideas, goods and services) and, lastly, the goal of market-ing is to create satisfactory exchanges among willing core notions of Marketing , therefore, are satisfac-tion and exchange. When a business adopts the marketingapproach, it strives to create exchanges with targeted con-sumers so that both the business and its customers reachtheir goals ( , satisfaction for the consumer and contri-bution to profits for the firm).

9 government organizations can engage in marketingaccording to this definition. When a government depart-ment develops a product be it a physical product suchas an ocean chart, an idea such as don t start smoking, orthe provision of a service such as the upkeep of a nationalpark for visitors and then prices, promotes and dis-tributes it to a targeted audience to promote an exchange, Marketing is taking of Marketing ingovernmentOne of the greatest obstacles to using Marketing effec-tively in government is a lack of understanding of the dif-ferent types of Marketing in which governments canengage.

10 Although books often portray public sector mar-keting as a monolith, the research reveals that Marketing ingovernment is quite diverse. A typology of four differentbranches of Marketing shows the major forms of marketingthat occur in government A: Marketing of products andservicesIt may be surprising to some that the first type of mar-keting governments engage in is the Marketing of prod-ucts and services, , the Marketing of paper and elec-tronic charts by the Canadian Hydrographic Service (CHS),or the Marketing of statistical information by StatisticsCanada.